Colby Brown @colby@transportation.social

"Those who have never seen Superior get an inadequate, even inaccurate idea, by hearing it spoken of as a 'lake,' and to those who have sailed over its vast extent the word sounds positively ludicrous. Though its waters are fresh and crystal, Superior is a sea. It breeds storms, and rain and fogs, like the sea. It is cold in mid-summer as the Atlantic. It is wild, masterful, and dreaded as the Black Sea." - Rev. George Grant, Ocean to Ocean, 1872

#photography #LakeSuperior #minnesota

Larry Summers and others published a paper with an interesting theory on why consumers believe inflation is higher than the government’s CPI numbers. Since 1983, it has ignored interest rates even though they affect car and mortgage payments.

Using a pre-1983 CPI formula would have inflation around 18% versus the official 7.1% in November 2022. It’s a plausible theory that explains why people’s sentiment doesn’t match inflation stats.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2024/03/23/summers-inflation-reached-18-in-2022-using-the-governments-previous-formula/?sh=1edc93e62092

Wednesday's Most Read # 2 - Has remote work changed how people travel in the U.S? https://bit.ly/43UYeFX MIT News

A short memory of how I built 38 useful Twitter bots in 2009: https://bensmith.blog/posts/i-invented-tweeting-trains-probably

Wednesday's Most Read # 1 - A Possible Future for Downtowns Out in the Suburbs https://bit.ly/4cI274Z Governing

Mondo Transit !

Today's episode: Off-the-Wall Solutions

By which I mean: Out-of-the-Wall Solutions

1/ The Liziba (李子坝) station of the #Chongqing Monorail

🚝🧱🧵

The fact that you can follow the president of the United States (@potus) from your Mastodon account instead of being forced to have an X or Threads account for it is a huge W in my book. Of course our team is fully available to help if they'd want to set up Mastodon on whitehouse.gov. I believe governments should not rely on 3rd party platforms to connect with their constituents.

Happy Easter to those who celebrate.

In many ways, the archetypical nighttime institution—the all night diner—was invented to serve this kind of work.

New results from another completed guaranteed #basicincome pilot. This one was in Cambridge, MA where 130 people got $500/mo for 18 months. Did they work less? No. They worked MORE.

Recipients went from 36% FT employed to 40%. Those who didn't get it went from 30% to 28%. PT and seasonal employment also grew for those with the basic income.

That isn't unusual. Most of the pilots have shown increased employment.

So what else was observed?

Read the report:
https://cambridgecf.org/research-on-cambridges-guaranteed-income-pilot-shows-tangible-benefits-for-cash-recipients/

@remenca @dfeldman this is actually a very important criticism — systems should not work on "garbage in, garbage out". As far as possible, they should work on "garbage in, error message out". That the system is not only incapable of spotting the mistake but actually in the first sentence affirms that the input was correct means you can't trust it. If its only failure mode is to confidently make an incorrect diagnosis, then how can you ever trust anything it says isn't just that?

Imagine if we had implemented the Interstate Highway System alphabetically by state? Too often, active transportation networks are built out in exactly that patchy way.

We just posted a new $44.5M grant opportunity that is different:

1) Just for active transportation,
2) Focused on planning and implementing *networks*,
3) Aims for outcomes beyond safety.

Learn more about ATIIP:
https://highways.dot.gov/newsroom/biden-harris-administration-announces-nearly-45-million-available-funds-improve-bicyclist

This is both terrifying and deeply, deeply stupid.

This isn't just about TikTok. The bill gives USG the power to ban any old foreign-owned media/tech they designate as adversarial.
https://apnews.com/article/tiktok-ban-house-vote-china-national-security-8fa7258fae1a4902d344c9d978d58a37?taid=65f1bb38c2c1680001c4da1b&utm_campaign=TrueAnthem&utm_medium=AP&utm_source=Twitter

@mekkaokereke @blikkie @AdrianVolt @tess

While there are racial and gender differences in how people look at the climate crisis, I think it's safe to say that ALL Americans are held hostage by
1. a car industry that forces the American public to buy large cars (that make large profits) and
2. a lack of viable alternatives like public transit. By "viable" I mean it works for everyone not just "the undeserving poor".

The EPA could have mandated smaller EVs. But they backed down to industry.

trains are the crabs of transportation technology

every time you try making a mode of transportation more efficient, you approach it being a train a little bit more