Category: Announcement

MA Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Board seeking interested candidates

MA Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Board seeking interested candidates

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CALL FOR INTEREST IN SERVING ON THE MASSACHUSETTS BICYCLE AND PEDESTRIAN ADVISORY BOARD

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is seeking interested candidates in serving as public members on the Massachusetts Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Board (MABPAB). MABPAB public members volunteer their time for the benefit of advancing bicycle and pedestrian transportation across the Commonwealth. Nominated candidates will be appointed for a two-year volunteer term, beginning fall 2018. Official nominations will be made by the Governor of Massachusetts.

Mission:

Legislatively established in 2004 and appointed by the Governor of Massachusetts, the Board’s purposes are to:

  1. Advise Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) and other State Agencies on bicycle and pedestrian transportation initiatives
  2. Advise MassDOT on issues of interest to people who walk and bicycle today, or wish to walk and bike more
  3. Monitor the implementation of the Massachusetts Statewide Bicycle Transportation Plan and the Massachusetts Statewide Pedestrian Transportation Plan, and assist MassDOT in preparing future plan updates.

Meetings:

The Board meets six times a year, every other month during the day. Three of these meetings are held at the State Transportation Building in Boston and three are held at different locations across the Commonwealth. Advisory Board members are expected to attend every meeting in person.

Sample topics covered at Advisory Board meetings:
– Statewide Bicycle Plan
– Statewide Pedestrian Plan
– Safety
– Year-round Maintenance
– Monitoring and Evaluation
– Public Health
– Trails/Multi use paths
– Safe Routes to School
– Complete Streets
– Events and Outreach
– Access to Transit
– Accessibility
– Sustainable Mobility
– Planning and Design
– Education and Enforcement

Membership:

The Board is made up of public members representing the following:
– Bicycling organization representatives
– Bicycling representatives
– Bicycle industry representative
– Pedestrian representatives

The Board also consists of designees from statewide bicycle and pedestrian advocacy organizations, WalkBoston and MassBike, and the following governmental agencies:
– Department of Transportation
– Department of Conservation & Recreation
– MBTA
– Department of Public Health
-Department of Energy and Environmental Affairs
– Representative from a Regional Planning Agency
– State Police
-Office of Travel & Tourism

Terms:

Candidates should be residents of Massachusetts interested in serving as public members. Nominated candidates shall serve without compensation for a term of two years, beginning September 2018. Member-volunteers may be reappointed. All nominated individuals will be subject to a standard background check.

To Apply:

Interested candidates should email or send a resume and letter of interest to the Massachusetts Department of Transportation at mabpab@dot.state.ma.us or Att: MABPAB, State Transportation Building, 10 Park Plaza, Suite 4160, Boston, MA 02116. In your resume, please include contact information, including mailing address, email address and phone number where we can contact you. In your letter, please include what public seat you are applying for (i.e. bicycle organization representative, pedestrian representative); your background (work and/or life experience) that relates to the mission of the Board; what, if any, groups you will be formally representing while serving on the Board; what you would like to contribute to the Board; and any additional information for consideration. Please apply by June 25, 2018 to be considered.

If you have any questions about the Board, please contact MABPAB@dot.state.ma.us

Want to get involved? Join the newsletter team

Want to get involved? Join the newsletter team

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We mail out copies of our printed newsletter 3-4 times a year to supporters, state & local officials; with our new website, these articles are also added as individual posts to be shared online (see previous newsletters). We’re looking for a new volunteer newsletter editor to help!

What’s it take to be a newsletter editor?

The role of newsletter editor involves more coordinating than editing. Here is the current lifecycle of a newsletter, from inspiration to a supporter’s mailbox:

  1. A WalkBoston newsletter starts with a brainstorming session at the Communications Committee (we meet after work on the first Thursday of the month). Together with the editor, the Committee picks a topic and often creates a list of potential authors. Armed with that information, the editor drafts emails to each author inviting them to participate and explaining logistics. Each edition has 2-4 stories.
  2.  After each author agrees to participate, the newsletter editor is responsible for checking in with authors and getting final drafts. With last drafts in hand, the editor does a preliminary review for content and word count. Once the articles are a reasonable length and flow together in an interesting way, the editor passes a word document with all articles included on to WalkBoston board member Nina Garfinkle at Garfinkle Design.
  3. You’re not all on your own as an editor! Nina drops all the articles into the WalkBoston newsletter branded format and circulates the newsletter to you and our crack editing team from the Communications Committee. This team does all the detailed line editing and helps us create a perfect product. Nina inputs each edit directly from the group into the formatted draft. Once the newsletter is as clean as possible, Nina sends the draft to WalkBoston’s staff for final edits and information on upcoming events.
  4. When this is complete, the office runs a mailing list and the newsletter is out the door! Brendan converts the articles to posts for the website so they go live a week or so after the newsletter hits mailboxes, making sure the articles receive additional visibility.

As you can see, this is not a job that requires spectacular editing skills as much as it needs organization, communication and an interest in putting out exciting newsletters that help spread the WalkBoston mission. Interested? Questions? Ideas? Get in touch!

