Michael McLean

@michaelmclean

Ideal city: ⚛️ nuclear-powered, 🏙️ dense housing, 💰 affordable, 🚇 transit. Aka Chicago. Posting about those things here, and trying to make them better IRL.

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Michael McLean@michaelmclean· 29d

PJM had a capacity auction today, and it cleared the limit of $325/mw day. The uncapped clearing price was highest in the ComEd region. $776!!! Holy shit. I think my capacity charge would be like $30 per month uncapped. www.pjm.com/-/media/DotC...

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· 29d

Seems like they aren’t on IQAir. Probably available in the Chicago data portal though

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· 29d

A few of my friends are hosting a lecture at Harold Washington Library about nuclear energy in Illinois. You can ride a nuclear powered train to and from the lecture chipublib.bibliocommons.com/events/6a26f...

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 14

Salem already has an AP1000 early site permit. 2 year head start. www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1608/...

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 14

It’s so over. Run your purifiers and wear your masks outside.

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 14

This you?

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 14

Republicans are making us poorer

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 14

Maiko!

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 14

I see my friends

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 14

The “make it beautiful” crowd will love this one chicago.urbanize.city/post/mixed-u...

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 14

Bipartisan package of nuclear bills coming together in the house energycommerce.house.gov/posts/chairm...

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 14

Looks like a lot of the city’s air quality monitors have been added to IQAir

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 13

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 12

Dr Annie Andrews is no longer behind Graham in the polls.

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 12

Just how the doctor drew it up

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 11

Jfc

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 11

ABRP is pretty good. I have an OBDII Bluetooth dongle for my car that feeds it live telemetry for my state of charge. Pretty nuts that I can get down to Louisville in the same amount of time as a gas car. That 800v architecture and the Alpitronic chargers go brrrrr.

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 10

Front AND back

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 10

🆕 Chicago Smart Streets pilot data has been retrieved via FOIA up thru June 27th Access the map, and raw data here -> michaelmclean.me/chicago-smar...

$Interactive map titled “Smart Streets Infractions,” with All Violations selected. It summarizes 104,753 violations and $3,268,640 in listed fines across 13,401 recorded locations. Dark circles mark geocoded enforcement locations; larger circles indicate more violations. Markers form dense strings along major streets, with the largest and most overlapping clusters in River North, the Loop, and West Loop—particularly along Chicago Avenue, Dearborn Street, and Wells Street. Additional corridors extend north through Old Town toward Lakeview, west toward Wicker Park and Pilsen, and south through the South Loop. Locations become sparser toward the outer western edges. The largest individual locations include 36 West Chicago Avenue with 1,062 violations, 158 West Adams Street with 1,045, and two South Dearborn Street addresses with about 1,000 each. A magenta outline marks the original pilot zone, roughly North Avenue to Roosevelt Road between Ashland Avenue and the lakefront. A larger blue boundary marks the expansion area, extending roughly from Irving Park Road to 31st Street. The original zone contains 85,606 violations, the expansion-only area contains 18,720, and 427 fall outside the supplied boundaries. Lake Michigan occupies the right side of the map; no ward is selected.$

Stacked bar chart titled “Monthly warnings and fines issued,” showing Smart Streets records from November 2024 through June 27, 2026. The horizontal axis lists months; the vertical axis runs from zero to 15,000 records. Monthly totals generally range from 3,100 to 4,500 through September 2025, after 2,640 in November 2024. That first month consists almost entirely of 30-day installation warnings; subsequent bars are dominated by zero-fine warnings. A marker identifies the first CTA bus violation on October 15, 2025, followed by a rise from 4,701 records in October to 5,205 in December and 5,831 in January. Another marker identifies the pilot expansion on January 21, 2026. Activity then increases sharply to 8,162 records in February, 10,846 in March, and a peak of 11,091 in April, before easing to 10,483 in May and 6,591 during partial June. Fine-bearing records become more varied in 2026—including bus-lane, bike-lane, bus-stop, expired-meter, and commercial-loading-zone violations—but warnings remain the largest part of every monthly bar.

