[M II A II R II K]

What Does American Exceptionalism Mean For Livable Streets?


July 2, 2010

By Noah Kazis

Read More: http://streetsblog.net/2010/07/02/wh...vable-streets/

Is the United States exceptional? It's a question that's bedeviled activists and historians alike since the country was born 234 years ago this Sunday. It's also a question that's been bugging Barbara McCann, the executive director of the Complete Streets Coalition. She's been at Velo-City, a bike conference held in cycling mecca Copenhagen this year. Writes McCann on her organization's blog:

"Frankly, in the past, I’ve discounted the value of the European model in the United States. It has been just too different - and certainly has been rejected by most local elected officials in the US. Specific European treatments such as cycle-tracks (bicycle lanes raised from the road surface and separate from the sidewalk) seemed pointless to discuss. On this trip, however, I came away with greater clarity about what European cities have to teach the Complete Streets movement in the United States."

- But one or two cycle-tracks does not a Copenhagen make. There's nowhere in this country even close to the cutting edge of livable streets. So McCann's question seems apt: Just how much can the United States learn from other countries?

- "The lesson for most of the United States, then, is not to simply import a technique or two (although it is encouraging to see a few American cities trying it): it is to learn how to build the political consensus that roads serve purposes beyond automobile travel."

Rush hour in Copenhagen. Photo: Complete Streets Coalition