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Maybe you’re longing to see the streets of your city free of cars, but you’re waiting for the mayor to declare a car-free day. Or maybe you’ve thought about eliminating the car traffic from your favorite intersection by having a Reclaim the Streets party.

 

But maybe you, like me, live in a place where automobile right-of-way is so sacred that any unauthorized blocking of traffic is likely to result in an attack from riot cops with all the trimmings, like pepper spray, verbal abuse, bruised limbs, arrest and hefty fines.

 

You don’t necessarily have to risk bodily harm from law enforcement or be the mayor of your city to liberate the streets from motor vehicles. If you’re willing to jump through a few hoops by applying for a permit, chances are you too can transform your streets into car-free zones, at least for a day.

 

The details of the permit process are bound to vary from city to city, but in their essentials will be pretty similar. For a block party — a street closure on a residential street — you will need to get signed permission from all adjacent property owners.

 

Closures on high-volume streets are “community events” and require greater community and political support, as well as a bit more paperwork and advance planning. A large city like New York might require that applications for community events are submitted a year in advance. In Portland, applications are accepted up to a month in advance for community events and two weeks in advance for block parties. The general rule seems to be, the bigger the street closure, the more advance notice everyone likes to have.

 

Permit fees for street closures may be nominal, like they are in Portland, but rates vary widely. New York City’s block party permit fee is $15, while Seattle charges $94 and requires a $200 cleaning deposit. Don’t be discouraged by expenses. Chances are you will be able to find some organization or individual willing to sponsor your car-free event. Often the transportation department will even waive fees if your event promotes alternative transportation.

  

It is best to obtain a street closure permit application early on, so you can get an idea of what you will need to do and what some of your expenses will be. Think big! Consider applying for a huge street closure permit to transform your city’s central arterial street into a pedestrian plaza for the day. By applying for a big street closure, you will become very familiar with the permit process and you will then be poised to close streets to car traffic throughout the year.

 

Make sure to include some side streets in your application, so that if your big street closure permit is denied, you can still have a block party. Once you are well-versed with the procedures, write up a programme that details how to navigate the permit process in your town and distribute widely.

 

12 steps to street closure

 

This story was written by Sara Stout and appeared on Shareable.net. It was originally published on Carbusters. It is reprinted here with permission.

 

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