Communication Committee Members:
Nina Garfinkle, Communications Chair
Hillary Borcherding, outgoing Newsletter Editor (who is helping with the transition, but stepping down as she has recently moved to Vermont!)
Joyce DiBona
Don Eunson
Shay Karime
Brendan Kearney, WalkBoston staff
Ken Krause

MA Vision Zero Coalition Statement on Commonwealth Ave Fatal Crash

MA Vision Zero Coalition Statement on Commonwealth Ave Fatal Crash

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Statement from the Massachusetts Vision Zero Coalition:

The Commonwealth Avenue crash that claimed the life of Theodore J. Schwalb, age 80, an arts teacher at Stoneham High School for more than 40 years, is disturbing on many levels. The driver, Phocian Fitts, acknowledges that he drove the car that struck and killed Mr. Schwalb in the middle of the day and then fled the scene. He stated this in an interview with Boston 25 News after he was released from police custody:

“People hit and run people all the time, it just happened to be an unfortunate situation where I was driving.”

Mr. Fitts’ comments, although brazen, reflect the low bar we’ve set when it comes to holding people accountable for reckless driving behavior.

  • A culture that accepts fatal crashes as a fact of life means law enforcement isn’t holding drivers accountable. We are deeply disturbed that the alleged suspect was initially questioned and released without charges despite fleeing the scene of a fatal crash. An arrest was only made after the Boston 25 News interview, in which he admitted to “driving too quick to the point where I couldn’t really stop” before running over and killing a fellow Boston resident.
  • A culture that accepts fatal crashes as a fact of life means lawmakers don’t realize the urgency of safety legislation. A hands free driving bill, which has passed the Senate and is backed by broad public support and Governor Baker, has languished in the House for years and now is awaiting action in the House Ways and Means Committee.
  • A culture that accepts fatal crashes as a fact of life means that thousands of people are seriously injured on Massachusetts streets every year.  In 2017, there were 4,537 injury crashes on Boston’s streets, which is up ten percent since 2015. Across Massachusetts, at least 133 people have been killed on our roads in the first 5 months of 2018.

While we are brokenhearted that another life has been lost on our streets, we are hopeful that the culture is beginning to shift around designing and building safer streets. In 2015 Mayor Walsh committed Boston to Vision Zero, an effort to eliminate serious and fatal crashes. Cambridge and Somerville soon followed suit.

Each of these cities have worked to make good on their Vision Zero commitments by redesigning dangerous corridors and intersections, and Boston recently announced a major investment in its Transportation Department’s safety efforts.

To ensure our streets are safe and accessible for everyone, design is important. We also need law enforcement and elected leaders to step up and make it clear that reckless driving deserves severe consequences.

Wendy Landman, Executive Director, WalkBoston
Emily Stein, President, Safe Roads Alliance
Stacy Thompson, Executive Director, LivableStreets Alliance
Becca Wolfson, Executive Director, Boston Cyclist Union

Additional Sources

  • A 2018 AAA study found that “Hit-and-run crashes in the United States are trending in the wrong direction,” according to Dr. David Yang, executive director of the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety. The report found that most victims of fatal hit-and-run crashes are pedestrians or bicyclists. Over the past 10 years, nearly 20 percent of all pedestrian deaths were caused by hit-and-run crashes, meanwhile just one percent of all driver fatalities in that same time period were hit-and-run crashes.
  • The Massachusetts Vision Zero Coalition maintains a map of fatal crashes involving people biking or walking across Massachusetts.
  • WalkBoston tracks fatal pedestrian crashes across Massachusetts. This is compiled manually via news & social media alerts in order to give communities more information to help push for safer streets.
Longfellow has come a long way!

Longfellow has come a long way!

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WalkBoston is thrilled that after many years of advocacy, planning and design – and five years of construction – the Longfellow Bridge is open to all users. People on foot, on bikes, on the Red Line and in vehicles are all in motion. We celebrate the comfortable sidewalks, the beautifully restored ironwork and stonework, and the elegant new lighting. We are anticipating the fully accessible new bridge to the Esplanade which will open this summer.  Just a quick glance at the pictures below tell the sidewalk story!

Before (photos taken between 2007-2011):

     

After (photos taken June 2018):

We are continuing to work with our many advocacy partners to make biking across the bridge even safer than it is today, and are pleased that MassDOT Secretary Stephanie Pollack has committed to a pilot test of a separated bike lane on the inbound to Boston uphill portion of the bridge. We urge everyone to take a walk across the Longfellow Bridge this summer to enjoy the fabulous views and the cool river breeze. Support your local advocacy organizations (like WalkBoston) to keep state and local decision makers moving in the right direction on transportation in order to make our Commonwealth the best it can be!
Maintaining access for people walking around construction projects

Maintaining access for people walking around construction projects

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With Massachusetts’ booming economy, pedestrians encounter construction sites on streets large and small. WalkBoston recently led a lunch-n-learn at Commodore Builders, (a WalkBoston corporate supporter) focused on construction site management strategies that provide safe spaces for people to continue walking during construction.

Key points:

  • Maintain a safe path of ACCESSIBLE travel.
  • Match the solution to the setting – if there are a lot of walkers and busy streets, do not force pedestrians to cross the street. Find space for pedestrians on the same side of the street.
  • Provide advance warning at a safe crossing if the sidewalk is closed mid-block.

We shared good and bad examples of local construction sites and links to some good resources. If your company is interested in a similar presentation, please get in touch. Stay tuned: later this summer, we’ll be leading a construction access walk in Allston!

If you see a construction site that blocks access for pedestrians, we encourage you to report it to your city or town. In more and more municipalities across MA, you can dial 311, or use a reporting app like Commonwealth Connect. You can also tag us in photos @WalkBoston on Twitter.