STYLE GUIDE | NEW YORK CITY DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

LOGO STYLE & USAGE

DOT Logo
Originally designed in 1995, our logo has recently been updated with a new green color (as opposed to its original red) re ecting the Agencys commitment to sustainability. DOT is exploring ways to green all aspects of our operations, including our vehicle eet, facilities, and thousands of streetlights and signals. Our logo is no exception. The new green logo shown below is now the of cial DOT logo. Please do not use the old red logo on any new materials.

The Jackson Heights Transportation Portal: A Virtual Public Meeting Space for the Agency and the Community
Why use a portal?
The Jackson Heights Neighborhood Transportation Study is a comprehensive, multi-modal transportation study to address the safety and mobility of pedestrians, transit and vehicles, as well as quality of life issues in Jackson Heights, New York, NY. To support the study, NYC DOT created a transportation portal to present community outreach materials and news updates from the process. Project staff can easily publish news updates and share documents, and community members can easily provide feedback on the proposals. The Jackson Heights site was New York City DOTs first Transportation Portal - an interactive website that acted as a virtual public workshop. On the Portal, community members are able to view all documents, access a calendar of events (and receive RSS feeds whenever the calendar was updated) as well as use the data map and communicate with the project team. The data map featured layers of technical data, such as average speeds, pedestrian and traffic volumes and parking occupancy, that users could turn on or off and even download to analyze on their own. Recommendations for the study were shown by location and type, with improvements shown in slide-show format with text descriptions. The front page of the Portal is reserved for blogtype posts from the Project Manager, which encourage comments from community members and quick responses from the Project Manager.

nyc.gov/dot/projects/
Standard Logo. It is preferred that this version of the logo always be used where practical.

Contact:

Black Logo: Use where color printing is not an option. Ex. Fax Cover Sheet

Neil Freeman. Director, Web and New Media, NYC DOT. 212-839-6468 nfreeman@dot.nyc.gov
Single-Color Green Logo: Use where 2 or 4-color printing is not practical Ex. A brochure printed using a single color (green) White Logo: Use when design circumstances merit the use of an all-white logo. Ex. Logo must be placed over a dark background.

Low-resoultion versions available for download on the Creative Services section of the DOT Intranet. For High-resolution versions, contact Creative Services.

OpenPlans role in the project

NYC DOT worked with OpenPlans to develop the portals. Work began on the portals in Fall 2010, using the Jackson Heights project as the pilot. Working iteratively, NYC DOT and OpenPlans designed and added new features over time. At the end of the project, NYC DOT will be left with a framework that makes it easy to create new portals without requiring an external consultant. OpenPlans is a social enterprise developing open-source technology solutions that make cities run better. The software developed with NYC DOT is available for re-use by other agencies. Find out more at openplans.org

Other portals
NYC DOT used the portals framework to create three more sites. Bike Share
nyc.gov/bikeshare

Data and downloads

Past presentations and documents can be added for download. Items are arranged by type of document. In this section, the map data files are also available, for exploration offline.

Recommendations
The proposals for Jackson Heights are presented as slideshows, with key features of each proposal highlighted and described in the text underneath. The proposals are grouped by location and type - so visitors can explore all proposals for a particular intersection, or all aspects of proposals relating to pedestrian safety. Visitors can comment on the proposals, helping NYC DOT to collect additional feedback.

NYC DOT created an interactive map to gather public input on suitable locations for the Bike Share program, coming to NYCs streets in summer 2012. The site included an interactive map, making it easy to drop a pin on the map where youd like to see a bike share station. Visitors can share locations and leave comments.

Open source
The portal is built on an open source publishing framework, and is itself also open source. This permits the greatest re-use, and enables NYC DOT to benefit from future improvements by other users. The portals run on Wordpress, a widely-used content publishing framework. Using Wordpress makes it easy to add new features by including existing plugins. The tools built into Wordpress for styling and arranging content made it possible to develop and extend the portals over time as NYC DOTs needs changed. OpenPlans open source theme is called PlanningPress. Find out more at openplans.org/projects/ planningpress

Although the proposals are presented as an interactive slideshow, the print version of the pages lays out each slide of the slideshow with the written description presented below it. This feature was added in response to feedback from user testing with community members.

Chinatown Curbside Management

nyc.gov/dot/projects/chinatown-curbsidemanagement

The website runs on an open source publishing framework, created by OpenPlans, a nonprofit software development group working in close consultation with NYC DOT. By choosing to support an open source software project, NYC DOT can benefit from future enhancements to the platform. In addition to the Jackson Heights project, the portals have been used for three other studies, including gathering public input on station siting for NYCs bike share program.

Front page
The overall site theme matches the NYC DOT web look and feel The side bar and flexible front page can be reconfigured by project staff as the needs of the project change, for example adding banners, photos, featured comments, and summaries of recent comments. Pages and sub-pages can be added and removed from the menu.

