Stop trying to solve traffic and start building great places

It’s a situation far too common for most Americans. You’re sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic on the highway, again. Hundreds of cars are idling around you. It’s a typical, backed-up commute to work. Frustrated, you might wonder: How did we get here?

It wasn’t an accident. Our congested commutes are the result of decisions that stretch back decades, to when Americans began to build their communities around cars. Today, the ways in which we plan and invest in transportation continue to contribute to problems like congestion, lack of accessible and affordable transportation options, and a sprawling, unsafe, and ecologically destructive built environment. 

Behind many of these challenges lies a measure familiar to transportation planners and engineers: “level of service,” or LOS. This seemingly innocuous statistic, however, is one of the biggest reasons we’re literally and figuratively stuck in traffic—and it signals a need for a new way to guide our future plans and investments. Click here to read the full article by the Brookings Institute 

From Highway Boondoggle to Neighborhood Boulevard

In a recent Facebook post, I got caught in a back, and forth about the never ending transit conversation in Hillsborough County, Florida. There was a criticism of a former county commissioner Mark Sharpe (Republican) and his transit boondoggles. I've known Mark for a long time. I'm well aware of the expenses of the many transportation studies and the waste they generated. I've barked at him for years. Sometimes there were small victories but saw very little manifest. Republicans dominate our County, and they vote party line whether it's right or wrong.  We have for years lobbied, participated in endless roundtable discussions demonstrated and appeared in droves to the many public meetings and for what? Zero.

Charrette meeting in Seminole Heights, Tampa 2016

Aside from all the rhetoric, the fact remains a mass transit system is necessary for a burgeoning metropolis such is the case of the Tampa Bay region. We need a dedicated source of funding, raising the millage by 2 points would be a good start.  We need a functioning urban planning team with a mandate to help build a grid and systems to move us forward. What we have today lacks the political mandate to grow an integrated system with mass transit and roads.

The current County Commission continues to allot lands to developers without incorporating the impact of how those future residents travel from point A to point B. It has been like this for the whole tenure of the Republican led county commission. Their mantra is if it doesn't make a profit it's not worth it. Well, there's a good argument against that logic. When it comes to most government services, they still have to operate in bad economic times. The private sector, on the other hand, tends to bailout when times are tough.  Remember the hoopla around Ybor Centro? Though it's not an essential government service, the premise is the same, when it crashed taxpayers then had to foot the bill.  Mass transit is mostly a government service. Airlines get massive subsidies from the federal government. Some from the Department of Defense, others from the Essential Air Services program to aid rural areas. The benefactors are US based airlines. You would think they would have loyalty to country and its workforce, but many have outsourced other components with those subsidies.  The private sector is not all compassionate. It's all about the investors and in most cases shortchange their employees.

Image courtesy TBBJ by Janelle Erwin

Concept by Joshua Frank, Urban Planner

There is good news. A new generation is stepping up to the plate proposing viable alternatives to our transportation needs, incorporating both the public and private sector. There's currently a proposal to create a Boulevard to replace the north south segment of I-275. It offers opportunities for the industry by way of building the infrastructure. Afterward, condos, apartments, offices, tech centers, schools, the possibilities are many.  Two things stand out, unlike roads, it expands our tax base and provide upward mobility for the masses.

Metropolitan Planning Organization Public Meeting August 1, 2017 at 9:00 a.m.

Positive Reinforcement, if only we could do it with humans

[This training guide by Emily Larlham is for humans to learn how to train their pets with positive reinforcement. If instead, you substitute someone you know like a neighbor, friend or family member and practice Progressive Reinforcement, you just may make the world a better place. Mauricio Rosas, 1/28/2017]

Progressive Reinforcement Training Manifesto

By Emily Larlham

The Need for a New Term:

A type of animal training exists that involves no forms of intimidation, confrontation, violence, reprimands, or domination. This non-violent kind of training has gone under many names: “Clicker Training,” “Positive Training,” “Positive Reinforcement Training,” and “Reward Training,” among others.   There is a need for a more specific, more accurate, more inspirational term. "Progressive Reinforcement Training."

