We made it through to another Friday! Time to recap all the lovely sunny goodness on the site this week. And—pssst—it’s our first anniversary next week! How cool is that?!?

• Monday, I wrote about how true optimism can only be earned through action. Mark my words: “Optimism = responsibility” will be the “Where’s the beef?” of 2009.
• Tuesday, Uli updated us on the progress of her Organizing for America group, which has been together since the Obama campaign and is working through their ideas of how to best contribute to the task of perfecting our union.
• Wednesday, Victoria shared her thoughts on supporting children’s development—certainly a powerful way of creating the future—through tutoring.
• Thursday, I spoke of my love for the Little House books, and how important it is to recognize the good values from our past so we can carry them forward.

Today’s video is a short interview with my man Enrique Peñalosa in which he discusses what makes a city great: “We can have a city that is very friendly to cars, or a city that is very friendly to people. We cannot have both ... Mathematically, it is totally impossible to solve the transportation problems of a city using cars.” Mayor Bloomberg seems to have been listening—witness his recent proposal to turn Broadway into a pedestrian-only space.

I find this hugely exciting. I understand that much of the US is built so that cars are necessary, but that is not the case in New York. How great would it be to be able to walk down Broadway enjoying Times Square with plenty of room to move around and without having to worry about getting whacked by a taxi?

More broadly, how great would it be to be able to walk, ride trains, bike, and bus our way to most places that we need to go? If sitting in traffic becomes a thing of the past? My hope is that, as we work to improve infrastructure in this country, we become less dependent on cars and more connected with each other.

Let us know what you think of reducing the role of cars in our lives ...