A line of school buses in a parking lot, seen from the back side.

National Links: School Bus Problems and Bringing Back Denver

Every day, The Overhead Wire collects news about cities and sends the links to their email list. At the end of the week they take some of the most popular stories and post them to Greater Greater Washington, a group blog similar to Streets.mn that focuses on urban issues in the D.C. region. They are national and international links, sometimes entertaining or absurd but often useful.

Inside the plan to save Denver’s downtown: The revitalization of Denver’s Union Station, in Lower Downtown, created a swell of redevelopment and momentum. So much so that the facility will pay off its bonds 14 years early. But the pandemic hit downtown Denver hard, with increasing crime and office vacancies. Now a new plan would extend the Union Station model to the rest of downtown as Mayor Mike Johnston — a Democrat elected in 2023 on a promise to “build America’s best city” — pushes for a 15-year plan to re-imagine the region’s core. (Robert Sanchez | 5280 Magazine)

Who’s riding the bus?: The familiar yellow school bus has suffered setbacks in recent years with driver shortages and budget cuts. In some cases, extreme cuts to the school bus network have led to massive car lines outside of schools that snarl traffic, waste parents’ time and pollute the air. In Cypress, Texas, the school district saved $4 million by reducing school buses, but set off a chain reaction that caused a line more than a mile long to drop off kids at a local middle school. (Henry Grabar | Slate)

Why U.S. nightlife is so lame: Nightlife in many cities in the United States pales in comparison with their counterparts around the world. A number of factors cause a lack of good options, including a culture of driving that means a night out of drinking may be unsafe, strict residential zoning that excludes commercial uses like bars and hangouts and makes small-business creation less likely, and a stigmatization of nighttime activities. (Darrell Owens | The Discourse Lounge)

Processes that created a housing crisis: Many of the tedious processes people go through just to add a small unit or build new housing likely arose from well-intended attempts to be more democratic. But they have allowed bad actors to block new development at all turns. Rather than focus our efforts on the effects and people using the system, let’s fix the underlying system itself. (Jerusalem Demsas | The Atlantic)

Richmond, California, makes Chevron pay: Richmond, California, reached a quick $550 million settlement with Chevron after the city threatened a ballot initiative that would have taxed every barrel of gasoline produced by the refinery inside city limits. Richmond’s win could be a playbook that other cities use to extract concessions for the outsized impacts from polluting industries and large corporations. (Will McCarthy | Politico)

On this week’s Talking Headways podcast, Move Minnesota’s departing Executive Director Sam Rockwell talks about climate bills the DFL-controlled Minnesota Legislature passed that limit the building of new roads — thus reducing emissions.

Quote of the Week

“Adults in the United States hold disparate attitudes toward private property, rule-bending, risk, consequences and externalities when those issues concern automobile use. A system built around private automobiles not only creates automobile dependency, it also engenders further demand for auto-centric ways to fix its problems.”

— Professor Tara Goddard in Findings Press describing her research on the phenomenon of “windshield bias” and “motor-normativity.”

Jeff Wood

About Jeff Wood

Jeff Wood is an urban planner focused on transportation and land use issues living and working in the San Francisco Bay Area. Jeff blogs at The Overhead Wire and tweets @theoverheadwire. He also shares news links daily from around the country on issues related to cities at The Direct Transfer