This is absolute death to urbanism.

Indices of disorder: Starbucks is no longer permitting non-paying customers to just hang out.

Pausing housing construction "to stem the tide of gentrification" is like taking up smoking to improve respiratory health.

Infuriating to see this happen to one of St. Louis's most underrated institutions, the National Museum of Transportation. Antisocial freaks destroy public assets—like treasured historic artifacts—for nothing other than their own satisfaction. We all end up paying a price.

Chicago is in very, very serious trouble with its current leadership. A mayor too incompetent to encourage growth and a slew of alderman on both the right and the left with far too much power to limit the minimal growth actually occurring.

Can someone explain the logic behind rust belt towns opposing new development? Like, shouldn’t they strongly support every single new apartment complex, office tower, or factory? Otherwise their tax base will continue to shrink and jobs & people will continue to move elsewhere.

Delayed Central West End tower to move forward stltoday.com/news/local/bus… via St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Best way to solve this is to allow people to build entirely new buildings for the “luxury” renters to move into.

For most urban progressives, it is our wealth and privilege that allows the segregation that assures us that our neighbors are not jerks who bring base-thumbing strangers to their door. Assholes who will hold a gun if we politely ask them to turn their music down. Consider that.

Zoning suffocates our cities and violates our rights. So tedious and unserious. Fully incompatible with a free society.

This is why I think Cities: Skylines hasn’t lived up to the reputation of SimCity 4 or its predecessors. It’s clear there’s not much of a theory of urbanism behind C:S, particularly the most recent version. (Still enjoy the game though)

This is, in one picture, the real villain in America’s political economy. It’s not corporations. It’s not immigrants. It’s this.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Own MAGA by making blue cities & states work: Fix fare evasion, address public safety, build housing people can afford, make transit reliable, keep streets clean. Stop with trying to do everything - deliver basic services well.

Underneath the idiocy here is a much deeper phenomenon, which is that these guys do not understand what cities *are* - they think cities and density are conspiracies, basically.

Incredible. Real spending on infrastructure declined due to cost increases. From Jason Furman foreignaffairs.com/united-states/…