Proponents of the "we don't need new housing, we just need policies that shrink the STR market and push existing homes back into the LTR pool" approach to solving the housing crisis should be paying close attention to Spain, where this approach is being tested. Early results are not promising.

Bezos will never manage to be anywhere near as pathetic a figure as Musk is, but that won't stop him from trying.

I can't quite bring myself to accept that the man who might end Orban's rule is named "Peter Magyar." It'd be like if Trump lost to some guy named Joe America.

This is an interesting semantic question. Which is more regulatory? A) "You can do exactly one thing with this land" or B) "You can do several things with this land, some of which are more intensely rule-bound than the thing in (A) but you can still do that too?"

This seems like a big deal! I think I've been operating under the assumption that anything suitable for posthumous publication would have been out by now, so a very pleasant surprise.

The days of the L8 are now numbered, thanks to a mayor not afraid to stand up to the bitter angry motorists who demand transit riders share the misery their transportation choices creates. What a world. www.theurbanist.org/2026/01/15/k...

I have an article forthcoming in the Annual Review of Political Science called, "Participatory Democracy & Its Limits." It focuses on limited citizen attention & how participation can backfire, w/ land use as an example. Abstract below; here's a preprint: kevinjelliott.wordpress.com/wp-content/u...

While I'm sure there's some true believers, I suspect a non-trivial part of the explanation for this is that it's a policy that functions as an answer to the question "how can we appear supportive of left-populist economics, without committing to actually consequential left-populist policies?"

I can identify some reasonable reasons to prefer land use/housing policy is primarily a municipal affair. What I can't wrap my mind around is elevating that preference to a first principle/a priori/quasi-theological commitment as Marohn does. At some point, "does it work" is something we should ask!

Two kinds of people who participate in these anti-institutional investors buying homes panics: 1) Anti-renter bigots, who want renters segregated out of single-family home neighborhoods 2) People who are easily manipulated into endorsing bigotry & segregation with a bit of left-populist rhetoric.

Lots of ppl have embarrassed themselves in the Trump era, but the "pretending Trump is the anti-war candidate for reasons other than propagandizing for him" crowd are among the most contemptible. If shame were still a thing in our world, they'd retire from offering public political opinions forever.

I agree, but it's not going to mean much if it doesn't come with a willingness to impose/enforce penalties for driving w/o a license onerous enough to deter. Because the bad/dangerous drivers *really* don't want to stop driving, those penalties will probably seem excessively severe to normal people.

In a world where employers were prohibited from firing employees for hurling racial epitaphs at paying consumers, it's considerably less likely they would give someone with a questionable past (like this woman) the job in the first place.

The specific decision bothers me less than that politicians, even the "good" ones, still find it acceptable to describe allowing ever-so-slightly more housing in a place as "attacking" that place. There's no journey to that conclusion that isn't incredibly pernicious and ugly.

Just witnessed someone absolutely torpedo a first date by going all in on "Michael Jackson was innocent" trutherism. You could tell he knew exactly what was happening in real time, but he just couldn't stop himself. Just a brutal thing to witness.

I, too am pro-Gondola, buy my reasons are less about to my general pro-transit views than my equally strongly felt anti-busybody views. Encouraging these people by letting them win is bad for their souls. They desperately need to find more edifying, less socially corrosive hobbies.

Spotify once again making me feel a little ridiculous by pointing out just how much of my life I spend listening to Nick Cave/Warren Ellis soundtracks.

wonder if mamdani tried to single stair pill him single stair, folks. you’re hearing it more and more. single stair. it’s a beautiful term. makes wonderful homes - and we love a lot of beautiful, affordable homes. i think i probably just coined it. i’m not sure. but you’re hearing it more and more.

Very curious to see what his running game looks like going forward. It seems like even modest adjustments from opposing pitchers/defenses could have shut down his base-stealing pretty easily, but they just didn't ever do it for some reason.

I would like to believe MTG's recent turn against Trump was motivated by cynical calculation to advance her political career, because then we could expect others Rs similarly situated to reach similar conclusions. Alas, I suspect she's just an idiosyncratic conspiracist following her muse.

It's wild that the city in the US making the most significant investments in public transit expansion is also the city with the deepest, most unwaivering commitment to the principle that as few people as possible should be allowed to leave near transit stops.

Never has that Norm McDonald "I know this may seem harsh" meme been more apt

The answer to the question "Can you see a large body of water when you look out the window?" is a strikingly effective predictor of voting behavior in Seattle.

Something like this was inevitable, and I'm sure there's more to come, but I figured it'd be a fringe-major leaguer journeyman. Clase hadn't made big money yet but it's not hard to imagine him getting an 80-100 million dollar contract in the next few years.

