City Planning Responds
May 4th, 2010
Sandy Hornick, director of strategic planning for the Department of City Planning, defends the city’s record on encouraging mass transit use in a comment posted today.
Reacting to Brian Paul’s article accusing the administration of building parking lots while at the same time not doing enough to boost transit use, Hornick writes, “No American location has more transit-oriented development than New York City. Thats why New Yorkers who own cars drive significantly fewer miles than the average American and those who live in our denser, inner city neighborhoods drive even fewer miles. ”
Hornick says that, in his article, Paul embraced ” a fundamental misconception that transit-oriented development means an absolute absence of cars.” Instead, Hornick continues, ” The essence of transit-oriented development is that people have practical choices for travel other than by private automobile. ”
Hornick also cites an array of actions by the Bloomberg administration that, he says, encourage the use of transit, as well as biking and walking. These include rezonings, limits on curb cuts and efforts to make streets more attractive.
Hornick’s comments are the latest entry in a debate sparked by Paul’s article. To read Hornick’s post and the others on parking and auto use, go here.
By Gail Robinson on May 4, 2010, 4:30 pmIn category: Land Use, Transportation, sustainability | 2 Comments »

May 6th, 2010 at 10:31 am
Who cares if NYC is the most transit-oriented city in America? NYC is a world class city. We should be comparing ourselves to London, Paris, Tokyo, etc. Set the bar high.
July 6th, 2010 at 4:47 am
This is probably one of the best articles I’ve read in a long time.
Pretty good post.