Month: September 2017
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The Week Observed, September 29, 2017
What City Observatory did this week 1.Interim report card on Portland’s Inclusionary Zoning Ordinance: An Incomplete. Portland’s inclusionary zoning requirements have been in effect for six months. While the ordinance prompted a land rush of development applications filed under the old rules, private sector apartment applications have almost completely evaporated since then. We take a…
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Transportation equity: Why peak period road pricing is fair
Peak hour car commuters have incomes almost double those who travel by transit, bike and foot The Oregon Legislature has directed the state’s department of transportation to come up with a value pricing system for interstate freeways in the Portland metropolitan area. A key idea behind value pricing is that it would charge those who…
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Portland’s Inclusionary Zoning Law: Waiting for the other shoe to drop
Developers stampeded to get grandfathered before new requirements took hold, will the pipeline run dry? In December, Portland’s City Council adopted one of the nation’s most sweeping inclusionary zoning requirements. Most new multifamily housing projects will have to set aside 20 percent of their units for families earning less than 80 percent of area median…
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The Week Observed, September 22, 2017
What City Observatory did this week 1. What price autonomous vehicles? It’s easy to obsess about the cool technological details of autonomous vehicles: their sophisticated computers, LIDAR systems, and vehicle-to-vehicle communication. But for economists, the big variable determining their impact is likely to hinge on their price. There’s a wide range of speculation now about…
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Racial wealth disparities: How housing widens the gap
The wealth of black families lags far behind whites, and housing markets play a key role There’s a great article from The New York Times’ Emily Badger about a new study that shows just how much Americans (especially white Americans) underestimate the gap in the economic circumstances between black and white families. The study also makes…
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What price for autonomous vehicles?
It’s easy to focus on technology, but pricing will determine autonomous vehicles impact. Everyone’s trying hard to imagine what a future full of autonomous cars might look like. Sure, there are big questions about whether a technology company or a conventional car company will succeed, whether the critical factor will be manufacturing prowess or software…
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The Week Observed, September 15, 2017
What City Observatory did this week 1. Cash prizes for bad corporate citizenship. The urban world is all abuzz, handicapping the city vs. city vs. city race to land Amazon’s HQ2, a rich prize of investment and jobs. Amazon’s request for proposals asks cities to sweeten their bids with an array of tax breaks and…
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Cities lead national income growth, again
Average household income in cities is increasing twice as fast as in their suburbs Earlier this week, the Census Bureau released its latest estimates of national income based on the annual Current Population Survey. The data show some good news: a continued improvement in household incomes and a reduction in poverty. Median household income increased…
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Cash prizes for bad corporate citizenship, Amazon edition
When we strongly incentivize anti-social behavior by big corporations, we get more of it Everyone in the urban space is busy handicapping the Amazon horserace, to see which city will land Amazon’s HQ2, which promises to be the biggest economic development prize of the 21st century. Amazon’s RFP, issued last week, invites metro areas with…
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The Week Observed, September 8, 2017
What City Observatory did this week 1. Is the urban revival over? A provocative (but highly misleading) headline in last week’s New York Times sits atop Richard Florida’s op-ed about the future of cities. Although Florida is really making the case that the urban revival is “fragile,” the headline says the revival is over. Actually,…
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Cognitive dissonance on the Potomac
How can a city be named the first “LEED Platinum” city and be building freeways in its suburbs? Submitted for your approval: Two recent news items from our nation’s capital. In the first, Washington DC proudly announced that has been proclaimed the world’s first LEED Platinum city–based on the number of LEED-certified buildings it’s built in…
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Oh, no! Is the urban revival really over?
Reports of the demise of the city rebound have been greatly exaggerated Richard Florida’s op-ed piece in The New York Times last week had an eye-catching headline: “The Urban Revival is Over.” Here was the apostle of cities, apparently calling and end to the bull market for urban living. First, let it be said that–as…
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The Week Observed, September 1, 2017
What City Observatory did this week 1. Inequality in three charts. New data produced by Thomas Piketty and his colleagues provides a rich, high-definition look at the growth of income inequality in the US. But while the quality of our understanding of the inequality problem has improved, it’s apparent that the growth of inequality in…