This article suggests fare-free transit is "normal" in Europe; it's far more common in the US. Europe: Tallinn, Luxembourg, Dunkirk, Komarno (17th largest city in Slovakia) US: Kansas City, Lawrence, Albuquerque, Chapel Hill, Alexandria, Worchester, Missoula, dozens of smaller systems.

I'll do a brief thread about this in the next few days, but I just noticed my contribution to the Oxford Handbook of Republicanism, on the place of Public Administration in Republican theory, has gone live. Happy to send a PDF to interested parties w/o access. academic.oup.com/edited-volum...

Ventured out into the wilds of East Dayton this afternoon to try Taqueria La Cuchilla. Well worth it; cachete (torta) and al pastor (taco) both exceptional. The creamy/spicy avocado sauce they give you is something I had no idea how much I needed in my life.

Apparently, it's national cat day. Here's Willow and Nova, stealing my chair just seconds after I made the mistake of getting up.

Pleased to see DSA's better angels prevail on a very important vote. If you're voting for Mamdani and want his mayoral term to be successful on his own terms, passing these propositions is not optional.

This is revealing. Fryer is, for all intents and purposes, a Harrell campaign operative. He's given this prime real estate for an opinion piece a week before the election, and the number of specific, positive Harrell accomplishments he chooses to identify and promote in the piece is zero.

An early memory of mine is asking my parents to explain the (utterly deranged) Bircher political messages on this sign as a kid. It gives me a small amount of pleasure to learn it is now owned by the Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis reservation.

People kvetch about the chaos-inducing serial comma, but you can also do a lot with a colon! Beware, biographers!!

Is there any remotely plausible path toward some sort of sanction or punishment for Adrienne Adams, or whoever whoever else is directly behind these obviously illegal mailers?

Good. Pujols deserves better.

Regardless of whether this guy gets a windfall by selling, "people who value not living near apartments more than they value being in the walkshed of a major transit stop moving out of that walkshed" seems like a highly desirable bit of Tiebout sorting.

Harrell's campaign is leaning hard on the "experience managing large, complex organizations" argument. And yet here's a story where SDOT ultimately follows its own policies and does the right thing, but *in spite of* Harrell's leadership, thanks to pressure from his opponent's activist organization.

Quite the impressive leader Harrell picked for SPD. If your internal promotions cannot hope to withstand an article in local indie media factually recounting the incidents in the promoted individual's disciplinary file, maybe that promotion isn't the right call? publicola.com/2025/10/09/r...

Rough baseball day for us upper left corner folk, but a nice silver lining. Happy "Yankees Elimination Day" to all who celebrate.

Rumor is that Gavin Newsom is wavering on housing and might veto SB 79. If you live in California, please reach out to the governor’s office today: cayimby.org/call-sb-79/

Tip for others returning to blue books: The key to grading a big pile of hand-written exams w/o losing your mind is to identify the ones with the worst handwriting and grade them first. Then you're "grading downhill." I am amazed at how effective this simple bit of psychological self-manipulation is

Adam Bonica leans into comparative trends to argue that anti-corruption is a strong campaign strategy for Democrats. This leaves me conflicted. data4democracy.substack.com/p/the-democr...

Happy Astros elimination day to all who celebrate.

The "pretend my conservative policy preference (no new housing) is actually progressive by making sure the poison pills sound leftish" gambit is rarely quite so transparent and nakedly cynical.

For any scholars of human rights or related topics: the Human Rights Center here at Dayton is having its biannual conference in April, and proposals are due at the end of the month. Consider submitting! If you come, remind me of this post and I'll buy you a beer. udayton.edu/blogs/udhuma...

I know this is all bad-faith and pretextual, but the fact that these NIMBYs think this might work as a pretext reveals a incredibly grim, dark worldview.

Another flag there's something off about this model: The AL are collectively slight favorites. Perhaps I've drunk from the CW well too deeply but that seems obviously wrong to me. Gambling community is at AL +120, NL -140

I don't know what to make of the degree to which the fangraphs model is so bullish on the Mariners. Beyond the WS question, 60/40 to win the division when the H2H games are in Houston?

seattle - CM rivera's amendment 102 is a poison pill that does not protect tree canopy, and will curtail housing in wealth neighborhoods this will push more development into areas that don't have trees - increasing exposure to heat islands please sign & boost actionnetwork.org/letters/amen...

Very interesting to see this in Berkeleyside, which in my experience rarely deviates much from the standard left-NIMBY songbook. And yet here they are, plainly and unequivocally debunking a core tenet of left-NIMBY theology. I wonder if this is part of a larger shift, or just a one-off.