Gonna mute this before too many train nerds (nothing but respect) tell me that this distance is too short to be covered by a maglev train. I know!
Co-host, The War on Cars. Writer, TV producer, advocate, runner, Disney parks fan. Born at 330.21 ppm. (he/him) Pre-order our new book, "Life After Cars," coming in October from Thesis, an imprint of Penguin Random House. https://linktr.ee/brooklynspoke
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Gonna mute this before too many train nerds (nothing but respect) tell me that this distance is too short to be covered by a maglev train. I know!
Only used for superhero movies!
For book tour, I just looked for a train between two U.S. cities about 165 miles apart. There's one train a day, it leaves at 6:50 PM, involves a transfer, and takes 16 hours and 20 minutes.
"How to Report ICE" zines are available for free printable download for these places: California Chicago Colorado DC Metro Area Florida Massachusetts NC Triangle Area NYC Philly Pittsburgh Portland St. Louis Metro Area Washington State Zine request form in folder. drive.google.com/drive/folder...
Loser stuff. America belongs to all of us, and only all of us.
Don't feel like doing a repost that puts the murder video on the timeline yet again but do feel like repeating the point that the president just straight-up assassinated 11 people for supposedly doing something that wouldn't be a death-penalty crime if they were caught and convicted
In the aftermath of Emmett Till's lynching, white supremacists called for federal troops to invade and occupy Chicago. "If the federal government intervenes in the interests of law enforcement anywhere, it should start in Chicago, crime capital extraordinary." h/t @larryglickman.bsky.social
Once a joke, always a joke. Good riddance.
I know, I know, but: The president of the US saying, literally, "we're going in" in reference to sending the military to an American city for no reason beyond terrorizing the local population should be the most immediately impeachable shit imaginable
Also, this is the reasoning of a child: "You say crime is down but actually, crime is still happening." Why is everyone with any power in America allergic to simply saying that Trump's actions are bad, full stop? Everything has to be a bizarre dance around obvious realities
Yeah, I feel like I'm going insane every time I see a headline or new story uncritically parroting the crime narrative. Crime ain't got nothing to do with it!
Again, the key divide within the Democratic party does not map onto a left/right axis: It is between those who want to fight back forcefully, like Pritzker, and those who can’t/won’t shake the impulse to accommodate, appease, and uphold “normalcy.”
"SEPTA cuts made Philly schools’ attendance tumble significantly Early district data show 63% of city schools showed an increase in late arrivals, and 54% had more students absent." -- www.inquirer.com/education/ph...
"Be loud for America."
I love this kind of development. It's a small detail that goes a long way toward sending a message that bikes are an important part of the city's transportation networks. It means someone is thinking about the actual user experience from a cyclist's POV. Kudos to DOT for continuing to push forward.
Not for camera tickets.
Yes, the vast majority of people who receive speed tickets in in NYC don't typically get a second or third, but a small percentage of super speeders rack up a lot of tickets in numbers that $50 fines can't stop. Escalating or sliding scale feels + the threat of having a car confiscated would help.
If a sliding scale isn't possible, then one solution would have the first speed camera ticket be a warning, the second be a small fine, and then have it go up with each successive ticket. That way no one could say these are "gotcha" tickets they didn't know about.
But the framing and POV really needs to change. 240,000 tickets in one month doesn't mean drivers are getting slammed. It means your city has an epidemic of dangerous speeding that needs to be fixed. The conversation should start there.
The part I agree with in this piece is the idea that there should be a sliding scale for fines based on income. If cameras don't issue points, rich people see the fine as nothing more than a small price to pay in order to do whatever the heck they want.
If the whole war on cars things doesn't work out you know i'll pivot to some sort of Disney podast.
Seriously. When we did our big trip with the grandparents and my kids the amount of research I felt like I had to do was almost like a part-time job.
The Times piece that Dan is commenting on really captured the moment we're in, as far as class divisions go. An excellent read.
Platner: No one cares that you pretend to be remorseful as you sell out to lobbyists. Symbolic opposition does not reopen hospitals. Weak condemnations do not bring back Roe V Wade. Maine deserves better than Susan Collins.
the thing about Zohran is he is really fucking good at politics and everyone on the Dem side behaving like he’s a liability has lost their minds I don’t care how you define It, he has It
Mamdani on Nadler: Just read that last sentence. Perfect.
Aw...
We'd love to! Would have to figure out local partners, travel, etc. but we're hoping to make it happen next year if possible.
The urbanist event of the season, no question. See you there!
1,000 seats. I'm blown away.
Holy moly. Our "Life After Cars" book event and live show with @nerd4cities.bsky.social on November 5th in Seattle is SOLD OUT! www.lifeaftercars.com
Meet Me On Milwaukee was a huge success - and @mclean.bsky.social and I accidentally wore matching @thewaroncars.bsky.social t-shirts 😆 But look at how excited people were - they were taking photos of all the people out on the street!
