Car free living? Not in my country

Though gas prices are down from their $4 a gallon high of last year, they have been starting to creep up lately and the idea of making neighborhoods car free or walkable is back in the news. Both articles mention that neighborhoods need to be designed to be pedestrian friendly and while I agree that design is key, but there needs to be a willingness too. The town has to do more then pay lip service, they need to want to be walkable.

We live in a development with sidewalks and near mass transit, school and the library. We also have several lovely parks a mile or so from our home. Yet we are constantly using our cars. Even though we want to walk or use transit, we find ourselves driving, especially if we have our children with us.

Walking to the stores and library from our home requires crossing a major 4 lane road with traffic lights. Though we live about 2-300 yards from the crossing as the crow flies, the sidewalks take a more circulatory path and require a 20 min walk. No biggie, but not so much fun when lugging books or groceries home. This road is about half the width of Queens Boulevard of death yet may be more dangerous as drivers, especially on the weekend, don't look for pedestrians, even those crossing in the crosswalk with a traffic light. One day, about a month after our son was born, and not too long removed from living in Brooklyn, we decided to walk to the library. When we got home there were several calls on our answering machine from my mother-in-law and one of her friends, complaining we did something no good parent should do -- cross the road in the crosswalk with the light. At the time I thought they over reacted, but after crossing that road, in the crosswalk and with a light, for the last 9 years coming home from NJ Transit and seeing drivers not paying attention, I can see their point.

One of the other things we looked for when buying our home was walkability to mass transit and thus we bought a house that gives me a less then 10 minute walk to the bus stop to NYC outside our development. What I didn't count on was the difficulty walking back from the bus stop in the evening. See the stop 10 min from our house is on that 4 lane road I mentioned above. The bus from the city stops directly across the road from the stop to the city. There isn't a crosswalk at the stop and the road is a divided road (grass median) with 55 MPH traffic, making crossing the street both dangerous and illegal. Fortunately there is a light about 200 feet up the road at the next stop. Unfortunately, there is no sidewalk along the road there making walking home from the stop challenging, especially as drivers, hoping to avoid traffic backed up for the light, drive on the shoulder where pedestrians walk. Adding sidewalks or a crosswalk (there is another development across the highway from us that haves the same problem in reverse) is laughed at, but not paying for police to ticket jaywalkers with nowhere to go. So that leaves the stop with the round about path (which is a no go for the development across the road as they don't have a way to walk there). After doing that a few times late in the evening when you're tired or cold, you either learn to pray that the drivers are paying attention when you get off at the closer stops or you add your name to the park and ride lists (well behind the telecommuting times, our town has plenty of monthly spots that stay empty but almost no daily parking for the commuters who go in only once or twice a week).

Finally, we live 2 blocks from our son's school, yet he is bused. While this may make sense in the newer parts of town, we live in an older part with a neighborhood school built right in the middle of our development of almost 1,000 homes. No matter. The children are not allowed to walk to school here anymore. They must be supervised at all times, either on the bus or organized before care in the school itself. Walking or biking to school with your friends, and then hanging out in the school yard until the bell rings is a no no.

And the parks I mentioned, well the roads that go them don't always have sidewalks along them (depends what, if anything is developed alongside) or even shoulders in some places, making walking or biking to them, especially with our children, less then desirable.

So in conclusion, while I and my neighbors live in a neighborhood with sidewalks, close to school (well grades 1-5 anyway), stores and mass transit, we have to use our cars more then we would otherwise due to the rest of those in the community not willing to live in a walking community. The feet are willing, but the community's mindset is weak.