{"id":63,"date":"2026-06-02T04:14:33","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T04:14:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/urbanatlasmedia.com\/?p=63"},"modified":"2026-06-02T04:14:33","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T04:14:33","slug":"does-your-city-need-a-department-of-sidewalks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/urbanatlasmedia.com\/?p=63","title":{"rendered":"Does Your City Need a &#8216;Department of Sidewalks&#8217;?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>A sidewalk is more than just a strip of asphalt. It\u2019s a place where countless laws collide. Those laws govern our movement, our safety, our right to free speech and our economy. They dictate who exactly is responsible for shoveling snow after a blizzard. But most communities don\u2019t have a single agency that manages all of these competing concerns \u2014 and maybe it\u2019s time they create one.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Today on The Brake, we interview sidewalk law expert Michael Pollack about his new book\u00a0\u201cSidewalk Nation: The Life and Law of America\u2019s Most Overlooked Resource.\u201d\u00a0And in that book, he untangles the dense web of policies that shape our pedestrian spaces, which might just change the way you look at sidewalks forever.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/urbanatlasmedia.com\/?p=53\">Talking Headways Podcast: Community Severance by Road<\/a><\/p>\n<div>\n<iframe allowfullscreen=\"\" frameborder=\"0\" loading=\"lazy\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-forms\" src=\"https:\/\/play.libsyn.com\/embed\/episode\/id\/41499030\/height\/192\/theme\/modern\/size\/large\/thumbnail\/yes\/custom-color\/fdb80b\/time-start\/00:00:00\/hide-playlist\/yes\/download\/yes\/font-color\/000000\" style=\"height: 192px; width: 100%;\" title=\"Embedded content\"><\/iframe>\n<\/div>\n<p><em>For an unedited transcript of this conversation (with AI typos), click here.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The overlooked sidewalk has become a central site of public life. We should treat it like one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":62,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-63","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-brake"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Does Your City Need a &#8216;Department of Sidewalks&#8217;? - Urban Atlas Media<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/urbanatlasmedia.com\/?p=63\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Does Your City Need a &#8216;Department of Sidewalks&#8217;? - Urban Atlas Media\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The overlooked sidewalk has become a central site of public life. 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