My Moon

I am excited and honored!  I was just appointed to serve on Pueblo's Transportation Advisory Commissionn (TAC) as a citizen representative.   TAC oversees short and long range transportation planning for the region, such as:

• Major regional corridors, including roadways and other modes
• Transportation safety and security
• Pedestrian trails, sidewalks and support facilities
• Regular and special transit services
• Freight movement and intermodal transfers
• Economic development interactions
• Commercial and general aviation operations
• Environmental and land use interactions.

I hope to learn a great deal and as a commissioner, continue to advocate for incorporating walkability and bikeability into the area's transportation projects.  Here's to a healthier Pueblo, one step at a time!

Adding a school garden and making the neighborhood a little more walkable

I hope my daughter's school garden makes the neighborhood a little more walkable.  Adding another element in the neighborhood, gives people an added destination of something to see or do when they are out walking.  According to walkablity guru Dan Burden, "In walkable places there are, of course, places to walk to—destinations that can be reached within a 5- or 10-minute walk. These attractions can be parks, schools, stores, services, and especially places to eat and places of employment."  

How to bring about awareness of walkability to little ones

More often than not, if you are like me, many places that I go everyday are not accessible or safe to walk to with small children.  The bus routes aren't direct.  The school is too far away.  The library and post office are spaced far apart.  The way we've designed our cities often makes it too danergous to venture out on foot with small children.  So we are in our cars.  In my case, the mini-van.  

But that doesn't mean we can't start talking to our children about walkability, liveability and the built enviornment concepts.  One game I play with my children is "I spy with my little eyes..."  We look for people walking, biking or using public transportation.  Also, we look for sidewalks, bus stops, signs and crosswalks.  It's a great way to bring about awareness of other modes of transportation, the way our urban landscape is working (or not) and how it is designed.  I'll often ask the kids, does that look safe?  Why or why not?  Where do you think the people are going getting on the bus? 

Can you see the crosswalk or do you think it needs to be repainted?  Is the street wide or narrow?  Are the cars going fast or slow?  Is the sidewalk close to the street or is there a tree line?   Are there people walking around here?  Why or why not?  

Bringing about awareness to these issues is an important step and a great way for children (and parents) to start thinking about walkability concepts.

Snowy Day

December 1st and it's snowing here in Pueblo.  Snow is sporadic here in the center of P-town, always jumping over us or dumping on the mountains beforehand. Whenever I travel out-of-state and far away from home, people often assume everywhere in Colorado is bitterly cold and snow filled.  Not so.  Whenever we get a snowy day, like today, I'm always so happy for the change of pace.

 

Snowly days have become perfect for puzzles and board games.  Little Luca has changed over night.  He has become quite the adement puzzle and game player.  As I write this post, he is still sitting quietly putting together Richard Scarry's 48 piece Busytown puzzle.  

 

Here's the box, torn off by an impatient 4 year old.  I found this puzzle at Tuesday Morning.  I've discovered they have the best puzzle selection and the best prices.  Of course, when looking at all the puzzles to choose from, I couldn't help but pick Richard Scarry's.  I foundly remember reading these book when I was a little girl.    I also couldn't resist the town hall sence with people walking, the bus, taxi, and moto going by, plus the quaint little shops.  I also snagged a puzzle of the Shy Little Kitten from the The Golden Book, another childhood classic.

Walkability 101

Ok.  I'm a dork.  I love watching videos like this one,  "What a Transportation Engineer Calls "Walkable".   I love understanding how cities function, how they are put together and what needs to be changed so we have great public spaces and healthy communities.  Right now, much of America is poorly designed and this arrangement is drastically effecting our health in a negative way.

Today many people don't walk places.  Our kids don't walk to school, we often drive to see friends, drive to work, drive to the movies or go shopping, drive to the grocery store or the library.  Streets aren't designed for people to walk on and amentities are scattered around the city, not close to home.   All this driving is making us unhealthy and overweight. 

Here in Colorado, we lost our blue status of healthy living and now are in the red.  1 in 5 Coloradeans are overweight and we are the healthiest state in the nation. When I heard Diane Sawyer on the news last night, saying we now have a nation in which they are recommending 9-12 year olds for cholestral screening, it makes good urban walkable planning all the more urgent.   

But in order for this to occur in much of the nation, everyday citizens, like myself, need to have a simple understanding of urban design.   Once we understand a little of urban planning, we can advocate for detached sidewalks, narrower streets and other streetscape elements that make our communities safer, healthier and just plan better to live in.

Here's a great easy explanation on how our transportation enigneers are designing streets and why they're just not working.