Locales

Bike Bakersfield has been the local bike advocacy group in Kern County since 1997. Executive director Jason Cater sat down with Streetsblog to discuss what's new for the group since it helped expand the Arvin Bike Kitchen last year. At the top of its agenda is adding new bicycle parking in Downtown Bakersfield.

Kern County, at the southern end of California’s Central Valley, is known for its small communities fostering the production of oil, agriculture, dairy, and beef, and more recently wind power. Spread across the county are small farming towns like Lamont, Wasco (rose capital California), and Mcfarland, all covering the ground with crops. Other communities like Buttonwillow and Taft, home of Elk Hills Oil Fields, once the U.S Navy’s largest petroleum reserve, are connected by fifty miles of freeway that are lined with oil derricks. Thirty miles over the mountains of Tehachapi, wind power is taking hold in the desert towns of  Mojave and California City. Crammed anywhere they can fit are dairies, even on the outskirts of Bakersfield.

Transit riders on Bakersfield’s Golden Empire Transit, better known as the GET bus, found their fares increased on August 1, but the increase will go towards rising operating costs rather than expansion of transit service.

The complex relationships between parking requirements, cities, and the cost of housing got a thorough analysis in a long article about Oakland, California, in this week's East Bay Express.

Bakersfield is not known for its culinary delights or world class restaurants, but there is one kitchen that stands out.

BART planners presented their ideas for renovating the 19th Street Station last week during two in-station events, seeking public comments on a plan to “improve the look, feel, and usability” of the station.

The California central valley town of Modesto is not usually high on anyone's list of cities embracing cutting-edge pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure. But that may change soon.

This is the third part of Streetsblog California's look at changes afoot in Oakland, California. On Tuesday, Ruth Miller discussed Mayor Libby Schaaf's proposal to create a Department of Transportation. Then Damien Newton talked to local planner and livable streets advocate Chris Kidd about the future of Oakland, and more about the DOT proposal.

This week, Streetsblog California takes a look at changes occurring in Oakland, California, related to the way the city plans and implements transportation projects.