6.03.2007

Roads for people

This week North Santiam Paving has been installing the final lift of porous asphalt here. The picture below, from last week, shows them completing a cross street section of an alley-way in the area of the live-work lofts. Pretty interesting--by increasing the cross hatches of light colored concrete, which look a lot like sidewalks or crosswalks, the street is transformed from an automobile-dominated road to a pedestrian right-of-way surface, a walking or bicycling surface. Though cars and trucks get through just fine, it's as if the space is more for people.

--santiago