Service Dogs from New Horizons Service Dogs are trained to understand

"Yes" as their reward for desired behavior. (added by Mauricio Rosas)

The above terms have been used so loosely in recent years that they have lost their original meanings.  How has this happened?  Trainers who use compulsion methods may incorporate a clicker (a noise maker to mark desirable behavior) and refer to themselves as a “Clicker Trainers.”  Trainers who use painful or intimidating methods may include food or toy rewards in their training and refer to themselves as “Reward Trainers” or “Positive Reinforcement Trainers.”  It is already possible that a member of the public may seek the guidance of a trainer who claims to be “Positive,” only to find out that this she routinely uses physical violence towards animals. I propose a new term the general public can use to refer to this type of modern training – a training system that is not only humane, compassionate, and reliable but is also based on the latest scientific studies.  Because this form of training consistently incorporates the latest and most reliable scientific findings, and because it furthers an evolutionary progress toward a more harmonious relationship between humans and the animals who live with them, it shall be referred to as

Progressive Reinforcement Training essentially means teaching animals by rewarding desired behaviors and excluding the intentional use of physical or psychological intimidation.

Progressive Reinforcement Training means:

1) Training by rewarding desirable behaviors so they will be more likely to occur in the future while preventing reinforcement of behaviors that are undesirable.

An example:  Letting a dog walk forwards while the leash remains loose to sniff a bush as a reward for not pulling, while not letting the dog reach the shrub if the leash becomes tight (so that pulling on a leash is never rewarded).

Another example: If you are training a dog to greet guests politely, you first reinforce the dog for calmly keeping all four feet on the floor (not jumping) in exciting situations, and then when the dog does jump up, you remove your attention briefly (by turning away from the dog- as attention is rewarding). However, if you simply tried to train a dog not to jump up by turning away from the dog repeatedly without rewarding him for the correct choices – the dog could become frustrated.  It is true that if the dog figures out that the jumping is not getting attention, the dog will try an alternate behavior – however, a dog will more likely try jumping higher, barking, whining, and nipping over standing still or sitting for attention. By rewarding the dog for what you want him to do first, you give the dog a default behavior to try when what he is doing is not working.

Examples of Rewards:

Roscoe will do anything for a toy! 

(added by Mauricio Rosas)

Food, toys, attention, people, other animals, running, sniffing, swimming, going outside, coming inside, etc.

Keep in mind the animal chooses what is rewarding, not the trainer. This means that if you give your dog a treat for sitting and then ask him to sit again and he doesn’t sit, it’s very likely the dog does not find the treat rewarding.  Other things to keep in mind are rewards will not be effective if the animal is full, or the animal is stressed.

2) Interrupting and preventing undesirable behaviors without physical or psychological intimidation, as well as rewarding the other response (training a behavior you find desirable in its place).

An example: If you want to teach a dog not to lie on your couch, you train the dog to do what you want him to do first.  That is, you teach him to go and lie on his dog-bed.  Then when he does try to go on the couch, you interrupt him and redirect him to the appropriate location (his dog bed) so that climbing onto the couch remains unreinforced.  During the training process you, also use management and prevention: while you are away from the house, you block the dog’s access to the couch, as he would likely choose to lie on the couch – and be reinforced for it – in your absence.

You can interrupt an animal’s undesirable behavior so that he is not self-rewarded without using physical or mental intimidation.  To do this, you can train the animal to respond to an attention cue or recall: something that means, “stop what you are doing and look at me,” or “stop what you are doing and come here immediately.”

A very basic training plan for training an attention noise to interrupt behavior:

First, you can make the noise that you want the animal to respond to (a whistle, or a kissy noise) and then feed a treat. Repeat this until the animal is expectant of a treat after the sound.  Next, make the noise while the animal is looking away from you and AS the animal turns to look at you (for the treat) mark that behavior with either a click (using a clicker) or by saying “yes.”  Once you have repeated this step, you can then add distractions.  Have the animal on a leash so he cannot reach the diversion (perhaps a low-value piece of food on the ground)- make the attention noise, and click or say “yes” and then feed a treat if the animal turns towards you after hearing the sound. If the animal does not turn towards you, do not click or say “yes.”  The animal should not be allowed to reach the distraction that it is interested in.  You can take a step backward from the distraction to make it easier so the animal can succeed.  You can condition this attention noise or a recall to muscle memory in the same way a driver responds to a green light traffic signal (green light means go!).  Once you have created many different scenarios where your animal can disengage in what he is interested in to come towards you and look at you, you can start using the sound to interrupt behaviors that you find undesirable.

Keep in mind that if you ignore the animal and only pay attention to him when he is doing an unwanted behavior, you will be training the animal to do exactly that which you do not want by providing your attention whenever the behavior occurs.  So the GOAL is to reward the animals other responses to the same situations in conjunction with interrupting and preventing the undesirable behaviors.

