When someone asked me how much my bike was, I’d be a bit sheepish and give a disclaimer acknowledging it’s “expensive”. But I stopped doing that because as a mode of transportation, high quality bicycles are cheap. I suggest bike people stop saying good quality bikes are “expensive”.

I recently started using my old Strida as part of a Regional Rail commute. Folding bikes and transit are like a super cheat code, shaving minutes off a commute time and expanding the reachable radius around transit locations. Would make a great youtube video.

"An influx of personally owned AVs would turbocharge total miles driven, especially through zombie miles that occur without any passenger inside...policymakers should be taking steps now to prepare for that possibility — and ensure that local communities don’t become mired in self-driving gridlock."

If I recall correctly, Brompton Bicycle became popular in London not from people who live in Central London commuting by bike, but more so from multi-modal commuters with rail/tube+bike. Folding bikes are ideal in cities that have incomplete transit systems that don’t go everywhere people need.

I went the whole month of May without using Uber or Lyft at all. I usually do 2-3 Uber/Lyft rides a month. My family is car-free, so this means we almost exclusively used transit, bikes, and walking to do everything last month.

I was at a bar last night and the person ahead of me was asked repeatedly if they wanted to keep a tab open. I think they were a native English speaker, but for some reason, they didn't understand what the bartender meant. They got a Liquid Death, so maybe they haven't been to a bar before? Weird.

I don't know how Arsenal lost despite The Killers performing the British national anthem before the game. youtu.be/gv_KBQHFzsw?...

Hearing someone play music live is such a gift. I was itching to go to a show tonight. Quickly listened to the artists playing at Milkboy and liked it so I went. Milkboy has a lot of good artists play there and it’s usually $20 or less. Support lesser known artists!

Not everyone who rides a bike is an ally. The "avid cyclists" are showing who they are on r/phillycycling when they think it's ok for EV owners to run a charging cable across a bike lane so they can charge their Tesla.

The highway expansion you committed $30 mil to is going to impact actual residents of south Philly and save drivers maybe 1 minute for about a year. How about you commit that money to SEPTA instead of a project that nobody here wants, that was pushed through in a deceitful way by PENNDOT?

This guy is a joke. Trying to "both sides" a traffic problem at the sports complex. The right solution is to invest in B line improvements and tell everyone to take SEPTA, not waste millions of taxpayer dollars on climate denying infrastructure.

Just picked up this book from the library. Walkability and pedestrian advocacy is an underrepresented focus in urbanism. Seems like a lot more people are into trains or bikes. But walking is something almost everyone can do and costs nothing. The collective health benefits are enormous.

For a split second, I thought the reserve players standing on the sideline of the Champions League final were cheerleaders. 😁 Non-Americans must think having cheerleaders in pro sports is ridiculous.

The policy objective shouldn’t be to reduce gas prices, it should be to reduce people’s gas expenses by not needing to drive for absolutely every single thing we do in our lives.

Rented a car for a day to run some errands. Got done early so I returned it. If I kept it, I would’ve felt compelled to do something that took advantage of having a car. I hate that feeling; I’d rather spend my afternoon doing something non-car dependent.

If I were in the market for an e-bike, I would get a Higbee Martini. It's a new bike company based here in Philly! It's one of the only e-bikes I've seen that prioritizes classic bicycle aesthetics. 99% of the e-bikes on the market are just so UGLY. And mini-velos are amazing! higbeebikes.com

Today’s announcement from Gov. Shapiro spending $30 million in state funds for Stadium District roadways is a major disappointment when SEPTA is still facing a long-term funding crisis threatening transit service

RETVRN!

A full block of cars respecting the bus/bike lane on Chestnut. Looks like the automated enforcement is working. 🙌🏼

When you visit a place like Copenhagen, it should make you wonder if you’re just wasting away your precious life not finding a way to move there. Pics from my trip there last summer.

Aside from this being a huge middle finger to SEPTA, this new on-ramp at 7th will also bring tons more traffic right next to SEYAA's baseball fields, endangering kids every day. The first step in the I-95 widening disaster

I am frugal about what subscriptions I pay for, but I've paid for Ride With GPS for a few years now. Its route planning tool is the best that I've seen. I also appreciate that it doesn't push the fitness aspect like Strava does. ridewithgps.com/pricing

If only a third of 16 and 17 year olds in Long Island are getting their drivers license, then teens in Philly most certainly don’t need to rush to get their license. My oldest is 15 and he can learn to drive when he’s an adult. Driving school is actually not as expensive as you’d think.

the leading causes of deaths in children are largely preventable: -firearms -motor vehicle collisions -drug poisoning/overdose we can and must do better @tedmel100.bsky.social @mollyjeffery.bsky.social in @nejm.org

I think about once a year, someone posts on the Philadelphia subreddit about where people keep their trash, if they can keep it out front (no, unless you want to be your block's public garbage can), do they really have to drag their trash through the house, etc. www.reddit.com/r/philadelph...