Line chart titled “Cumulative annual fines,” comparing listed Smart Streets fine amounts by calendar day. The horizontal axis runs from January through December; the vertical axis runs from zero to $2 million. The green 2026 line rises fastest, reaching $1,558,980 by June 27—more than twice the $687,230 accumulated by the same date in 2025. The orange 2025 line continues through the full year and ends at $1,678,320, only about $119,000 above the partial 2026 total. The short blue 2024 line begins in November, when the dataset starts, and ends at $31,340. These figures are fine levels listed in the FOIA export, grouped by issue date; they do not represent amounts paid or collected.

Heatmap titled “Day of week by hour of day,” showing all 104,753 Smart Streets violations by weekday and hour, with Violations selected rather than Fines. Seven rows represent Monday through Sunday and 24 columns represent midnight through 11 p.m.; darker blue indicates more violations. Activity is overwhelmingly concentrated on weekdays during daytime hours. Monday through Friday become busier around 7 a.m., remain busiest from 8 a.m. through 2 p.m., fall sharply at 3 p.m., rebound at 4 and 5 p.m., and fade after 6 p.m. Friday at 8 a.m. is the busiest individual weekday-hour combination, with 2,505 violations. Across all days, 1 p.m. is the busiest hour, with 12,098 violations, or 11.5 percent of the total; noon has 11,835 and 11 a.m. has 11,142. Only 1,467 violations occur at 3 p.m., and almost none occur from 1 through 3 a.m. Friday has the highest weekday total at 20,013, or 19.1 percent, closely followed by Wednesday at 19,858. Saturday falls to 6,585, or 6.3 percent, and Sunday to 1,846, or 1.8 percent. Hours are interpreted as Chicago local time.

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 10

if they demolish this building its going to ruin the character of the neighborhood. have you considered that Joseph?

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 10

1% of Hispanics prefer “LatinX” www.pewresearch.org/race-and-eth...

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 10

Some guy bemoaned how Wrigleyville has developed north of here. And somehow characterized this new proposal as not being “Chicago”. My brother in Christ this is what is there now. They make shit pizza and as a result can’t renew their lease! Developer confirmed on the call.

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 9

The trailhead building. Station is up the ramp

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 8

Mayor Mamdani is rolling out all door bus boarding next year. Mayor Brandon Johnson hasn’t even filled the CTA President position that has remained vacant for 16 months.

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 8

Great news — these long lead item loans are now oversubscribed. The department of energy has received seven letters of intent from utilities for five slots. The prospects for 10 new AP1000 reactors are looking better and better. www.greentape.pub/p/right-of-w...

Greg Beard: We've got seven signed letters of intent from both regulated utilities and independent power producers - and that doesn't count one more who hasn't given us a signed letter but keeps us posted on their board-level activity and says they're keen to move forward in an expedited fashion. So we think we've got eight, let's call it, and room for five.
Who gets the five? The utility and/or independent that moves the fastest — the one that gives us confidence that, once they take the loan, they'll meet their mile markers to get this power built and online the quickest. The intent is not to lend for long-lead items and then have the parts sit around in a warehouse. The intent is to spur the industry to fast-track and give this country access to the power we need. So that's the primary differentiator: providing us confidence that the borrower - the utility or IPP — has the site at the right location, has a plan for the build, and has the support of their state and local communities.

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 8

Check out the birds I saw yesterday

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 8

It’s utter slop. BUT. The median primary voter in Michigan is like 65 years old, and the Feds can’t really do anything like this. If it wins some votes, so be it. Much better than electing a republican.

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 8

Idk who One Illinois is going to back (will be putting like over a million into the race), but housing is on their list of nonnegotiables

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 7

Great!! Hardened bumpouts?

Michael McLean@michaelmclean· Jul 7

Got into the walkable daycare near us after a 1 ½ year wait