I’m glad to live in a great part of Minneapolis where kids traveling alone is okay. Didn’t start for us regularly until 2nd and 5th but now a year later they are pretty competent on their own.

Story time. This is why I love the city of Minneapolis!

“What I need you to know is we are organized. What I need you to know is that you need to get organized. What I need you to know is they are coming. What I need you to know is you can stop them.”

“I find Hampton a breath of fresh air and a reason for hope. He connects with people, listens intently, is pragmatic and values-driven and rejects the politics of division and anger.”

Why local developers aren't building apartments anymore. A case study. Flux Apartments in Uptown (pictured here). 216 units 2019: Sold for $54M Tuesday: Sold for $36.1M That's $167,000 per unit. If you wanted to build Flux today it would likely cost in the ballpark of $71M or $330K per unit.

Best thing California could do to fight fascism is build more housing.

This is a totally fascinating deep dive into one of those European social housing projects that goes mini-viral in North American housing circles because it's so pretty and cheap--and it turns out to be a lot more complicated. brendanwhitsitt.substack.com/p/24-does-eu...

This is the best discussion on transit funding I have ever read. All MSP urbanists who have followed the ‘how can we improve Met Council’ debate should read this.

I hate that one of my kids is at camp all week sleeping in a tent during an air quality alert. I did not send along masks and potable air purifiers but maybe I should in the future...

There’s gold in them hills

For some numbers : undocumented people account for 10% of the construction labor force and Trump's deportations could result in a loss of roughly 720,000 construction workers at a time when the industry is short about 275,000 workers

Home appliances should have custom melodies and beeps that can be selected after purchase. And a volume button.

I’m buying my kids a map to look at in the backseat of the car this summer so they learn how to read a map. I kept a road atlas on the side of the passenger seat for years until I got a smartphone. I also drew little maps with key streets after looking directions up online.

Maybe it’s okay Mpls and St Paul didn’t get a lot of compromised streetcars.

DC streetcar was so poorly designed: —No dedicated lanes & thus frequently obstructed by traffic —No connection to Metro or even the front of Union Station —No enforced signal priority, slowing trains —No real effort to improve the streetscape —Too many stops (8 stations/2.4 mi)

Turkeys are rewilding themselves in Minneapolis. Same with foxes and hawks.

@holz-bau.bsky.social @stephenjacobsmith.com Open question: how do we pay more and get lower quality housing in North America compared to Europe? What does a line by line hard cost comparison look like? Why do the costs differ so much?

It's not just you - it's hypernormalization

applying for jobs again

my buddy @resnikoff.bsky.social off the top rope with some actual class analysis www.thenation.com/article/soci...

Our windows may be contributing to our vitamin d deficiency

It’s “funny” that in the U.S. they consider the right wing owning most social & main stream media, unlimited money in politics, gerry-mandering in congressional seats, massive voter suppression efforts and even Russian bomb threats to be “free & fair elections.” And that’s just what we KNOW about.

Smart writeup from my colleague @pewilliams.bsky.social on how housing shortages impact the efficacy of voucher programs. More supply = more successful redistribution! www.firesidestacks.com/p/the-musica...

Build housing. Support a grocery store. Pedestrianize streets. Go nuts with a mural program. Expand farmers markets, sidewalk patios, and play spaces. Convert whole streets to trails. Add seating, public bathrooms, and shade trees. Just think of a place you like to spend time and why!

Someone should offer this man an auditorium for a community meeting to share the 36 hour NYC subway improvement plan.

No, this post is not about a Bette Davis movie, it is about roof overhangs and why they are useful, and why architects should get over their current fashion of avoiding them. lloydalter.substack.com/p/all-about-...

My latest: "Time to Wake Up And Confront The End of American Democracy" We're all in it now. Trump is flexing his authoritarian powers without any checks from Republicans or Democratic leadership. It's up to the majority to rise up & resist at every level. thelefthook.substack.com/p/time-to-wa...

Just found this fantastic thread. I need to read it to my boys

Is there a decent print newspaper I could subscribe to for my 10 year old to read?

New in PN: Trump’s "Crypto Reserve" is a world historical grift "It’s a kind of farm subsidy, but for billionaires making digital magic beans instead of food."

I’ve followed @mmasnick.bsky.social for years and this is the most important thing he’s written.

@klobuchar.senate.gov I quite like Bluesky. Do you like it too? There are a lot of nice DFLers around here. Can you remove your sponsorship of the Section 230 repeal so we can keep this place? Thanks.

Are contracts with the federal government worthless? If so, that has major implications for the real estate market…

They are just trying to destroy good government.

And we thought that the societal changes that C**** brought in March 2020 were substantial. The societal changes starting in January 2025 are going to be much, much bigger.

This is genuinely an important article. The two main lessons from Hungary appear to be: DO NOT WAIT DO NOT UNDERREACT Authoritarians like Orban and Trump rely on opposition being unwilling to believe that what is happening is actually happening. That’s their window. www.vox.com/politics/398...

I want to spell out the basic reason it’s so dangerous for Elon to have control of the U.S. payments system. It may seem like a technical matter, but the dynamics are simple. 1/x

What can we expect to come from these fires? Housing is fucked. Rents will skyrocket. Homelessness will go up. People will leave the area. Unemployment will expand. The film and tv industry is even more screwed. Building materials will run short. Infrastructure repairs will bankrupt cities.

L.A. wildfires awful news for an already awful housing affordablilty situation. * Rents to balloon, especially near Palisades and Altadena * More questions about home insurance coverage/premiums * Existing contracting/labor shortage * Slow building permitting www.latimes.com/homeless-hou...

@katiejonesmpls.bsky.social this is a cool bill to replicate in MN: single stair and elevator reform! Haven’t read the passive house and affordable housing parts yet

I need to show my 10 year old this thread for his next Minecraft house.

Little retrofit elevator in our building, big enough for two people standing with luggage (or, I think, one person seated in a manual wheelchair, although there were other barriers in the building to that). A million reasons ways the US regulatory system forbids this – no acceptance of global…

When I was in Oslo, I kept trying to take photos of the fountain with trams running through it but photos couldn’t do it justice! Then I sat in years of MSP transit planning meetings where we were told grass tracks just couldn’t be done here because maintenance. I didn’t ask for a fountain.

If plastic eating bacteria are released to eat plastic in the ocean, how long before the bacteria start eating coastal homes with lots of plastic in them? Window frames, insulation, siding, floors, furniture… www.anthropocenemagazine.org/2023/09/in-a...

Does Minneapolis have names for its bike lane snow plows? If not, can we name them?

Okay, Passive hive-mind: for a Zehnder ERV, what's your rule of thumb for # of supply & returns for making it efficient and minimizing CO2? The initial guidance we got from Zehnder was 'as few as possible'. Would 1 supply in a 245 sf living & 1 return in a 291 sf dining/kitchen be sufficient?

Optimist: the cup is ½ full Pessimist: the cup is ½ empty Full-time parent to small kids: No, she hasn’t any got more than you; both of you have got exactly the same amount of juice in your cups.

We are building a Passive House Duplex + Carriage House in Minneapolis. Duplex will be Passive House certified and Carriage House will be Zero Energy Ready Home certified. The crowdfunding campaign is live and has more details about the project: www.smallchange.co/projects/pas...

This quote made the list of the top 100. I had no idea the "quote collector" was watching.

My first post: a timeline cleanse for the five people following me.