Example: If your dog steals your underwear and runs around the house with them to get your attention, you have got to reinforce your dog with your attention when he is calm and doing NOTHING.  When your dog is lying at your feet quietly, that is when you will reinforce him with MORE attention than when he runs off with your underwear.

 3) Taking an animal’s emotional state and stress levels into account.

Trainers practicing Progressive Reinforcement read an animal’s body language to the best of their ability for signs of stress or arousal and adjust their training approach accordingly.

Example: Removing a dog that is offering stress signals from a situation where a child is chasing or pestering the dog.

4) Socializing and teaching an animal to cope with his environment using reinforcement.

You can use Progressive Reinforcement Training to socialize and teach an animal to cope with his environment by letting him experience low or non-stressful situations in which the animal is likely to succeed and earn rewards for desirable behavior.  You can then increase difficulty and distractions as the animal succeeds, with the goal of creating a confident, well-adjusted animal.

An example: Teaching an animal to be relaxed and calm while being handled or restrained by using reinforcement.  Pavlov’s dog was trained to have a new emotional response to a bell because the sound of a bell was followed by food. You can train your dog to enjoy handling, very simply put, by touching the dog and then feeding the dog a treat, and increase the invasiveness as the dog remains unstressed by the situation.  If the dog were too shy away, the trainer would have to go back a step to where the dog was comfortable (Classical Conditioning).

Another example: Feeding a dog a reward for remaining relaxed and calm around an exciting situation (perhaps a road with loud traffic), first from a distance and then as the dog succeeds from closer and closer.  If the dog were to become too excited or stressed, the trainer could go back a step in the training process until the dog was successful.

 5) Using a marker to train, whether it be a clicker, some other noise-maker, your voice or touch, or a visual marker.  Or, on the other hand, not using a marker, and instead, for example, reinforcing an animal by feeding a treat directly to his mouth.

A marker can be used to pinpoint behavior.  It tells an animal that what it's doing at that exact moment in time will win him reinforcement.

For example: If a dog sits, the trainer can click as the dog is sitting, and then feed the dog a treat.  Or the trainer can say, “Yes!” in a positive tone as the dog is sitting and then feed the dog a treat or release the dog to get a toy or go out the door.

Reinforcing behavior is also possible without using a marker.  For example, you can feed a dog a treat for looking at another dog to change his emotional response to the other dog (Classical Conditioning).  You can also reinforce your dog for calmly lying around the house or outside by tossing him a treat between his paws while he is not expecting the treat and he will be more likely to repeat the behavior in the future.

 6) Employing humane, effective, respectful training based on the latest scientific evidence.

A commitment to Progressive Reinforcement Training means strictly following all of the above principles – not just in training sessions, but during 100% of the time spent with an animal.

Progressive Reinforcement Training does not mean:

1) The intentional use of physical or psychological intimidation.

Using your voice, touch, body language, a device, or the environment to intimidate an animal for the purpose of continuing, initiating or ending the animal’s behavior.

Examples: staring at an animal, intentionally leaning over him, poking, jerking, shocking, squirting with water, startling with noise, or using your voice in an intimidating way to suppress behavior (saying “no” or “eh!”).

 2) Intentionally disregarding an animal’s stress levels or signals.

Deliberately putting an animal in overly stressful situations in which he cannot cope, rather than exposing the animal in a way that he is under his threshold (the animal can make choices and cope).

Example: Forcing an animal to meet a stranger while the animal is offering a wide range of stress and avoidance signals.

Example:  Dragging an animal across a surface he is frightened of and refuses to cross, instead of teaching the animal to feel confident and calm crossing the surface using Counter Conditioning (rewarding the animal for choosing to take steps across the floor until the animal is confident to cross calmly on his own)

 3) Holding selfish or uncompassionate goals for your training.

Intentionally putting an animal at risk for physical or emotional damage to satisfy one's own interests.

A commitment to Progressive Reinforcement never means deliberately using the intimidation tactics above – never in training sessions, and never during any other time spent with an animal.

Why refrain from using Physical or Psychological Intimidation? 

For scientific, moral, and ethical reasons. Using these forms of conditioning can produce unwanted side effects in addition to the basic trauma they do to an animal.

