Charles Brown is the founder and CEO of Equitable Cities, a consulting firm assisting with urban planning and design. Brown’s focus at Equitable Cities is on improving infrastructure for those without access to a car and highlighting the way transportation and equity are interlinked.
Brown spoke at the Tri-County Regional Planning Commission’s “Walk, Bike, Ride Greater Peoria: Paving the Way to Just Transportation” event earlier this week. I spoke with him afterwards to learn more about the connections between transportation and equity and moving away from a car-centered design philosophy held for decades.
This transcript has been edited for clarity and brevity.
Could you tell me a little bit about Equitable Cities? What do you do there?
Brown: Equitable Cities started about nine years ago, we work at the intersections of transportation, health and equity. Our clients include federal, state and local governments. The aim is to create more bicycle friendly, walking friendly and transit friendly communities around the US.
When we talk about walking and bicycle friendly infrastructure, we sometimes think of those as amenities. Would you explain a little bit how equity plays into the idea of improved transportation infrastructure?
Brown: Simply put, it’s giving people what they need to enjoy full, healthy lives. And when we look at the health statistics in this country, we could see that Black, brown and low income populations are disproportionately impacted by traffic fatalities, by lower access to everyday destinations, such as grocery stores. And we also know that when we look at their health overall, there's disparities across race, ethnicity, and income. So the tie to equity here is we can increase people's access, their mobility and their health by making communities more friendly for walking, biking, and taking public transit.
Can you give me an example of some of the kinds of projects that assist in these goals?
Brown: So we will work with cities to develop bicycle and pedestrian plans, which ultimately look at where, how, when, and to what degree people can be mobile in space. We look at crime prevention through environmental design, where we assess the built environment to see what impact crime may have on walking frequency. We also look at access to food and healthy places, such as parks, and open spaces. So those are the types of projects we would do.
The Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill was passed and there’s been a lot of projects, IDOT has been doing a ton of projects related to transportation infrastructure in Illinois. Do they relate to this? Or does it need to be more focused on biking and walkability?
Brown: Yes, it's about completing streets, meaning through new infrastructure investments. It's about maintaining existing streets through maintenance programs. And then lastly, it's about reconnecting communities. So removing highways that have historically been placed in Black, brown and low income communities, so that people can know once again, gain safe, equitable access to everyday destinations.
As a society we've been building for cars for decades now, how do you start chipping away at this idea of our public spaces being designed to get us as efficiently as possible in cars from one place to another?
Brown: Where the mode shift that you're speaking about from automobile to more people powered modes, such as bikes, and other forms of transportation is only possible if people have destinations within walking distance or transit distance. If it's safe, if it's accommodating, and persons with disability can move about without any barriers. So it's possible when we invest in the places where people live to create 15 minute cities for all.
Would you explain a little bit what 15 minute cities mean?
Brown: 15 minute cities is this idea that everything that you need for the most part is within 15 minutes in terms of a time span. It doesn't mean that you're only limited to that space. It means that ideally, one wouldn't have to travel far outside of their community for the things that they need most, such as food or groceries, health care, education, etc.
Are there health benefits to 15 minute cities?
Brown: Absolutely. It reduces our dependence on automobiles, which helps to protect the environment, which helps to make people healthier, because there'll be walking. It also reduces emission because it increases our use of bicycles and more electric modes.
As you're traveling around, what do you see as some of the transportation issues in Peoria?
Brown: I'm seeing a lack of intentional and targeted investment in street infrastructure that makes it safer for Black, brown and low income people, and quite frankly, everyone to get around. Ideally, you would complete more streets, you would maintain the streets that you have, you would remove the amount of litter that is present. You would reinvest in businesses, local businesses, and ultimately, you would target sustained crime that is in certain areas of your town. And I think investing in infrastructure is one way to do that, over policing.
Tonight, you were walking around with some of the tables, this was a roundtable discussion, about some of the ideas people had and some of the concerns they have about transportation here. What were you hearing, what was coming up in those conversations?
Brown: People are concerned about speeding, people are concerned about being hit by a car. People are also concerned that they don't have affordable access to transportation options that take them to and from work. They're heavily reliant on an automobile. So this auto-centric environment brings about those concerns, because you have to be of a certain demographic to be able to afford and sustain that level of access by way of automobiles. But what I hear mostly, though, is that people care about the community. They love the community, and they hope to see it return to its glory.
How do you start getting through to people who don't want to have to not just hop in their car and go where they go every day? What's the hearts and minds component of this?
Brown: Well, it's about looking out for those most vulnerable in your community. It's not a zero sum game. You're not forcing something upon people. What you're doing is providing options for everyone. And so that's the win-win here. You don't have to give up your car. We just want to make it safer for those who don't have access to a car.
