It's already Sunday and I've exhausted my cache of unread blog posts from the week, so I went in search of new blogs to read and can across this really good one: Spatial Analysis. A post from December has this set of maps – private turnpikes in 18th century London and the congestion zone map in the … [Read more...]
LaHood’s revealingly stupid reply to the WaPo’s HSR criticism
The WaPo earlier this week ran an editorial against California high-speed rail, and on Friday ran a response from Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. As the dedicated anti-California HSR blog High-Speed Train Talk says, the letter does a pretty good job of summing up everything that's wrong with … [Read more...]
Prince Charles on urbanism: the good and the bad
Prince Charles, perhaps the world's most famous urbanist, on Dharavi, which he's planning to replicate in either Calcutta or Bangalore: Unlike the ‘fragmented, deconstructed housing estates’ built in the West, the slum has ‘order and harmony’ he claimed, adding: ‘We have a great deal to learn about … [Read more...]
Midnight link list
1. "Gen Y/Millennials" want density. Ha! Sucks for them.2. Mini-bleg: Does anyone know what "building regulations" are preventing this proposed Jackson Heights building from having windows on one side?3. Southwest DC, before and after highways/urban renewal, in pictures.4. Overplanning … [Read more...]
Hump day list
Because for the first time since May, I have a hump day. Which is why all you get is a list.1. Traditionally, the NYC-dominated New York State Assembly's whacky rent control impulses have been tempered by the suburban/upstate-dominated Senate, but the NYT says that they may have struck a deal, … [Read more...]
Newsflash: there’s no supply and demand in a centrally-planned market
The NYT has an absolutely boneheaded article about the shortage of taxicabs in Manhattan during the evening rush-hour. They blame rising Manhattan rents and cabbies' schedules, but the statists at the New York Times don't see the obvious glaring issue: controlled prices and a taxicab cartel! They … [Read more...]
Yet another town moves from parking minimums to maximums with no stop in between
Despite its ridiculously biased opening sentence ("Fairfax County residents will have a harder time finding a free parking space in some neighborhoods if transportation planners get their way"), the Washington Post actually has a relatively informative article on potential new parking maximums in … [Read more...]
Terrorism and cities, then and now
I don't want to give anyone the impression that I (or Robert Fogelson) thinks that the threat of nuclear war in the 1950s was anything but a minor footnote in the history of American decentralization, but this bit from Fogelson's Downtown (I finally finished! – review forthcoming) caught my … [Read more...]