海角视频

For more than a decade, New York City has tested new ways of giving streets back to people.

First with paint and planters, later with busways, open streets, and shared鈥憇pace pilots that remade corridors from Broadway to 34th Avenue. What started as experimental has begun to feel systematic. Agencies now have a playbook, a fuller political mandate, and years of lived experience showing that better streets can boost local business activity, improve transit reliability, and create healthier public spaces.

As the city prepares to scale this work, it will have to answer bigger questions about equity, maintenance, freight, climate resilience, and the realities of long鈥憈erm stewardship.

In this discussion with associate principal and urban mobility specialist, Sam Frommer, touches on the city鈥檚 evolving approach and what it will take to make the next generation of pedestrian鈥慺irst streets stick.

NYC is prototyping a new generation of pedestrian – first, shared, and slow streets. What makes this moment different from previous attempts to transform street space? How would you describe the long鈥憈erm vision?

Sam Frommer: The work the city is doing through DOT is the result of a multi鈥慸ecade effort to build a robust toolbox of physical street interventions and communication strategies. Progress has been slow and sometimes messy, with wins, setbacks, and plenty of iteration along the way.

What鈥檚 different now is the broader recognition of the value these spaces provide. The success of Broadway, 14th Street in Manhattan, and 34th Street in Queens, during and after the pandemic along with the rise of pop鈥憉ps and plazas in virtually every neighborhood, has shifted expectations. DOT now has a stronger toolkit and is acting more ambitiously. With alignment among City Hall, the Council, and state partners like the MTA, there鈥檚 a real opportunity to fast鈥憈rack improvements and reduce neighborhood鈥憀evel friction.

At the same time, there鈥檚 a growing acknowledgment that streets are New York City鈥檚 largest publicly owned asset, yet we rarely treat them as true public space. They鈥檝e evolved into a monoculture for moving and storing cars. The vision ahead is to transform that monoculture into a multifunctional network one that supports walking, biking, and buses; mitigates flooding and heat; and strengthens local business corridors through outdoor dining and community activations.

Pedestrianization is central to this shift. It鈥檚 the most accessible and affordable mobility option, and it naturally weaves together neighborhoods, retail corridors, schools, and parks. The network effect is powerful: improvements on a single street ripple across the surrounding grid, enhancing safety and multimodal access at the district scale.

Pedestrianization isn鈥檛 new, from the 1966 Lower Manhattan Plan to the 2010 Shared Streets study but we also saw Open Streets revive neighborhoods during the pandemic. How do today鈥檚 strategies build on decades of visioning, and what do we now understand about their business and community impacts?

Frommer: Much of the 20th century engineered a car monoculture, erasing space that once belonged to buses, trolleys, walking, biking, even play. Yet streets were originally built for people on foot, and for horse 鈥� drawn carriages and trolleys long before mass car ownership. Today鈥檚 efforts are really a course correction, drawing on historic precedents like Park Avenue鈥檚 once鈥慻enerous planted mall and rediscovering how to balance movement and place to meet 21st鈥慶entury needs: cleaner air, access to open space, better quality of life, and safety.

At the same time, the pandemic offered a real鈥憈ime demonstration of the benefits of a people 鈥� first approach. Open Streets showed that when environments are safe and pleasant to walk, people come and they spend time. Some business owners still equate car traffic with customers, but successful corridors show the opposite. Broadway is a good example: fears that people wouldn鈥檛 drive in from New Jersey or the Bronx never materialized, and retail within the congestion area has held strong. Even without a single 鈥渕aster study,鈥� the on 鈥� the 鈥� ground reality is clear, walkable, calmer streets draw foot traffic and fuel economic activity.

Broadway and 14th Street succeeded through rapid testing and iteration, and we鈥檙e now seeing similar tactical pilots and curb reallocations in places like Meatpacking, Downtown Brooklyn, Union Square, and Paseo Park. How critical is this testing鈥慺irst model, what tools matter most, and what are we learning about where momentum is strongest?

Frommer: The key lesson isn鈥檛 just what works, it鈥檚 how to phase and position projects for success. The districts moving fastest, like Meatpacking, Downtown Brooklyn, Union Square, and Paseo Park, all have well鈥憆esourced Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) that can run strong visioning processes, stage pilots, and then secure capital funding. That capacity is a major reason these areas advance quickly, and while effective, it underscores an inequity: neighborhoods without similar resources risk being left behind. We need administration鈥憀evel strategies to democratize this process so all communities can benefit.

At the same time, rapid testing and iteration are essential not only for good design, but for public trust. Tools like pilots, pop 鈥� ups, traffic studies, and foot鈥憈raffic or spending analyses provide valuable technical input, but their greatest power is experiential. People can live with the changes, see how they function, and help shape the final outcome. You could implement a design based solely on modeling and be technically 鈥渞ight,鈥� but you鈥檇 still face disproportionate resistance. Testing gives communities the chance to get comfortable with change and to co鈥憃wn the results.

In many ways, everything old is new again. We鈥檙e restoring streets to do the many jobs they once did only now with better data, materials, and community engagement. It鈥檚 a 21st鈥慶entury course correction: using our biggest public resource to meet the intertwined challenges of safety, equity, climate, and economic vitality.

Sam Frommer, 海角视频
Associate Principal, Mobility

What are the takeaways for cities that want pedestrian 鈥� first districts to be equitable, economically beneficial, and resilient? And where can firms like 海角视频 help?

Frommer: Advocacy groups and BIDs push the city toward more ambitious pedestrian鈥慺ocused designs, often stepping in to maintain public spaces where the city cannot though this can deepen inequities between neighborhoods. When paired with broader strategies like bus priority, congestion pricing, curb daylighting, and green infrastructure, pedestrian鈥慶entered streets become part of a multifunctional system that improves safety, transit access, climate resilience, and quality of life. The biggest opportunity lies in reallocating street space for uses like wider sidewalks, bike lanes, waste containerization, and stormwater management, while the biggest challenge remains long鈥憈erm maintenance. Cities aiming for equitable, resilient pedestrian districts need strong public leadership supported by technical partners such as 海角视频, whose work鈥攆rom pedestrian bridges to district鈥憇cale plans in places like Traverse City and Guadalajara, shows how thoughtful design can turn fragmented spaces into connected, people鈥慺irst networks.