Better Block Houston profiled on NPR

How to change a neighborhood

Jay Blazek Crossley, Aug 10, 11.

The Better Block Houston project, which was a temporary transformation of a block of Holman at LaBranch in Houston’s Midtown, was profiled on NPR’s nationally syndicated Marketplace:

Kai Ryssdal: Those of you who live in pedestrian-friendly cities may not believe this, but there are people from more car-centric cultures—Los Angeles, just for instance, or Houston, Texas—where it’s nothing to drive, like, a mile on a quick errand instead of just hoofing it. Part of that’s force of habit. Part of it, though, is a lack of inviting places to walk, or enough safe routes to ride your bike.

In Houston, though, one group is trying to change that—block by block. From KUHF, Wendy Siegle reports.

Wendy Siegle: Zacq Lockrem rolls a small paint-striping machine down Holman Street in Houston.

Zacq Lockrem: There we go. Bike lane. So now we will go down and put the little bike guy in the middle too.

Within hours, that bike lane will be painted blue. It’s all part of a 24-hour stunt to turn a boring urban block into a vibrant one overnight. Lockrem and more than a dozen volunteers will pick up trash, and set up food stalls and cafe seating on the sidewalk.

Jay Crossley is an organizer with Houston’s Better Block Project, a movement that started in Dallas and is now spreading to other parts of the country.

Jay Crossley: We’re trying to show just how we can transform a neighborhood through transforming the street.