Month: July 2018
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E-Scooters and Paying for Roads
If charging scooters to use city streets makes sense, let’s charge cars proportionately A little bit late to the party, but today the first electric scooters appeared on the streets of Portland. Bird announced that, with the city’s permission, it was scattering hundreds of its electric scooters in and around the downtown. A second company,…
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Your summertime, urbanist “must read” Allan Mallach’s Divided City
A review of The Divided City Alan Mallach, The Divided City: Poverty and Prosperity in Urban America (Island Books, 2018, 326 pages). Before you head out to the beach or mountains or wherever your summertime plans take you, grab a copy of Alan Mallach’s new “Divided City.” It’s a cogent analysis of the current state…
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The Week Observed, July 27, 2018
What City Observatory did this week 1. Portland rents are going down. There are those who are skeptical that we can “build our way to affordability.” But the economic evidence suggests that’s exactly what’s happening in Portland. New apartment construction in the Rose City is finally catching up to demand (there’s a long lag between…
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The limited allure of small towns
A few knowledge workers decamp to rural America as they age, but cities are the key It’s an oft-told tale: talented professionals grow weary of the stress and high cost of city-living, and decamp with their spouses, children and knowledge-based businesses to some rural hamlet. It’s a harbinger of the end of cities as we…
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The clear case for congestion pricing in Portland
Why congestion pricing makes sense for Portland by Chris Hagerbaumer Today, City Observatory is pleased to offer a guest commentary from Chris Hagerbaumer on value pricing. Chris is the deputy director of the Oregon Environmental Council. As we’ve reported at City Observatory, the Oregon Legislature directed the state’s transportation department to develop a plan to…
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Portland rents are going down
More supply is driving down rents in the Rose City According to Apartment List.com, rents for one bedroom apartments in Portland have declined 3 percent in the past year. It’s a solid vindication of the standard predictions of economic theory: adding more supply (building more apartments) helps drive down prices. Just a couple of years…
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The Week Observed, July 20, 2018
What City Observatory did this week 1. Nattering nabobs of NIMBYism at the New York Times. Columnist Tim Egan called plans for a limited upzoning to enable more people to live in Seattle an unholy conspiracy of developers and socialists. In a guest commentary, City Observatory friend Ethan Seltzer responds, pointing out that all of…
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Parking: Where we embrace socialism in the US
How we embrace socialism for car storage in the public right of way Comrades, rejoice: In the face of the counter-revolutionary neo-liberal onslaught, there’s at least one arena where the people’s inalienable rights reign supreme: parking. Fear not, comrade sister: you will not have to search for a parking space in our socialist utopia! We…
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Nattering Nabobs of NIMBYism at the NYT
Denouncing developers and density is no way to solve a housing crisis Editor’s Note: Today we’re publishing a guest commentary from Ethan Seltzer responding to New York Times columnist Tim Egan’s recent column on housing and density in Seattle. In it, Egan condemned what he called an “unholy alliance” of developers and socialists who were…
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The Week Observed, July 13, 2018
What City Observatory did this week 1. Don’t demonize cars, just stop subsidizing them. Is there anything in the urban space that is more inflamed than the passion and rhetoric around cars and driving? Advocates on both sides are bitter and uncompromising: with cars (and their parking spaces) regarded as either a fundamental right or…
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How luxury housing becomes affordable
Build expensive new “luxury” apartments, and wait a few decades One of the most common refrains the the affordable housing discussion is “developers are targeting the high end of the market” and new apartments are just unaffordable. Left to its own devices, we’re told, there’s no way the market will build new housing affordable to…
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Envisioning more cohesive communities
What aspects of the built environment give rise to greater social trust? We’re pleased to offer a guest commentary today from Em Friedenberg. Em is a recent graduate of the University of Oregon, who’s studied urban design. Her recent research project provides some compelling illustrations of some of the key building blocks for the kind…
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Rather than demonizing driving—let’s just stop subsidizing it
A “war on cars” won’t win many hearts and minds; let’s ask for responsibility It’s clear that cars, and particular the large numbers of cars we have, and the way in which we and our urban environments have become dependent upon them, is either at the root of many of our most pressing problems (including…
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The Week Observed, July 6, 2018
What City Observatory did this week 1. Envisioning how we want to live in cities. Much of the discussion of the future of cities seems to revolve around what kind of new technologies we might apply in urban settings. But in our view, planning for the future city ought to be guided by our aspirations:…
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What makes America great, as always: Immigrants
Happy Independence Day, America! All Americans are immigrants (Even the Native American tribes trace their origins to Asians who migrated over the Siberian-Alaskan land bridge during the last ice age). And this nation of immigrants has always grown stronger by embracing newcomers who want to share in, and help build the American dream. So here,…
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Envisioning the way we want to live in cities
The biggest challenge for creating great cities is imagination, not technology There’s a definite technological determinism to how we approach future cities. Some combination of sensors, 5G Internet, sophisticated computing and a very centralized command infrastructure will inexorably lead to places that are somehow greener, more prosperous and just. Color us skeptical: the unbridled devotion…