Different shot, different day. Also, hello to Chicago's magic road! @ericallixrogers.com

I'd noticed that Canadian cities have a lot of slabby apartment blocks, but still surprised that Canada built more multifamily than single-family from 1963-1973 www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-63...

Even the worst-transit-served block in DC has better transit and lower VMT than this corner of Loudoun County. Following the logic of TOD, DC should allow this RF-1-style density everywhere. Yet it doesn't - because it's applying TOD logic to exclude, not include.

"By suppressing less-costly “middle housing,” the grand bargain of TOD restricts middle-class families to either sprawling suburbs or older, less safe homes, and burdens lower-income residents with high rents and overcrowding — or pushes them out of the region entirely."

I get why this is a thing, but it's truly annoying that Substack by default allows other people to opt you into emails support.substack.com/hc/en-us/art...

Which is fine, but long-term land values don't grow spectacularly. Again from Hoyt, a land speculator in the frontier village of Chicago who watched the city balloon to 3M+ residents… might as well have bought a 6% bond. So, uh, hooray for avoiding a 0.6% annual rent increase?

Analogy: this block at Canal Park has DC-"zoned capacity" for 5 food trucks. That in no way guarantees a food truck will be there. "It is legal to sell here" & "enough people will buy here to make business worthwhile" are entirely different things that OP has confused.

I jokingly call vintage Chicago courtyards "1.5-stair PABs" ultralocal.blogspot.com/2011/03/typo...

Your experience belongs on the YIMBYtown stage! The pro-housing movement's best ideas come from organizers, planners, architects, elected officials, developers, researchers, tenants, advocates, communicators, and neighbors who are on the ground making policy change. Full details at yimby.town

pausa de hidratación

Thank you, outhouse expert: cowboystatedaily.com/2026/06/24/w... “Those vaults and tanks will develop a bit of a crust on top, or the toilet paper will act as a lily pad,” [Adam] Fink said. “You might see something you dropped sitting right at the surface, but that doesn’t mean that’s the bottom.”

Their theory vs. every single property crash in history (and original Chicago School sociology, attempting to impose empiricism upon social phenomena when theory is much tidier) extension.harvard.edu/blog/how-to-...

How did the pool survive without filtration until the 2000s? Because Canada geese weren't spreading tons of fertilizer into stagnant ponds and pools across the eastern US until the 2000s. www.allaboutbirds.org/news/canada-...

She timed the market correctly, but many others didn't. Another comparison: these two 1960s Levittowns have the same houses the same distance from DC, yet very different outcomes westnorth.com/2015/07/06/h...

Though notably, the HDB touts actually substantially increased construction labor productivity?! www.hdb.gov.sg/hdb-pulse/ne...

Also, this is an unhinged way to divide New Jersey into three parts. NOAA: Yes, Central Jersey exists, it's from Perth Amboy to Millville

Dominion is having an unusual day. Power in NoVa (Ft. Belvoir highlighted) selling >$3000/kWh, while at Surry nuclear plant in SE VA it's -$60. If only there was some way to move those electrons...

Wind energy in the US is highly concentrated on the Great Plains, in states that largely elect Republicans.

This also matters with today's infrastructure. Data centers cluster in the mid-Atlantic because it has the best fiber and electrical connections to the northeast, midwest, and southeast (plus good access to trans-Atlantic cables, and superior reliability)

We're conditioned to think of the Northeast Corridor as stacked north-south, but it's closer to west-east. Boston, New York, and Philadelphia are all further east than north of Washington DC; e.g., NYC's bearing relative to DC is 50.75°. 45° would be true NE, 45-90 is ENE.

Venn diagram of portmanteau names updated to add two

Alexandria began annexing outside the DC diamond not long after it was ceded, but most of its area outside DC (i.e., most of the Fairfax annexes, vs. Arlington co.) was added in 1952 tropicsofmeta.com/2013/03/14/t... Virginia began restricting annexations shortly thereafter

This calls for a Venn diagram

Goldman Sachs: 3/4 of today's data centers are *NOT* AI, and 53% of data centers built in 2025-26 are *NOT* AI www.goldmansachs.com/insights/art...

DC's strict solar-rights laws have predictably been weaponized to prevent taller housing, e.g. the 9-story bldg proposed for this vacant lot. I'm developing a surface parking lot right now; it won't get a solar canopy b/c future ADUs above it would have a much greater carbon impact.

These are *not* small structures; they have welded steel bracing and concrete footings. Cost is 40% more, energy and carbon footprint is 2-4X larger (concrete = lotsa CO2). link.springer.com/article/10.1... Ground/roof-mount systems can just drill prefab studs in.

US "traction" (streetcar) companies were local conglomerates, often controlling electric power; they were the first to run power lines into new suburbs. Anti-monopoly advocates of the day pushed to break up these businesses, triumphing in 1935. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_...

Japan's land readjustment policy allows private RRs to leverage their existing land holdings w/ neighbors' land, lead urban redevelopment, and share returns. RRs want to maximize long-term ridership growth & their consistent cash flow reduces borrowing costs for the higher risk/return dev't biz.

Screen cap from a local PBS doc on Marshall Fields highlighting 11 foreign "buying offices... scores of buyers... go abroad to seek merchandise" www.pbs.org/video/the-cu...

sO MuCh WiNNiNg!!!!!!! No wonder Donald has an ironic online nickname in China: "Trump the Nation Builder," for his monumental efforts at advancing China's global interests at America's expense. www.washingtonpost.com/world/2026/0...