 The many problems with using physical or psychological intimidation:

1) Without perfect timing, intensity, and consistency, the “training” amounts to nothing more than abuse.
2) The animal learns to avoid the Punisher in order to indulge in undesirable behavior.
3) These techniques can cause irreversible emotional damage to the animal.
4) The punishment can increase stress hormones, arousal, and aggression.
5) Animals can habituate to the punishment – meaning that the intensity of the punishment must keep increasing to have any effect as the animal learns to endure it.
6) You cannot change an animal’s basic emotional response to find children, adults, or other animals (or anything for that matter) reinforcing by using intimidation; you can only suppress the dog’s punished behaviors.
7) Intimidation can cause dogs to hide their warning signs before attempting to bite.
8) Dogs trained with punishment can feel trapped by their handlers, since the decision to leave a ‘stay’ or to leave the handler’s side (to escape from a bothersome child, for example) can cause punishment.  Animals who feel they have no escape tend to bite rather than move away.
9) Intended intimidation can actually increase the behavior you wish to extinguish, as intimidation involves giving a form of attention to an animal.
10) The presence of the Punisher becomes less reinforcing for the animal.  If you punish your dog using intimidation, it is harder to compete with the reinforcement value of other things in the environment.  Your dog will find other stimuli in the environment more reinforcing than you as the dog increasingly associates you with punishment rather than reward.
11) Dogs who have been trained with physical or psychological intimidation do not offer behaviors on their own as readily when asked, making complex behaviors difficult to train
12) Handlers who use intimidation as punishment will punish their animals more easily in the future as punishment is rewarding to the handlers themselves (they get the result they wanted- hitting a dog made it stop barking, so they will be more likely to hit the dog in the future).  In other words, using physical or psychological intimidation causes one’s own behavior patterns to change.

In conclusion, Progressive Reinforcement Training is not a permissive form of training.  It requires providing consequences to all behaviors.  The trainer takes on the role of a benevolent leader and guide using these ethical and scientifically based methods.

Source: http://dogmantics.com/progressive-reinforcement-training-manifesto/

Black and Minority Urbnites were Considered Blight

The construction of American highways provided for unprecedented economic growth but it also tore apart Black and Minority communities in the urban core
Help Stop Tampa Bay Express (STOP TBX) and the widening of I-275 sign up

FDOT's TBX Express Lanes are a Safety Hazard to First Responders

Tampa, FL - As the discussion of the TBX moves closer to an inevitable decision it's important to recognize Tampa is being asked to sacrifice its urban core's economic viability and building lanes that are dangerous.

"Research on toll roads in Tampa by Sisinnio Concas, a professor at the University of South Florida’s Center for Urban Transportation Research, found that the improved access delivered by new toll roads to neighborhoods in the suburbs of Tampa and Miami increased land and property prices in both areas by about 5 percent." Not all properties values are affected by freeways in the same way. Proximity to the freeway was observed to have a negative effect on the value of detached single-family homes, writes Jason Carey. In other words the Historic Heights Bungalow style homes would decline in value and blight would take over.

In a research paper for AZDOT, Impact of Highways on Property Values: Case Study of the Superstition Freeway Corridor, Jason Carey writes, "Highway users might expect to benefit from reduced travel time, reduced vehicle operating costs, and reductions in the frequency and severity of crashes." It appears the opposite is true. Instead of fewer crashes the Florida State Troopers reported 12,000 + crashes in a span of three years on the I-95 express lanes. In fact, March 5, 2011 "was the deadliest I-95 accident in Miami-Dade County for at least the past decade, according to an analysis of crash report by WLRN, Florida International University professor Jeffrey Onsted and The New Tropic." FDOT's express lane has received the ire of law enforcement. "Florida Highway Patrol Troopers are extremely reluctant to make any traffic stops in the express lanes, for fear of placing the motorists

School Bus Crash on I-95 Miami Express Lane 

they stop, and themselves, in danger from the traffic speeding along side." We recently found out the Tampa express lanes on the segment north of the Downtown Interchange will be reduced from 12' to 11'. The allowed minimum width by FHWA is 12 feet.

With these many safety concerns and loss of property values, the Tampa Bay Express Lanes are DOA.

To find out more about Stop TBX click here

Executive Director of TBARTA, Chiaramonte seals the deal for I 275 Expansion

Raymond A. Chiaramonte, Executive Director of TBARTA (Tampa Bay Area Regional Transportation Authority) seals the deal for 275 expansion. 

In response to a letter Chiaramonte writes:

Dear Mr. John Q. Public,

Thank you for your email. We greatly appreciate your interest in transportation issues in the Tampa Bay area, specifically Hillsborough County. With over 450,000 new residents expected in Hillsborough alone by 2040, it is certainly an imperative that citizens stay engaged to provide the best possible solutions that benefit not just us, but the region as a whole.

