Streets can be good friends or quiet bullies. We talk with author and planner Bruce Appleyard about Livable Streets 2.0 and how design choices—lane widths, speeds, buffers, sidewalks, and bike protection—shape safety, community bonds, and the energy we feel the moment our feet touch the curb. Bruce shares the personal story behind the book’s legacy and why traffic’s “invisible harms” still fracture neighborhoods, then maps a clear path to build streets that give back.

We dig into cognitive mapping and what children’s drawings reveal about freedom, learning, and place. When kids can walk and bike, their mental maps grow richer, their confidence rises, and schools benefit from more alert, active students. Bruce connects these human-scale wins to economic outcomes, explaining how the “street slum” effect drains main streets and how people-first redesigns boost sales and foot traffic. Slower is safer—and also better for business.

Enjoy the stories, borrow the tactics, and help your city trade throughput for life. If this resonated, follow the show, leave a review, and share it with a friend who’s ready to rethink their block.

Show Notes:

• Author Recommended Reading: 
  • Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in the American City by Peter Norton
  • The U.S. Traffic Calming Manual by Reid Ewing
  • Anything written by Dan Burton 
  • Walkable City Rules by Jeff Speck
  • Right of Way:Race, Class, and the Silent Epidemic of Pedestrian Deaths in America by Angie Schmidt
  • Arrested Mobility: Overcoming the Threat to Black Movement by Charles T. Brown
  • Great Streets by Allan Jacobs
  • Killed by a Traffic Engineer by Wes Marshall
  • Confessions of a Recovering Engineer: Transportation for a Strong Town by Chuck Marohn
  • Streets and the Shaping of Towns and cities by Michael southworth and Eran Ben Joseph
  • End of the Road: Reimagining the Street as the Heart of the City by Billy Riggs
  • Life After Cars By Sarah Goodyear and Doug Gordon
• Bruce’s website which features more information on the topic: https://rethinkingstreets.com/
• To help support the show, pick up a copy of the book through our Bookshop page at https://bookshop.org/shop/bookedonplanning or get a copy through your local bookstore!

To view the show transcripts, click on the episode at https://bookedonplanning.buzzsprout.com/

RDG Planning & Design
Architects, landscape architects, engineers, artists & planners with a drive to make a difference.

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