For All Those Interested in Safer, Friendlier Streets in Highland Park

You can make a big difference! This is a critical-mass type meeting--all cyclists and supporters needed! The City of HP is considering adopting roadway policy that requires including the needs of cyclists, but they would first like to ensure there is bit more widespread community support. So if you want safer and friendlier streets for all of us who share the road, please attend; and have your neighbors and friends join you; and please circulate this to your clubs, HP friends and neighbors! And show up--please! Thanks for helping make our streets "complete" and inclusive of cyclists too! See below for more details and links.

Jay Goldstein
for: North Suburban Complete Streets Coalition

"Ninety-percent of life is just showing up" -Woody Allen

Wednesday JULY 22 at 6:30 pm
Highland Park City Hall 1707 St. Johns
(directly across from the HP Metra station)
View Larger Map

Please come to a meeting of the Highland Park Traffic Commission on JULY 22 at 6:30 pm. Lina Hoffman, North Suburban Coordinator from the Active Transportation Alliance (formerly Chicagoland Bicycle Federation) will be making a presentation on "Complete Streets." The goal is for the HP Traffic Commission to adopt policy that takes all users into consideration (including pedestrians and cyclists) when making decisions that impact our roadways in Highland Park. We need to have strong representation at this meeting.

Why do we need a Complete Streets plan? Such a plan will help insure that the needs of pedestrians and cyclists, as well as cars, are considered when building, designing or reconstructing roadways. The state has such a policy which applies to state controlled roads; and Lake County is also implementing such a policy. Each jurisdiction needs their own Complete Streets policies and plans since each controls their own roads. A Complete Streets Plan for Highland Park would impact HP city roads only.

Highland Park is important because:

--Highland Park is a bike friendly community for families, kids, students, commuters and shoppers; active residents who also ride to parks, beaches, Ravinia and events. Plus we have a large cycling community with many resident cycling enthusiasts and area cycling groups that originate and/or pass through town.
--There are on-going citywide initiatives currently to become more environmentally sustainable and to improve health -- this fits in with these goals.
--If Highland Park were to implement Complete Streets, it would serve as a model for other communities that have not yet. Plus adopting Complete Streets will demonstrate in another way how Highland Park remains committed to keeping our community desirable and livable.

More info:
www.completestreets.org
www.activetrans.org
Questions? Email:
Kim Stone
kstone@spcpweb.org or
Lina Hoffman
lina@activetrans.org

More details on Complete Streets

The Complete Street movement is about enacting smarter public policy that benefits everyone which results in increased safety(1), improved quality of life and health, reduced congestion and is more fiscally sound. It has been already adopted by eleven states, including the State of Illinois; also DuPage County, City of Chicago and over 80 communities around the country(2) including Philadelphia on June 5 of this year(3). Complete Streets is widely supported by groups ranging from the National Realtors Association, the YMCA, AARP and the Institute of Transportation Engineers who themselves became to be known the last half-century as the "throughput crowd" for focusing solely on increased roadway capacity and speeds while not being inclusive of all users and without consideration of other benefits. So it would appear that those not yet on-board with Complete Streets might now be said to be old school and hopefully will become a minority. Also for a federal policy, the “Complete Streets Act of 2009” is now before Congress.

(1) In the US every 113 minutes a pedestrian or cyclists is killed by a motor vehicle and every 8 minutes one is injured or paralyzed. It may be interesting to note that this is 3x the current rate of Germany which was historically also a motor vehicle centric country but has now worked hard for years on reforming their street policy. Source http://www.postwritersgroup.com/archives/peir071209.htm. Studies have shown just a few Complete Street policy implementations can reduce risks 28% to 40% while increasing safety for drivers as well. See http://www.completestreets.org/webdocs/federal/cs-2009pressrelease.pdf. While bikes and pedestrians account for 13% of all road fatalities they received less than 1% of safety education funds. Engineering, Education and Enforcement are three keys. See http://www.wdef.com/news/complete_streets_legislation_could_improve...

(2) For an up to date atlas where Complete Streets policy has been enacted see: http://www.completestreets.org/complete-streets-fundamentals/comple...

(3) See June 5 entry on http://www.completestreets.org/news-blog/blog/