Stephen Miller
In spring 2017, Stephen wrote for Streetsblog USA, covering the livable streets movement and transportation policy developments around the nation.
From August 2012 to October 2015, he was a reporter for Streetsblog NYC, covering livable streets and transportation issues in the city and the region. After joining Streetsblog, he covered the tail end of the Bloomberg administration and the launch of Citi Bike. Since then, he covered mayoral elections, the de Blasio administration's ongoing Vision Zero campaign, and New York City's ever-evolving street safety and livable streets movements.
Recent Posts
What Will It Take for Sacramento to Make Walking Safer in Poor Neighborhoods?
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Police and city planners in Sacramento have come under scrutiny in the weeks since police were caught on tape assaulting Nandi Cain, Jr., a black man, during a jaywalking stop. Cain, who was legally using an unmarked crosswalk, has since filed a civil rights lawsuit against the city. Now, reporters are looking into why there are so few marked crosswalks in one of Sacramento's poorest areas.
A Simple Change to Make the Walk to Transit Feel Within Reach
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Sometimes, high-quality transit is within a walkable distance, but people just aren't used to walking to the train. New signage in St. Paul, Minnesota, funded through a local challenge from a national foundation, aims to help people get over that mental block and walking to the nearest Green Line station.
Popular Support for Bike Lanes Is Precisely the Problem for Atlanta Columnist Bill Torpy
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A plan to put an extra-wide suburban Atlanta thoroughfare on a road diet, adding protected bike lanes in the process, has come under fire from a local columnist with an unhealthy vendetta against people who ride bikes.
Get Ready for Uber’s “Flying Cars” Conference to Generate Lots of Dumb Headlines
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Whizzing above the city may sound appealing in a Jetsons sort of way, but Uber's thinking on this technology is completely untethered from its impact on the cities and towns below, where the people are.
It’s Hard to Overstate the Health Benefits of Biking to Work
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A massive new study of commuters in the United Kingdom reveals that people who bike to work tend to live longer and are at lower risk of heart disease and cancer. While the study establishes correlation but doesn't prove causation, the size of the sample and the magnitude of the effects strongly suggest that biking to work can yield major health benefits.
Peak Sprawl? The Fringes of the New York Region Are Shrinking
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A new report out of Rutgers University [PDF] reveals that since 2010, the fringes of the New York region have lost population as the core has grown, a reversal of the sprawling pattern that predominated starting in 1950, when the suburbs grew and the city shrank. The report compares regional growth between 1950 and 1980 […]
EPA Rejects New York’s Clean Water Money Grab for Highway Bridge
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This morning, the Environmental Protection Agency rejected the $510.9 million federal loan New York state had requested from a clean water program to pay for the Tappan Zee Bridge replacement project. Only $29 million worth of TZB work is eligible for clean water money, the EPA’s regional office ruled, averting a dangerous precedent that could have […]
New Report Out of NYC: Protected Bike Lanes Improve Safety for Everyone
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In sync with Bicycling Magazine naming New York America’s best biking city, the NYC Department of Transportation released a report this week full of stats on the safety impact of protected bike lanes. It’s the most robust data the city has released about this type of street design, and the results prove that protected bike lanes […]
Don’t Hate the Parking App Profiteers, Hate the Free Parking Game
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Haystack, the latest app allowing drivers to sell access to a parking space, blazed across the Internet this month after Boston Mayor Martin Walsh threatened to ban it. Valleywag called it a “scourge.” The Awl compared it to profiteering off access to clean water. The haters have it wrong though: The apps aren’t screwing over […]
How to Measure the Economic Effect of Livable Streets
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When a street redesign to prioritize walking, biking, or transit is introduced, the headlines are predictable: A handful of business owners scream bloody murder. Anecdotes from grumpy merchants tend to dominate the news coverage, but what’s the real economic impact of projects like Select Bus Service, pedestrian plazas, road diets and protected bike lanes? How […]
Parents of 3 Year Old Toddler Killed by SUV in NYC Crosswalk: ‘We Challenge Drivers to Pause and Ask – Is It Worth It?’
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Last month, three year-old Allison Liao was crossing Main Street in Flushing with her grandmother when an SUV driver turned left, hitting and killing the toddler while she had the walk signal in the crosswalk. Yesterday in Jackson Heights, Liao’s parents marched with the families and friends of other traffic violence victims, and made this powerful […]
Meet Streetmix, the Website Where You Can Design Your Own Street
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Last fall, Lou Huang was at a community meeting for the initiative to redesign Second Street in San Francisco. Planners handed out paper cutouts, allowing participants to mix and match to create their ideal street. Huang, an urban designer himself, thought the exercise would make for a great website. Now, after months of work beginning at a January […]