Long Beach, CA

Level: silver
Population: 461,823
Population Density: 9,164/sq. mi.
Contact: Michelle Mowery
562.570.6618
Michelle.Mowery@longbeach.gov

Community Highlights

Long Beach is designated as a Silver-level community due to its pedestrian safety enforcement activities, excellent transit access, and sidewalk coverage. Highlights of Long Beach’s application include:

  • Long Beach’s 2017 CX3 Pedestrian Plan includes a focus on medium-density, low-income neighborhoods with higher than average pedestrian mode share that would especially benefit from walkability improvements. Their 2016 Downtown and TOD Pedestrian Master Plan contains major infrastructure improvements that will improve pedestrian access to the Metro Blue Line and the surrounding community.
  • The City installed an ‘Eco-Totem’ automated counter along a newly separated pedestrian path, and created a city wide mobility challenge around it called #CountMeInLB.
  • Long Beach has carried out over 20 Road Diets since 2010, and has made their signal operations more pedestrian friendly by installing countdown timers and implementing rest-on-red signals at certain intersections.
  • The Long Beach Police Department is dedicated to pedestrian safety enforcement – 100 percent of officers are trained in pedestrian laws and safety. The Department’s traffic safety division has police patrolling on foot and bike, with 30 officers bike patrol certified. Enforcement activities also include progressive ticketing and speed feedback signs that are installed throughout the City.
  • With transit services that offer long operating hours and short headways, 93 percent of Long Beach residents live within a quarter-mile of a bus stop or with a half-mile or a rail stop. Long Beach Transit (LBT) recently made improvements to the pedestrian environment at the downtown Transit Gallery, where 90 percent of routes pass through. Improvements included extensive public art, new shelters, lights, and landscaping. LBT also works with the City Public Works Department on bus stop location and improvement projects.
  • Long Beach has good sidewalk design standards and 100 percent sidewalk coverage on arterial and non-arterial streets. Sidewalks are repaired on a regular maintenance schedule and the City has almost complete curb ramp access in compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.