Why is it always presumed that a landlord cannot be asked to weather a bit of a bumpy ride for a short period, but tenants must do everything right or face the consequences? If a landlord can't handle a limited amount of arrears, they shouldn't be in business.

Interesting parallel between the failure of DC's H Street streetcar and CalHSR: both gambled on prioritizing the least value segments on the idea that the full project would need to be completed, only to have the whole thing go bust. thetransitguy.substack.com/p/why-the-dc...

When someone says „Scientists do not want you to know“ you can dismiss everything from there on. Scientists want you to know. They are desperate that you know. They can’t shut up about what they found out and want you to know.

I guess doing a pour-over for everyone would take too long?

it looks like footprints stopped growing. i wish they had data on height. still, a very cool report.

check out this graph of sea ice. or is it Colorado watershed rainfall. or EV sales. no my bad it’s science funding

This, from Ada Palmer as part of The Chronicle's survey of 11 scholars on the future of higher ed, is what I needed to end the week.

@littlejohn.bsky.social 🎸Crünchy Puddles, a Mpls-based, kid-friendly metal band (h/t @douglasmack.bsky.social )

A message from the Wonderwall

"Minneapolis", 1925 lithograph by Ukrainian-American Louis Lozowick, Smithsonian American Art Museum

"The unnamed Himalayan ridge calls for aid!"

The Bay Area's new transit map is out and it comes with one incredibly exciting change: parks accessible by transit services! Let's talk regional wayfinding to parks and destinations 🧵

You don’t hear it much, probably due to corporate capture of media, but this is what FDR did that got the ‘33 Act and the ‘34 Act passed. generational anger at corporations funneled into aggressive legislation that would have been unthinkable ten years earlier.

I don’t have kids, but I think often about how urban parenting offers so many opportunities to teach spatial awareness and what it means to share a world with, and make room for, others. This is a recurring thought because I encounter — daily — so many ppl who clearly never learned these lessons :)

✨ introducing… ✨ 🌇 Transportation for the Abundant Society 🚅 "Abundance" says our problem is artificial scarcity—especially housing. But you can’t build your way out if transportation policy still treats traffic flow as sacred. Transportation is the binding constraint. ssrn.com/abstract=538...

2027 Mud Season Olympics 2029 Stick Season Olympics

X's algorithm is in fact doing what you think it's doing. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Make winter biking an Olympic sport you cowards

For no particular reason, thinking about how the Minneapolis Aquatennial was concocted by business men in 1940 to water down the memory of a 1934 Union victory that happened in spite of violent and deadly opposition

The problem with the pathetic quiet of so many local elites during the ICE crisis isn't really that they failed to meet some partisan political bar, it's that they failed to meet a basic *civic* bar. We need a new class of local leader who loves the city + state as much as its everyday people do.

Is it Braess’s paradox if adding a new link prompts the owner of an existing link to employ radical regulatory capture to block the new link’s opening and preserve his profitable monopoly of a network bottleneck?

If you cannot do it with people watching, what you're doing is not "law enforcement," obviously. It is legal to observe ICE, and the people committing "obstruction of justice" here are not the observers. This should be 100000000% obvious.

Never thought this piece from 2017 would apply to the Super Bowl halftime show but here is some FURTHER READING

a few FASCINATING TIDBITS from my research into the history of seven-layer dip 1. This appears to be the first published use of the term "super bowl" to as a pun referencing a bowl of football snacks. Dec. 31, 1971.

SHAKESPEARE IS ALWAYS RELEVANT ABD NECESSARY.

I love this guy, very calming using historical analogy reading his city council for filth.

Aren’t we paying them to do… something… too?

It's S-curves all the way down

It is not illegal to watch, record, follow, or track immigration officers. It *is* illegal to threaten, punish, or point a gun at them when they've done nothing illegal. If all these people were doing is observing, this is a crime. As are all the similar videos. We can't let this become normal.

happening this morning in Minneapolis -- ICE agents drawing guns on observers. I reiterate again that it is only a matter of time before DHS kills more innocent people in Minnesota. Congress needs to shut this shit down right now.

Evergreen and for the whole country. If this ends before they get to your town, you’ll have some meals prepped and you will have made some friends. You cannot lose.

A retiree wrote this email to a DHS attorney. Within five hours, DHS demanded Google turn over records for his account. A Kafkaesque form of domestic surveillance, intimidating Americans for lawful speech. New from us at the Post: www.washingtonpost.com/investigatio... @johnwoodrowcox.bsky.social

This attitude underlies so much of the chaos of the past year — change the rules *while people are in the process of following the rules* and then punish them for following the "old" rules. It undermines the very *idea* that security or stability can be found anywhere other than blind loyalty.

Text of lawsuit by Gateway project vs. US government for failure to fund the cross-Hudson tunnel. The key issue: The US government suspended funding for this vital infrastructure project because that project used DBE contracting, but the DBE contracting was *required* by the US DOT's own rules!

This makes the Jan 23, 2026 action the largest strike in Minnesota History, and depending on which number you use, 3rd in American History after the massive national strikes of 1919, or the Great Railroad Strike of 1922. I note with extreme interest that mainstream media didn't report these facts.

A new poll finds that 1 in 4 Minnesota voters took part in the Jan 23 shutdown against ICE, or have a loved one who did. Of those, 38% DID NOT WORK, either because they made the choice to stay out, or their workplaces closed. By me, @thomasbirm.bsky.social, @bloomekatz.bsky.social

Deportation is a transportation issue The words deportation and transportation share a common ancestor in the Latin portare, meaning "to carry." Their prefixes define their intent: trans-port is to carry across; de-port is to carry away or off. Both relate to the porta—the gate or threshold. In…

I’ve been fascinated by the story of the 1st Minnesota since I first heard it. I wrote this to connect some dots that feel like they point in the same direction, even if they start 160 years apart. andrewowen.bandcamp.com/track/first-...

Handmade roundabout sign is great

In 2025, just 560K tons of grain moved through the Duluth port — the lowest level since 1890. 1890! In the StarTribune, weather is specifically blamed, but tariffs aren’t even mentioned. Here’s a better report on the DLH shipping disaster from Wisconsin Public Radio. www.wpr.org/news/trumps-...

Violating hospitality is one of the oldest proscriptions across so many cultures.

Some jawdropping CBP crime statistics here...

First Minnesota Inspired by the 1st Minnesota Infantry Regiment and... *gestures widely* It's CC-SA; I'd be honored if you listened, performed, or improved it!

They just gassed my park. Flash banged, and arrested an observer. Why?? They parked illegally in front of the community center, hung out. Waited till people came out, then gassed. Targeted enforcement my ass

Working on something about the USA's stated ideals and engrained mythology and grim realities (you know, easy stuff to address in 600 words) and once again remembering that no one can ever nail it quite like Langston Hughes