The 2023 City of Durham Resident Survey was just released:

Here are the relevant transportation results. durhamnc.gov/civicalerts.as…
Here's how transportation categories fit within the larger context. Ease of travel and street maintenance are in the middle tier, but quality of pedestrian, biking infrastructure and transit are at the bottom.

(Transportation is a negative good, but this is still striking.)

Started our Richmond visit at the excellent Richmond Railway Museum.

The model train scene is very impressive. This is a model of Broad Street in Richmond when streetcars still ran (now replaced by @GrtcPulse BRT).

A key way to gauge the potential success of a transit plan is to see how well it improves access to jobs, particularly for low-wealth people of color.

Unfortunately, the way this was done for the Durham Transit Plan options is not a good measure of equity.

An important thread: This is what is shown on the Transit Plan website ( engagedurham.com/durham-county-…)

It's shown two ways:

1. The % increase in the number of jobs accessible from six Durham Housing Authority communities in 45 minutes or less for each of the three transit options that have been shown.

What is a city that you thought you were going to love, but didn't? The one that comes to mind for me is Vancouver. There were mitigating circumstances: it rained pretty hard most of the time I was there and it was just before the Olympics so everything was under construction.

I’ve been checking out a lot of the Shared Streets and some trails I haven’t been on in some time. A few observations: I rode the Pearsontown Trail for the first time - it’s the one shown in purple and green that connects the Rocky Creek Greenway and NC Central. It’s a fascinating trail. Cuts between homes, some on-street segments. Signage needs to be refreshed.

I catalogued all of the legal pedestrian crossings of the Durham Freeway just for the smell of it. I used Google Streetview, so if any conditions have changed recently that I did not note, please let me know. I discuss planned improvements if I was aware of them. I also added something I'm calling Pedestrian Comfort Level of Service for each crossing (a nod to en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level_of_…), with A representing safe and inviting infrastructure for pedestrians, F for dangerous or inaccessible conditions, and B-D in between (I don't use E).

I continue to be confused by Durham's "Downtown Trail". Let's start with what it supposedly is before seeing what it actually is, and why it all matters. From the City's page on Trails & Greenways: This trail runs through the middle of downtown Durham. Green bricks along the side of the sidewalks mark the trail, but there is also good road signage. (cont.)