One thing that makes me sad about Philly is I don’t see a lot of families /w kids on transit, esp the subway and L. And I don’t blame them if it’s because there’s a high likelihood they have to inhale second hand smoke. It’s gotten a little better recently but it still happens way too often.

My 13yo asked me yesterday if he could go biking with his friends. I was a bit sad that I had to say no. He hasn’t ridden a bike in years so there’s that. But some of his friends have e-bikes and I worry about the risks of him trying to keep up. Most importantly, it’s Philly drivers I don’t trust.

Don’t let people perpetuate the narrative that Philly public schools are bad. The reality is that the district is graduating thousands of kids every year, including many as the first in their family to go to college. Many beautiful stories of kids on their way to achieving their hopes and dreams!

It's interesting when politicians write books as if they can influence conversation and ideas through putting words on paper. There's a wide variety of statistics out there on what percentage of Americans read--many of them feel overly optimistic. Anecdotally, very few people I know read.

MONTREAL: “A total of 12 streets are being pedestrianized this year, encouraging local businesses and bringing outdoor festivities to the heart of the city and to some residential neighnourholds.” Via @cultmtl.com Another year of continent-leading street transformations trading cars for civic life.

These cards aren’t worth much but it’s still fun having this pair of Deion Sanders cards. It’s hard to compare him and Bo because Bo’s career was cut short. Despite that, it’s hard to argue with what Prime Time accomplished over a long career in both football and baseball.

I support policies to promote e-bike adoption but I also don’t agree with articles that claim e-bikes to be *the* solution for reducing car dependency. I raised two kids without an e-bike or cargo bike. It was possible thanks for density, mixed zoning, and public transit.

Great video from @pew.org on why we need to build more housing! Easy to understand explanation of "moving chains" of affordability--people moving into newer, "luxury" housing opens up availability in lower-priced housing and keeps those rents low. www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQYM...

Folding bikes enable trips that aren’t possible or efficient with just transit or just bicycle. Because transit on its own often can’t get you where you need and some bike trips are too long, even with an e-bike. With a folding bike, you can use both transit and bike to get where you need!

Reforming BIRT wouldn’t just bring massive benefit to Philadelphians. I’d like to think more jobs in Center City would spur residential and commercial development in Camden too. It could be what Jersey City is to New York if Philly just had the jobs to support it.

I’m starting to unfollow IG accounts where people are just taking video selfies of themselves talking. I get why some people like them—it makes people feel like someone’s talking to them. But maybe we should just go out and talk to people IRL instead of all of us recording ourselves yapping?

I love all the discussion about e-bikes, but I think the bike parking problem is real and it deserves just as much attention and investment as bike lanes. If you can’t confidently secure your bike where you live, work, shop, etc, many people aren’t going to use those bike lanes.

Thanks to @citycastphilly.bsky.social for including us in their bike month roundup of social rides! link.citycast.fm/view/65ba735...

Sometimes the bus doesn’t come when it’s supposed to and you’re like “shit I guess I’m walking home” then you start to walk along the river and get treated to this

In the late 2010s, VCs tried hard to make everyone believe crypto and blockchain were the next big thing to change the world. With AI, they realized they didn’t try hard enough to force everyone onto the hype train. They seem pretty intent on not making that mistake this time.

Every couple years, I get the urge to change browsers for various reasons. This time, it's to get away from the ubiquity of AI. Google is pushing all their products--hardware, services--to be designed around AI. My 15yo suggested I try Zen. It uses the same engine as Firefox. zen-browser.app

My urbanist sticker collection is growing.

Someone posted on Reddit about finishing their freshman year at Temple and not having made any friends. How does that happen? I miss college so much. It was just so much fun meeting new people in the dorms all the time and just hanging out.

We set our thermostat at 78 in the summer and it’s fine. 🤷

New Era is doing a promo for 30% off all already marked down for sale items. Great chance to get some non-standard Phillies (or whoever your favorite team is) hats at a great price! www.neweracap.com/collections/...

As usual, I’ll be voting for @tungwill.bsky.social as a write-in candidate for any seats where I don’t want to vote for the candidates on the ballot. Feel free to join me. Someday we will elect him as mayor of Philadelphia!

I own a lot more non-fiction books than fiction. It annoys me because I enjoy reading fiction so much more. But I can’t help myself from buying non-fiction books because I’m drawn to the ideas the books represent. I sometimes look at all my non-fiction books but I don’t want to read any of them.

If I opened a coffee shop, I’d want it to be like Rebel and Wolf. It’s one of the few coffee shops outside of Center City that’s open late. I love how they use it for community events.

It’s the time of year I need to carry a sweatshirt with me because indoor places are too cold. Hello, climate change? And who can afford to set their A/C temp to 72 in this economy???

It can simultaneously be true that 1) Philly is dysfunctional as hell But 2) Somehow it’s an incredible city thanks to hundreds, if not thousands, of selfless, generous regular people like this who use their spare time and resources to make Philly livable and functional.