The Study is also the first implementation of the Neighborhood Transportation Study approach, based on a community-driven process and shortterm treatments that are meant to be implemented within 1 year of the completion of the Study. In addition, the Study constantly reinforced a commitment to the neighborhood to monitor these treatments and adjust as necessary.

In Manhattans Chinatown, NYC DOT and partner organizations have developed a study plan to address parking conditions through community outreach and coordination. The portal presents progress on the study, and will be used to gather information about local conditions and feedback on proposals.

Project background
Jackson Heights, Queens is a diverse and vibrant neighborhood in Northern Queens, containing historic areas and residential streets as well as the Jackson Heights Shopping District. The Shopping District serves as a local and regional retail and dining destination with a considerable amount of vehicular and pedestrian activity. Local residents and merchants asked DOT to explore changes that can help create safer, less congested streets and better transit access for this vibrant community. Building on previous work performed by the NYC DOT and the community, the Transportation Study is envisioned as Phase 1 of a two phase study to comprehensively address transportation issues in Jackson Heights. Phase 1 will focus on short-term improvements, e.g. changes to curbside regulations, traffic signals and temporary markings, while Phase 2 will focus on longerterm improvements that would require intensive analysis, capital commitment or major coordination with agencies other than NYC DOT. Phase 1 of the study is paid for by City and Federal funds, secured in part by Congressman Joseph Crowley.

Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway

nyc.gov/dot/projects/greenway

Interactive map Project timeline

Early 2009: Study Begins. DOT received City and Federal funds (obtained with the help of Congressman Joseph Crowley) to conduct a neighborhood transportation study in Jackson Heights. In order to maximize the usefulness of the study to Jackson Heights residents and visitors DOT decided to break the study into two phases, with short-term improvements to be implemented as longer-term solutions are designed and budgeted for. May 2009: first Community Advisory Committee meetings. DOT convened a Community Advisory Committee to receive input from key stakeholders representing different organizations, businesses and civic interests in Jackson Heights to provide continuous input throughout the life cycle of this project. July 2009: Community Workshops. Community members identified transportation issues and concerns in an interactive small group format. Summer 2009: Neighborhood Walk-Throughs. DOT staff held a series of walk-throughs with community stakeholders to identify issues and potential solutions in the field. See the notes from the visits. Fall 2009: Data Collection. DOT and its consultants collected data about traffic speeds, pedestrian volumes, street vendor locations and curbside parking space occupancy. Winter 2009-2010: Data Analysis. DOT and its consultants analyzed the data and prepared findings to share with community stakeholders. April 2010: Community Visioning Workshops. Community members created a vision of how Jackson Heights streets will look and function, and create the framework for future transportation improvements. June 2010: Queens Community Board Presentations. DOT staff presented findings and feedback from community meetings to the transportation committees of Queens Community Boards 3 and 4. October 2010: Transportation Portal goes live Fall 2010: Develop Short-Term Improvements. DOT worked throughout the Fall of 2010 to develop proposals for short-term improvements that were shared with and refined by community stakeholders. February 2011: Presentation of Draft Short-Term Improvements. NYC DOT held a community forum to present the draft improvements to the community for comments and review. June 2011: Presentation of Revised Plans to Community Boards 3 and 4. NYC DOT presented the final short-term improvement plans to both Community Boards. Each board voted unanimously in favor of the plan. August 2011: Implementation begins. NYC DOT collected transportation data in the study area, including traffic speeds, parking occupancy, pedestrian volumes and crash data. A survey also collected locations of street vendors on sidewalks around the commercial core. The interactive map presents these datasets as map layers that visitors can toggle on and off, overlaid on a Google basemap showing a map or aerial background. The map legend describes each layer, including information about when it was collected. Visitors can toggle between weekday and weekend data. The map can be expanded to fill the screen, allowing the data to be explored in more detail. Visitors can grab a permalink to their map, making it possible to share the current view of layers with others.

Goals and Objectives

The overall study goals for both phases of the Jackson Heights Neighborhood Transportation Study are: Improve pedestrian and vehicular safety Improve economic vitality through transportation improvements Improve quality-of-life by minimizing air pollution Identify, and prioritize, types of users for streets and public spaces Encourage use of efficient and sustainable modes of transportation Encourage efficient use of on-street parking

Timeline
The timeline answers those common questions about long-running community outreach projects: whats happened? whats coming next? NYC DOT staff can easily add new items to the timeline, and choose to show specific dates (e.g. a meeting) or phases (e.g. ongoing work throughout the Spring).

The Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway is a proposed 14-mile pedestrian and bicycle trail, intended to increase access to the waterfront, improve pedestrian and bicycle safety, and connect the numerous public open spaces along the waterfront. The portal presents news updates on public outreach, and an interactive map of the route options.