Regarding TBARTA (Tampa Bay Area Regional Transportation Authority), we do not advocate for transit alone – the needs of our region expand beyond a single mode – but address the needs and choices of all commuters, including car, bicycle, walking, boating, carpooling, transit, as well as expanding options for freight across the seven-county region of Citrus, Hernando, Pasco, Hillsborough, Pinellas, Sarasota, and Manatee County. We also work closely with Polk County, and constantly collaborate with HART, PSTA, PCPT, MCAT, SCAT, and other transit agencies and planning authorities to advocate for solutions to our regional transportation issues.

There is no transportation mode silver bullet solution that will address all of the issues that we face to keep our region a place individuals want to live, work, commute and play. We live in a very complex, rapidly growing metropolitan area where all modes must be expanded to meet our ever increasing needs. To start, it is critical that we acknowledge, as a region, the multifaceted nature of urban transportation, and that to remain competitive with other regions throughout the state and country, we will need to be flexible in our approach. The key to this will be to remain collaborative and committed to open discourse throughout the process, making regular improvements through review and assessment of how the proposed solutions address the needs of our communities. Your engagement has been, and continues to be meaningful proof that we are well on our way to successfully addressing this challenge.

Specifically regarding the Tampa Bay Express lane project (TBX), the project is confined to the same areas as the original build of the interstate system did in the 1960’s. There is little if any new Right-of-Way needed north of Martin Luther King Boulevard or west of downtown since the envelop for the project is already largely in place. Construction is also almost totally within existing ROW between downtown Tampa east to the Polk Parkway. The only area where some additional right of way is needed is the area of the existing interchange between I-4 and I-275 near downtown Tampa. FDOT is working with the community to try and come up with final designs that could actually improve some existing situations in that area. It is important that community leaders participate in this effort in making sure this 20-year-old project is implemented in the best possible way.

The importance of this project to connect the region together cannot be over emphasized. The TBX lanes are the foundation of a project that includes 4 out of the 8 top regional priorities for TBARTA’s seven-county region. These projects form the core of the region’s main transportation plan providing access to Hillsborough County’s regional centers. As you probably know, Hillsborough employment nodes form the largest job centers in West Central Florida, this includes Tampa International Airport, the University of South Florida, the largest hospitals, largest port, largest convention center, largest museum area, and Busch Gardens, the largest attraction. Tampa International Airport just alone serves over 4,000,000 people annually from outside Hillsborough County, roughly 11,000 people a day (20,000 daily if you include Hillsborough residents). These numbers make up only 39% of airport passengers – the other 61% of passengers are tourists who do not live in the region, but use our roadways.

Along with the attractors mentioned, Hillsborough County absorbs huge amounts of incoming traffic each day with 230,000 vehicles entering from the north and 240,000 vehicles entering from the west; this is not even considering the traffic from the east and south. These lanes will greatly help in separating some of this pass-through traffic from local traffic. These are facts that exist and must be dealt with using all forms of transportation solutions.

The plan for TBX lanes include the opportunity for express bus transit connecting the immediate areas outside the City of Tampa, and will ultimately include the entire seven-county region with premium transit. The express bus system now in place in Miami-Ft. Lauderdale has 2,500 boarding’s a day on its express lanes. This will provide an important move forward for premium bus transit while at the same time in some cases providing the transit envelope for future rail transit. The TBX lanes will also allow emergency vehicles and school buses an opportunity to bypass existing traffic. We have to start expansion of transit somewhere and the express lanes provide the opportunity for doing that.

The reconstruction of the interstate system to serve the immense transportation needs of a region approaching 4,000,000 in population can help address neighborhood issues that already exist through consideration of sound walls, landscaping, trails, CPTED design, iconic gateways, lighting and other possible amenities to be considered as part of the design process.

The bottom line: this is a way for the Tampa Bay Area to move forward toward transit that can include both bus and rail in the future. It is our turn for a major project in this region. The money will go to another region if we do not follow through. If we let this opportunity pass, we will only be that much further behind in addressing our transportation problems. This can be a win/win situation if we work together. We can’t work on solutions unless we move forward and work together on a plan through the PDE process.

Again, we appreciate your interest in this issue, and hope that in the future we are able to engage in an open dialogue about transportation options for our future. We look forward to this opportunity.

Best Regards,

Ray

Ramond A. Chiaramonte

Executive Director

Tampa Bay Area Regional Transportation Authority (TBARTA)

New address: 4350 West Cypress Street, Suite 700 | Tampa, FL 33607

P: 813-282-8200 | 800-998-RIDE (7433) | F: 813-282-8700