It really feels like the key difference between people who use Xitter and those of us who use Bluesky is that at least on Bluesky we know we're too online.
On one hand, reducing car use reduces urban pollution. But on the other, everyone likes it and cities become more livable
Thinking of the emissions alone. All those parents idling their cars for hours. Oof.
Yep a good-faith critique of learning loss would lead to proposals for a massive, New Deal-scale investment in public education. The people pushing the narrative are doing precisely the opposite.
This should be the lead story in all major national news outlets. Public health people prefer to stay out of the limelight unless there is no other choice. I can’t overstate how bad things have to be for 9 former CDC directors to band together and pen an op-ed in the NYT warning the entire country.
Why did they abbreviate Sergeant and Lieutenant but not Captain? I have questions.
I wouldn't trust Eric Adams to deliver my newspaper.
The kind of traffic jam we need a lot more of!
She was brought to the US as an 8yo, worked hard, studied, earned a scholarship, planned to become a nurse. ICE kidnapped her. Held her for 6 MONTHS in a detention facility with conditions so miserable that she finally agreed to voluntarily move to Honduras, which her family left at gunpoint.
Lake Shore Drive is ours @thewaroncars.bsky.social
Congestion pricing is actually the perfect example here. Trump declared that “congestion pricing is dead” (and that he is the king) Hochul and the MTA told him to fuck off, and now, more than 6 months later, congestion pricing is still alive and working exactly as planned
The man is historically unpopular! If everyone would hammer this point instead of resigning themselves to "But nothing matters" it would probably have some effect on where this all goes.
The matches haven't even started yet and I've already gotten kudos for my cap. #TheWarOnCars
One reason I try to avoid being in a car as much as possible is because I now assume every driver is on their phone doing exactly this.
If you don’t believe that Trump’s authoritarianism can be defeated, look at how scared MAGA is of chalk:
“Automobiles have produced far more cumulative damage in the world, in terms of death, illness, and environmental destruction, than nearly any other invention in human history,” argue the co-creators of The War on Cars podcast, in this incisive account... This will inspire anti-car activists."
I’m reading Victor Klemperer’s diaries now, which describe waves of rumors and years of changes in emotional atmospherics, sometimes within the same day. So I assume the current rumor is more indicative of life under authoritarianism than anything else.
going back to the founders it would have been recognized as an act of gratitude and patriotism to dedicate one's life to service of their adopted country, but Vance rejects the fundamental ideal of America in favor of crude blood-and-soil Nazism that he learned on the internet five years ago
I, for one, am really looking forward to book tour and a lot of time in airports, on trains... I'll be triple masked everywhere I go.
Every time your electricity bill goes up for the next 10 years, it can be traced back to this Administration’s actions. They are making solar and wind power illegal to build in the United States. They are artificially restricting supply while demand is going up.
This headline is really something. A better version would be: "Removal of a mere seven parking spots provides room for safety improvements for $12mil trail, which will be enjoyed by thousands" Morro Bay-Cayucos connector trail will result in loss of some parking spots share.google/ZvLHRnL8LWtQ...
"Life After Cars" is an October 2025 Next Big Idea Club must-read title!
i remain convinced that no one, least of all me, has really appreciated how badly gutshot the republican budget has rendered rural america, everyone can see the entry wound, no one can yet see the exit wound
I’m so grateful that I have tenure and the academic freedom to call it like I see it. “Dr. Kathleen Bachynski, a professor of public health at Muhlenberg College, described Kennedy’s comments as “absolute gibberish” and slammed the HHS secretary as a “dangerous buffoon” who is “threatening us all.”
Good idea. Call your senator and ask him what he could be doing to limit the damage.
More than 150 injuries from traffic crashes could have been avoided. Nearly a quarter-million bus riders could have had faster commutes. Instead, Eric Adams’s City Hall stymied several redesigns at the behest of powerful interests. nyc.streetsblog.org/2025/08/28/s...
only so many words you can put in a headline but the whole response is loud and proud support for the trans community and worth reading
"Analysis has found drivers in the tallest cars could not see children as old as nine when they were directly in front of the vehicle."
Really excited for this one. Also, Seattle is *this* close to selling out and tickets for San Francisco and Vancouver are going fast. More cities being added every week. Book tour is gonna be big! www.lifeaftercars.com
The way you know this is culture war bullshit pushed by the fossil fuel industry is that buildings kill up to a billion birds per year and you can be sure our real estate developer president never cared one whit about it.
"Do not pretend you do not understand" goes a long way towards the heart of a LOT of problems rn
Some early reviews for "Life After Cars" are up on Goodreads!
Pretty wild because Marte is generally terrible on other urbanist-related issues, such as housing.
Is it possible that…urbanism is a winning strategy in cities?
I love how she sees herself as the hero here and not the villain that denied *SUBSIDIZED AFFORDABLE* homes to a number of families.
