CONNECTWhose Streets? Our Streets!
We are 5 organizations that want to bring transportation and housing advocates together to create a new mobility movement that prioritizes equity, climate change, and the need to make walking and biking safer, improve buses, and to make it possible for low-income people to live near high quality transit. We will expand our movement with a series of coordinated and inclusive events to address our common and most pressing issues—ranging from bikeable and walkable streets to affordable housing near transit, and from open streets to better buses.
In which areas of Los Angeles will you be directly working?
City of Los Angeles
In what stage of innovation is this project?
Expand existing program
Please list the organizations collaborating on this proposal.
ACT-LA
CicLAvia
Investing in Place
Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition
Move LA
If you are submitting a collaborative proposal, please describe the specific role of partner organizations in the project.
#NAME?
What is the need you’re responding to?
Individuals who are walking, biking and riding transit around LA are first hand witnesses to the inequities and needs on the ground. Neighbors understand which is the most dangerous area for crossing the street, and workers know which bus routes are in need of more investment so they can get to work on time. In many cases, people want to get involved in organizing for their community’s transportation needs but aren’t sure how to plug in. Our organizations are increasing the avenues for community involvement and encouraging organizations to collaborate and strengthen their organizing power. Through events, surveys, workshops and more, we will provide on-ramps for community members who want to create an accessible city with better air and water quality, less traffic and thriving streets.
Why is this project important to the work of your organization?
We are a group of organizations actively working to increase collaboration, trust and power. In the fall of 2019, non-profit organizations: CicLAvia, Investing in Place, Los Angeles Walks, Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, People for Mobility Justice, Move LA, all transportation non-profits working in Los Angeles, co-created a monthly space where staff could strengthen relationships, share information and develop ideas for collaborative campaigns. We recognized transportation advocacy in the City of Los Angeles needed a reboot. In January 2020, our key partner ACT-LA joined this effort to expand these conversations to include affordable housing near transit and align the group's efforts to engage grassroots organizations in campaigns to win transit justice and equitable transit-oriented communities. All partners are experts in these issues and have relationships with decision-makers. If we collaborate to rethink our transportation system we can contest the status quo.
Approximately how many people will be impacted by this proposal?
Direct Impact: 3,000
Indirect Impact: 300,000
Please describe the broader impact of your proposal.
LA’s transportation system is not sustainable, or affordable and desperately needs an overhaul. We need walkable sidewalks, protected bike lanes, streets where cars travel at slower speeds and buses have their own lanes. There has been “a staggering 75% increase in the number of pedestrian deaths between 2015 and 2018”, Cars are expensive and transportation is the major contributor of GHGs and air pollution, putting those who live near freeways at high risk for pandemics like COVID-19. Many people who used to ride buses and trains have been pushed to housing farther out from their jobs, schools, and healthcare resources they depend on. All are major reasons transit ridership is down, traffic is up, and we’re scared to walk and bike.
Please explain how you will define and measure success for your project.
We would define and measure success as a powerful, engaged, inclusive constituency and conversation around transportation and transit-oriented communities in the City of Los Angeles. For years the Los Angeles region has struggled to build a transportation advocacy movement that can generate sufficient political will to achieve equitable transportation and land use. Let’s change that by getting more Angelenos involved in dreaming about a more equitable city together.
Transportation budgets will shrink in the aftermath of COVID-19, and there needs to be an organized and supported constituency to ensure funds are prioritized to address issues around equity, sustainability and climate change.
Los Angeles is a big place with so many advocacy organizations operating in different ways and in diverse communities. This proposal would provide us with an opportunity to double down and build power together in order to have a bigger and more inclusive impact. All of the applicant organizations are already doing their own work, but this proposal would bring us together and pool our constituencies and power. While we all work in the same space, there hasn't been an opportunity to work together as one and this could be that shot.The result could be a resounding success.
Which of the CONNECT metrics will your submission impact?
Government responsiveness to residents’ needs
Public transit ridership
Transit-accessible housing and employment
Are there any other LA2050 goal categories that your proposal will impact?
LA is the best place to PLAY
LA is the healthiest place to LIVE
Which of LA2050’s resources will be of the most value to you?
Access to the LA2050 community
Communications support
Capacity, including staff
Strategy assistance and implementation