On-Street Bike Parking in Buenos Aires.  Photo by the author.

I spotted this cool on-street bike rack in the trendy Palermo neighborhood of Buenos Aires. It says “One car = ten bikes”.  It’s a very cool, visual way of providing bicycle parking in a neighborhood with narrow sidewalks and heavy pedestrian activity that also educates the driving public on the efficiency of travel by bicycle and the need for on-street bike infrastructure.

Metro’s planners recognize that bike parking is a really efficient use of space and a cost-effective way for us to provide alternatives for how our riders get to our stations.  Read more about Metro’s bike parking efforts on PlanItMetro.

Editor’s note: we have been made aware that this bike rack design is very similar to or perhaps based on a bike rack design by a company called Cyclehoop.  Congrats to Cyclehoop for such an innovative and educational design.

Photo of New York City bus lane violation.

This picture of a bus lane in New York City shows how easily bus priority treatments can be violated without enforcement mechanisms in place. Traffic control officers, bus-mounted cameras or self-enforcing contra-flow lanes can help ensure that street space dedicated to buses is available for them to use.  Bus priority is a hot topic here at PlanItMetro.

A crowd of tourists wait to board the St. Charles Streetcar.

 A few years ago I visited New Orleans and took the St. Charles Streetcar from downtown to the terminus by Jefferson Ave.  The stop where my friends and I boarded had a ticket vending machine, which we used.  The stop pictured, however, did not.  I shared this picture with friends, entitled “Twenty-Plus Reasons For Off-Board Fare Payment.”

Metro is currently investigating options for off-board SmarTrip loading.

A new dedicated busway along “the widest street in the world” has reduced friction between buses and cars, but created some new friction between preservationists and government officials in Buenos Aires.

Median contraflow busway along Av 9 de Julio.

I just returned from my honeymoon in Buenos Aires. One of the first things I noticed while exploring the downtown “micro center” was a four-lane contraflow busway along Av 9 de Julio, often referred to as the widest street in the world.

Av 9 de Julio is literally a block wide — check out this jaw-dropping photo — with 7 traffic lanes in each direction in the main roadway and an additional 2 lanes of access road, also in each direction.  Up until recently, buses traveled in the access lanes, conflicting with cars and pedestrians.  A new four-lane busway facility was recently constructed along the center of this massive avenue.  The facility is well lit, attractive and fast:  the bus travel time down the three-kilometer roadway is expected to drop from 60 minutes to 20. Read more…