"The number of office-to-apartment conversions in the U.S. pipeline at the start of 2026 grew to 90,300 units, a 28% increase from a year earlier." www.wsj.com/real-estate/...

To build a highway across an entire metro area to carry 72,000 people an hour at peak, you'd have to wipe out enough city to fit 32 lanes plus ramps and intersections. The Elizabeth Line does that every day with no emissions, no traffic jams, no crashes, and no surface disruption in central London.

Who knew it would take a Democratic Socialist to get some law and order www.amny.com/news/mamdani...

The state wanted to widen the original Robert Moses monster even more. nyc.streetsblog.org/2026/05/18/b...

@governor.ny.gov Now that a few hundred LIRR folks held up a few hundred thousand riders to get their raises and keep earning $200k to move trains like in the 1950s, consider that this train works just fine without a driver or conductor. Which is one reason it comes every three minutes.

Buying a home in America used to cost 2-3X median household income, but now 4-10X. Cities below 5X are either in demand and build aggressively, or are in relative decline. If your city is in demand and not building, it's a problem. You can find yours on this graph live in the reply link.

New study of 38 cities in Europe that cut speed limits to 30 km/h (19 mph) on many streets, shows safety gains and no impact on congestion or trip times. Better flow (less clumping, fewer stops/slow restarts) compensates for lower top speed. See reply below for another dramatic case not in Europe.

IMO, if you want to protect "the children," you should do something about the two leading causes of death for US children. (Guess which party works relentlessly to prevent any progress on this score.)

How package delivery works in Venice

"In March, the first month of the war in the Middle East, more than 344,000 electric vehicles were registered across Europe, over 40 percent more than a year earlier, according to the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association." www.nytimes.com/2026/05/08/b...

In Malibu for a wedding. Speed limit on Pacific Coast Highway cut to 25 mph for rebuilding from 2025 fires. Multiple signs, radar displays showing actual speeds, pleas to "Slow Down!" So far seen zero people driving under the limit. So next time someone says cyclists don't follow traffic laws...

The next time someone claims driving isn't subsidized, look at the world's governments and US states giving up billions in tax revenue to contain the spike in fuel prices from the war. www.reuters.com/business/ene...

Just witnessed power of price signals to solve "impossible" traffic. São Paulo has famous jams into intl airport, but now started free-flow-tolling express lanes, no charge on others. People can choose to save time or save money. Taxi took us rush hour from south side SP in 30 mins, usually an hour.

If São Paulo can get cars off its equivalent of Fifth Avenue every Sunday and holiday, which can't New York do it on Fifth Avenue? @nyc-dot.bsky.social

Brazilian art from a bike, Bandeirantes sculpture group on the right, batucada on the left (sound)

A kissing canopy, but of bamboo (Ibirapuera Park, São Paulo)

Cars are dehumanizing us. How to even explain this map to someone in western Europe?

It was only in 2018 that New York started barring cars from Central Park. Now it's hard to imagine they were ever allowed. The former drive has become “the most heavily used resource in the park by a wide margin.” www.nytimes.com/2026/03/31/n...

New buildings like this going up in São Paulo offering one dedicated electric-vehicle charging spot per apartment

Mobility so light it works indoors too

There's only one policy in the world that has ever really reduced traffic jams in crowded cities and this is it. But what's cool is it makes the city better for everyone, not just drivers. www.nytimes.com/2026/03/27/o...

His chain is ours.

Paris just elected another pro-bike mayor, but France's second biggest metro area is Lyon, which re-elected its own, Grégory Doucet

Great analysis on how California is not getting the general benefits that normally come from hosting important industries -- in this case the world's top tech companies -- due to the barriers blocking more people from living near them. open.substack.com/pub/matthewy...

And... it's official. 53% for Grégoire vs 38% for the right and 9% for the farther left. www.politico.eu/article/soci...

Former Fiat and Michelin plants, now a park. Turin, Italy.

Mayor Anne Hidalgo spent 12 years making Paris a place to bike more than drive. Some said pushback from Parisians with cars might hurt her deputy and successor candidate. Emmanuel Grégoire. But first-round results are in, and he beat expectations, now in a strong position to win it all.

What a great piece if you follow this stuff sethackerman.substack.com/p/eur…

In the first six days, "Pentagon officials told lawmakers... the cost of the war had exceeded $11.3 billion," or 3.8 billion NYC bus fares.

When you leave Cadorna train station in Milan, you get lots of mobility options

Prospective Car Buyer Takes SUV Out For Test Hit And Run https://theonion.com/prospective-car-buyer-takes-suv-out-for-test-hit-and-run/

The city of Helsinki thinks driverless buses are how to get the best of autonomous-vehicle technology without the behavioral problem of people flooding urban zones with AV cars once the time-and-focus cost of driving disappears. www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsOR...

Graphics software makes a fine floor-mosaic design, but is it realistic to try to execute something this intricate?

American citizens are emigrating in record numbers, and it's not (just) political. www.wsj.com/us-news/amer...

Winter done right in Jersey City

It's winter in New York, but summer in São Paulo

There was once a plan to run a bus lane and a protected bicycle lanes down Westwood Boulevard. It might have been one of Los Angeles' great promenades. Instead, NIMBYs killed the proposal, and now it's a round-the-clock car sewer where people randomly die in extremely violent ways.

@zohrankmamdani.bsky.social this is the kind of thinking we need for 42nd Street. What a world-class upgrade, and probably pays for itself in real-estate tax value. Tram connects to the ferry docks at both ends and one subway line after another. youtu.be/CKpOjL5kbVE?...

When these cycleways were being built in the 2010s, a black-cab driver told me Transport for London was run by fools because Londoners don't cycle

I used to follow the Brazilian power industry for professional reasons but never imagined wind & solar could rise this fast. 14 years to get from near zero to about a quarter of electricity supply, in a $2.8 trillion economy. Almost all the rest is hydro.

Bike bridge, summer in São Paulo

Here's a reform that's been overlooked but fixes a problem caused back when city planners thought car speed was all that mattered. The choking of downtowns wasn't just from highways and parking lots but also one-way speedways. apnews.com/article/one-...

Driving school Italian style, teaching sidewalk parking

These two represent economies that produce $35 trillion a year of output, 20% more than the US in local purchasing power. They just signed a free-trade deal. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/09/b...

Not sure if gift articles can be shared in multiples, but this is the best review of the first year of New York congestion pricing www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Back in São Paulo. Grey day, Sunday family lunchtime, plus peak summer-vacation weekend. Never seen this bike/coffee lounge so empty.

A murderer is on the loose in NYC. He killed a man, 25 years old, immigrant from Ecuador, who was just walking home from celebrating the New Year. His weapon was an SUV, so this gets treated differently from other killings. He may get a ticket— for fleeing.