If part of what cities need to do is become antifragile and embrace streets not roads, then how do we do this? We’ve spent time talking about the history, methods and rationale for a new way to think about roads. In sum, I’ve argued that we can kill the concept of the road and potentially reinvigorate cities through a new vision for streets. But, particularly in an era where we face an unprecedented need to restore the environmental sanctity and social justice of our cities, I think it is important to consider how we take action. It is import that we do as Pope Francis suggests in his recent encyclical and not separate environment and social challenges.

So how do we do this? In my experience, while plans and visions are important, they are simply words until we (citizens, policy makers, engineers and planners) take unabashed actions, exercise leadership and use management inertia to make change. And there is so much work to do to change that we need to make a start on our streets and in our cities. There are so many streets that are not friendly to walking and biking. There are so many roadways that are hostile to public discourse and transactional exchanges. There are many streets where we need to take action on both environmental and social challenges.

I have spent a large portion of my career focused on trying to reinvigorate a dialogue about how streets can be a catalyst for change. I observed forms of social segregation and environmental marginalization as central cities gentrified and have long argued that walkable places need to become more available to poor and minority populations. In this light, I have always been careful to say that economic development and gentrification are not necessarily the problem, but when uncontrolled they can be a symptom and have negative consequences.