Sunday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Jeffrey Sachs writes that the fight against climate breakdown demands a concerted solution to global problem – rather than political wrangling over…
Transportation
Save Money and Lives with Smaller Fire Trucks
Firefighters are making cities harder places to live in, this might seem like an odd thing to read. It’s counterintuitive since we’re used to thinking blindly that the firefighters (and…
Creative Ways to Communicate Mobility in Cities
Navigating cities can be a challenge for anybody with mobility issues due to a lack of infrastructure and poor communication. Decades of efforts to improve urban design have made a…
Talented, Smart People Want to Take Transit
The amount of people who want to drive to work is dropping while the people wanting to take transit is increasing. This is happening despite of 100 years of car-focused…
Transit-First Pilot Project in Toronto a Success
Toronto is a city where the car reigns supreme and any suggestion of sharing the road is deemed to be a war on the car. It’s surprising then that last…
Big Data Proves Bicycles are the Fastest Mode of Transportation
Regular readers of this site already know that in urban settings using a bicycle is the best way to get around. Thanks to an on-demand food delivery company there is…
It’s Time to Argue for Better Modes of Transit
The video above The Guardian explores the costs of subsidizing cars in cities and looks at alternatives to car-focussed design. In the UK Nottingham raised the price of parking to…
Investing in Walkable Communities Saves Cities Money
Having multiple forms of transportation improves how people navigate the world. When people are provided with mobility options they will more likely leave behind a car. It turns out that…
Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Ben Chu reports on the conclusion from the chief economist of the Bank of England that decreased unionization in the UK is…
How Australia can Make Roads Safer
Since roughly WWII we’ve been designing roads and streets for only one purpose: the automobile. Before the 20th century roads were designed to move people around efficiently, today roads are…
One Spanish City Banned Cars and Found Success
Cars in cities just cause traffic and block other modes of transportation so one Spanish city decided to do something about and banned car traffic in its downtown. The results…
Providing Bike Lanes is Better than Providing Parking
In North America riding a bicycle in the cities built for cars can be stressful. Because these cities are designed for cars it’s hard to get anywhere quickly and New…
For Happier Cities get More Cyclists
Cities where people cycle regularly are happier than cities in which cycling is rare. The evidence continues to mount that building good cycling infrastructure will improve the life of everybody…
Denver Saved Itself by Investing in Trains
The 1970s oil crisis left an impact on the city of Denver in the forms of good public transit. The writing was on the wall that individualized transit infrastructure that…
Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Simon Wren-Lewis discusses how media negligence allowed austerian economics to be treated as credible long after any pretense of academic merit has…
Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Humberto DaSilva comments on the need to recognize that it’s the distortion of the political system by the wealthy that’s left most…
Saturday Evening Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Joel Achenbach and Angela Fritz discuss how climate change is amplifying all kinds of extreme weather (with severe heat as only the most…
Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading… – Thomas Torslov, Ludvig Wier and Gabriel Zucman examine the shifting of corporate profits to tax havens – and the false promise that corporate…
How Canadian Cities can Copy Copenhagen
“It’s colder here than anywhere else” is a popular myth that Canadians tell themselves which then leads to Canadians thinking that solutions used in the rest of the world won’t…