Giffin Glastonbury
Professor Marc Schlossberg
Final Project
7/26/2023
Better Life Through Design
Principles of Residential Urban Design
Residential roads should be designed differently from arterial and connector roads because residential neighborhoods have very different needs from local and main thoroughfare streets. Street design can dramatically affect the quality of life for residents either for better or worse. Traffic calming and other amenities like greenspace can be incorporated into road design without dramatically restricting street parking or impeding vehicular access. The street should be designed to make living more comfortable at the human scale. In the U.S, Urban Design is often too large, spread out and isolating. To help heal a divided society, the design of our neighborhoods should encourage climate change adaptation and social integration. To meet the challenges of the future, neighborhood streets must be places where pedestrians, bicyclists, seniors, and children can linger, play and be safe from the dominance of the speeding vehicle and have shade instead of hot asphalt heat islands.
Raised Crosswalks and Traffic Filtering: Cars Crossing the Path of Pedestrians
At the beginning of a residential area, vehicles should have to cross a threshold. Raised crosswalks can suggest that the driver is leaving a busier connecting street and entering a residential area. This is also safer for pedestrians. The road should signal to the drivers via design to slow down, to behave differently. (Is it bad design or bad behavior?) Having wide open streets which visually look identical to connectors is not the solution. Raised crosswalks as well as traffic filtering of inlets will dramatically reduce unnecessary traffic and increase safety for pedestrians but also lead to a calmer, quieter street.
Bollards and Greenspace: Traffic Calming Amenities
Overall, residential street design should function to make spaces more habitable for residents. Filtering vehicle traffic and calming cars are important goals, but the designs should be beautiful and bring joy to residents. For example, stone boulders can restrict vehicle movement like bollards, yet their non-uniform shapes gently soften the edges of the city and provide impromptu sitting opportunities.
Many traffic calming interventions like the narrowing of a street or placement of a chicane should be combined with other functions within the urban design. There should be small simple third spaces that foster social interaction within each neighborhood. A simple pocket park, like a swing set for kids, an adult work out station or a few stone boulders and a tree can greatly help to foster neighborhood social connectivity and suggest to people that they have permission to hang out around the street. Or some streets can become entire pedestrian zones.
Deciduous tree coverage will continue to become especially important to maintain livability during the summer months, especially in already hot areas. The U.S typically has wide residential roads which could easily be redesigned to accommodate new, shadier street design. So perhaps, after all, a wide-open street is not a bad thing, it’s possible that we could quickly redesign and change neighborhood streets to accommodate a variety of needs and enhance the quality of life in American neighborhoods.
Define the Parking: ‘Narrow’ the Street with Occasional or Lots of Trees
More narrowly appearing residential roads require drivers to proceed more cautiously. Instead of asking drivers to slow down, the design should encourage proper behavior. This can be done by defining the areas along the street allowed for vehicle parking and then replacing a few of the parking spots with trees or green amenities. The trees in the image above create a narrower feeling, provide shade, and bird habitat all while also softening the edges of the city for humans.
Modes of transportation like walking or cycling encourage more social connection amongst neighbors than car travel offers. Lower travel speeds (15mph or lower) are sufficient for local residential traffic and allow for further placement of street amenities. If speed bumps are to be used, ones which allow pedestrians, kids, and bicyclists to easily pass over are important. The speed hump on the left is smooth enough not to not bother pedestrians and bicyclists but noticeable by vehicles.
Our urban designs can be modified for the better.
Perhaps only the many advantages need to be understood first. Greenspaces and trees offer countless benefits for society. From safer and quieter streets, to enhancing physical and mental wellness. The design of our residential neighborhoods should be continually improved to address the concerns of society. Encouraging social engagement and beautification can be part of our street design priorities.
After all, where do the children play?
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