I have never seen so many public servants protest the mismanagement of a government. Trumpists will point to this as proof of the deep state, but the reality is that these are professionals who are desperately trying to get the public to understand how bad things are.
Anyone who looks at America in 2025 and thinks, "maybe we can fix this by throwing trans people under the bus" 1) doesn't have the brains to understand what's going on or how we got here 2) doesn't have the stomach for any of the fights ahead and 3) is vice signaling to their MAGA friends.
The resignation letters are really worth a read. Searing and powerful. Some further details about the conflict over Covid vaccines. bsky.app/profile/mala...
I'm not sure Americans have a frame of reference for the sort of gangster government we have now. Any objective functions it performs are an afterthought. The law only used as a tool to punish political enemies and ignored in every other instance
This is genuinely sick shit.
So many adults have to fail a child before he ends up 10 years old telling CNN about the mass shooting he lived through this morning
A functional society would ban these guns. It’s that simple.
this picture of a mom shoes off sprinting to the Mpls school: www.startribune.com/minneapolis-... By Richard Tsong-Taatarii for @startribune.com, which should be a go-to source for anyone following
"Covid vaccines are more dangerous than the entire scientific edifice claims and also this long list of sick and vulnerable people can still have one" is a hell of an argument
I keep thinking about how Hochul deployed the national guard to the subways for the totally fake made up crime crisis and now she’s trying to claim Trump shouldn’t send troops to NYC and her arguments are completely poisoned by her own previous absurd fascist actions.
Again, I say: Cuomo has given up on New York. He's now talking smack about Mamdani on shows no New Yorker cares about, not to win this election, but to burnish his national reputation as a conservative Democrat talking head.
"It's all part and parcel with how Adams has governed: His commitments to build bike lanes and bus lanes are only good until someone with money and influence says otherwise — then all bets are off."
A thought experiment. What if the world's climate policy for the next few years was: flood the planet with cheap or free solar panels? billmckibben.substack.com/p/a-modest-p...
Hey #Vancouver folks, this is worth attending to: https://visionzerovancouver.ca/2025/08/01/life-after-cars/ Wish I was still around so I could finally meet @lucymaloney.bsky.social in person!
How can you find a "middle ground" when the other side is off the deep end?
There's an incentive for them to respond to complaints ("My trash didn't get picked up," "My street wasn't plowed") and not much of one for them to respond to suggestions for change. If change does happen, it results in complaints ("Someone took my parking") that they can respond to. Not good!
As always, the people who stand to benefit from better uses of the curb don't know that they need to advocate for such things while the people who might lose the privilege of storing their private property in public space for free have every motivation in the world to speak up.
About a quarter of a million people live on the Upper West Side and about 75% of households there are car free. Who cares if even a few thousand people there complain about paid parking?
It doesn't help that in this case he's found a willing partner in a member of the City Council who, as much as she'll stand up for things here and there, will always cave to Upper West Side parkers.
Randy Mastro is like a one-man DOGE when it comes to street improvements. He's fought things like bike lanes and congestion pricing for years outside of government. Now that he's on the inside he's doing everything he can to prevent progress. Still a lot more time for him to do even more damage.
this stuff is such a disgrace. a free citizen of a free country should be ashamed to engage in it.
A nice dose of optimism. Worth a listen!
Cars are the new cigarettes. Nice work by @tomflood.bsky.social as always.
New BONUS episode: "Cars Drive Us Apart, Subway Takes Unite Us." Some recent studies explain just how destructive cars are to the social fabric of our communities. Plus: our take on David Byrne’s Subway Takes appearance—and his take about urban bike etiquette! www.patreon.com/posts/bonus-...
Set your mind back to July 2024. Joe Biden had just had a disastrous debate. The entire country agreed on one thing: He was deeply, deeply unpopular. Biden's approval rating at the time? 36% among all adults, 31% among independents. Trump's approval today? 37% and 29%, respectively.
It's all over the news — right up there with bag-of-chips-gate. McGuinness isn’t the Adams administration's only stalled street safety project. It’s time for investigations into reversals & stalling on Fordham, Ashland, Bedford — everywhere the safety of New Yorkers is an afterthought.
“Selling off the safety of our neighbors, the kids in Greenpoint who cross the street every day, for a couple thousands dollars and a cameo on ‘Blue Bloods.’ We all deserve better.”
“it reminded me right away of, when you read in our history, about ‘degenerate art’ that the Nazis targeted. I was like, ‘There it is: another sign of where they want to take the country.’” www.washingtonpost.com/entertainmen...
Orlando wasn’t having what DeSantis did. They recolored the Pulse Memorial crosswalk.
"...automobile travel has about ten times the death rate as public transit, and transit vehicles also impose less risk on non-occupants like cyclists, pedestrians and other road users. Cars should come with warnings: 'Driving causes painful injuries, disabilities and death.'"
Just read it! Great reporting. What a wild story!