I recently rewatched the Wolf of Wall Street and holy cow... it's 180 minutes! Who has the time?? And it would have been funnier if it was cut by at least a third imo

The Fed must set different interest rates in Spokane

"We’ve lived all our lives in the Great World 2 Afterparty, and now that party is over." www.noahpinion.blog/p/the-great-...

One way to reduce condo defect liability: stop forcing architects to design buildings that leak. HCD’s “objective design standards” guide *encourages* making building envelopes more complex, heightening leak and therefore defect lawsuit risk cao-94612.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/documents/Ap...

Pattern language

Must-read think piece from @ebwhamilton.bsky.social on the connection intersection of housing and family formation. "To Support Families, Repair the Housing Ladder" www.governing.com/urban/to-sup...

Yes, it is true. www.grassrootinstitute.org/2025/10/long...

In the 2000s, a proto-YIMBY bill would have prevented Texas localities from mandating HOAs in new subdivisions. From Beyond Privateopia

Kind of unexpected chart from @ebwhamilton.bsky.social: In the US, the ratio of 3 and 4-bedroom housing units to households has actually grown quite a bit in the fast few decades! You hear a lot about a shortage of family housing, but this suggests the opposite? www.governing.com/urban/to-sup...

Thanks Bobby! I'm sure there are neighborhoods where your approach is badly needed and Baby Maybe units make more sense than the marginal studio/one-bedroom.

I agree w Emily there needs to be more housing for incremental life stages. I have 0 disagreements w her policy recommendations My emphasis for "family" housing (as a developer) is on building Baby Maybe units rather than Studios, bc I think they are under supplied relative to demand I'll explain🔽

This is another excellent piece from @ebwhamilton.bsky.social. I don't think I would've predicted how much we are overbuilding large bedroom housing to smaller housing even as household size shift and everyone complains "we don't need more luxury studios." It does in fact look like we need more.

Pro-housing voices from the right of center are increasingly focused on a "we need housing For Families" framing. In a new column I explain why broad-based liberalization, especially for inexpensive types of housing, is important for helping people start families: www.governing.com/urban/to-sup...

American zoning law, and downzoning

Thanks to Jason Sorens for reviewing @charlescgardner.bsky.social’s and my new law review article on protections against downzoning: jasonsorens.substack.com/p/regulatory...

I totally agree many museums are way too big and have way too much stuff. I like a small, tightly-focused museum where you can go, see most of what’s on display, and really learn something. DC’s Museum of Women in the Arts is a good example open.substack.com/pub/matthewy...

You know baseball season has been going on for too long when your 1.5 year old yells “more baseball song” all day to hear Seven Nation Army on repeat

It’s always interesting to me that this nazi aesthetic had a little moment in post-WWII DC

I have the trick or treater most likely to fret about the safety of new multifamily housing on a video call while driving a car

It’s kind of wild how retailers can offer free shipping left and right, but it’s exorbitantly expensive to mail a box house to house

Such a happy example of people practicing evidence-backed living: www.nytimes.com/2025/10/20/w...

The German company that makes the mechanical ladder used in the Louvre heist has used the image to advertise, with the text 'When you need to move fast' 10/10 response, no notes

I have recently heard/read several people describing the International Code Council's process for adopting model building codes a "consensus process."

I'm about to talk with a state legislator who was born in this millennium, and I was just called ma'am by an intern. All signs are pointing to retirement time?

Me rn

This Louvre story is catnip for my four year olds because a museum heist is the premise for many episodes of Spidey and his Amazing Friends. They are ready to head to Paris to crack the case.

Wow. The agenda is up for the 10/20 Council meeting... and it includes a settlement agreement in the White v. Charlottesville case. The city will prepare a Traffic Impact Statement by the process in 24VAC30-155. In exchange, the plaintiffs will drop the case against the new zoning ordinance.

Bumped into @ryanradia.com at the grocery store only to be humiliated to admit that we’d gotten there not by bike, not by firetruck, but by by minivan 😔

At 13 I babysat non-relative babies for money reason.com/2025/10/16/m...

My kids very rarely see TV commercials, but right now we’re watching Dodger baseball with commercials. This has caused them to learn about Disney World ☠️☠️☠️

In California, cities like to thwart new housing with affordable housing mandates. Texas cites thwart new housing with luxury housing mandates. The result is the same; less construction, higher prices.

Ridiculous costumes and expressing defiance through silliness is proving to be effective. You all owe 3rd wave ska an apology

I was married but I’m not married any more. Women don’t like the vehicle.

To the lawyers out there: how are public art requirements constitutional? What is the conceivable nexus between building a building and creating a need for more art? The new building will reduce the community's art per capita?

This is the county whose Democratic Party politicians have opposed every housing bill introduced by Scott Wiener in the last decade, saying they were best suited to solve the crisis. They are not serious people.

The ways that Texas NIMBYs are finding to make apartments more expensive to build are are funnier than what coastal NIMBYs come up with reason.com/2025/10/14/t... by @christianb.bsky.social

Updated the 2025 California Housing Legislation Highlights summary and illustration. Have a look at this year's results on housing bills! #CALeg tinyurl.com/2025housingbills

Overcrowded housing was a big reason why California had so many covid cases and covid deaths, despite so many precautions. today.usc.edu/los-angeles-...

If you want to really feel the housing crisis, browse the Census microdata for LA households with lots of people in them. About 16,000 houses in LA County have three bedrooms and 8+ people.

Someone needs to ask, "how does it save money to lay off people who aren't receiving paychecks?"

My first thought was “wow I hope this guy didn’t give out his name because he could absolutely be charged” and yup, he is correct to stay anonymous. This man’s account is shocking. His neighbors’ situation is shocking. The entire Chicago raid is shocking.

I’m listening to the podcast Sold a Story, and it is both fascinating and scandalizing. In the late twentieth century, schools decided to stop teaching reading to kids who couldn’t figure out how to decode words for themselves.

This Brian Potter post provides a thorough break down of the data on rising pedestrian fatalities in the U.S. open.substack.com/pub/construc...

Not to be that guy but the democrats should have had the foresight to see this coming when Obama did this exact same thing (including to US citizens!) and they did nothing. It’s not as if they weren’t warned by the ACLU and many others! Bipartisan “war on terror” foolishness delivered this.

Lmao who are the special interests pushing single-stair reform? Small scale multifamily infill developers who don't exist yet?

“The Montana experience shows why it’s often necessary to come back and pass cleanup bills to achieve policymakers’ initial intentions … Zoning and building code regulations have a 100-year history of making it more difficult to build housing over time. Unwinding this morass will take time as well.”

"'Momfluencers' and other social media phenomena that encourage parents to compare their children to other parents’ children are fueling an expensive educational arms race that may be contributing to record-low global fertility." www.brookings.edu/articles/pol...

I can't stop thinking about this. We're pursuing zero fire risk in multifam, while tolerating much more in single-fam. People respond by building and living in single-fam, where they're exposed to not only one of the highest fire death risks in the developed world, but also TONS more car crash risk

Love this new report on buildings' relative fire safety from @alexhrwtz.bsky.social and Pew colleagues. www.pew.org/en/research-...

Sorry to be extremely “back in my day,” but wtf has happened to the quality of Halloween candy buckets?