Morning @BethOsborneT4A! I feel like you asked me a question yesterday on Slow Streets, but I can't find it so just replying here. It was a great question so I wanted to make sure to answer it. Thanks for asking! Never said cities shouldn't do slow streets...a

When (white) ppl read critiques or commentary from BIPOC folks and then minimize and simplify what we're saying to that I think it's often racist, anti-Black and extremely white-and wealth centered.

(White) Transportation folks like to create false dichotomies and then blame BIPOC folks for not understanding or conflating when in reality we are seeing and experiencing the world differently and frankly much more clearly and on a deeper more nuisanced level.

Experiencing place and space in nonwhite or queer or disabled or poor or...any oppressed group...bodies means we understand on a deeper level than those criticizing (and often attacking) us that being 'safe' is more complicated than slowing down traffic or coloring a lane green.

So absolutely places should invest in white-centered, able bodied, cisgendered infrastructure that centers those with wealth and access to resources and power, but they also have to acknowledge that that's exactly what it is and as a result has some limits.

If I'm on a slow street or in a bike lane but someone thinks my Black skin makes me dangerous or that I don't belong in that neighborhood then that planning intervention will be used as a tool in policing my mobility and can ultimately result in the loss of my life.

Same if I'm eating on a sidewalk-in a tent or not-but someone seems me as unsightly as opposed to a deserving diner.

So jurisdictions & decision makers & advocates & all those who say they care have to fight for money, policies, & programs that get to the white supremacy, anti-Blackness, racism, ableism, sexism, etc. that is built into our built environments and the institutions that govern it.

So tldr version do both: build slow streets and...
Implement sidewalk dining and....
Understand that if we want all community members to thrive thinking this work is neutral is simply building on past inequities and fortifying them.

I know this was more than you probably needed or wanted early on a Thursday. Lol, but I so respect you and your work, thay I wanted to make sure I was as thoughtful as I could be...on twitter. Ha. Anyways, thanks for asking.