Category Archives: Blog

Mondays 107: Gas Shock!

March 21, 2022

This week on the Mondays show we talk about the impact of gas prices and have some studies on urbanization’s impact on getting to net zero! We also talk about insurance and wild fires.  Lots of different topics!

Check below for links the the articles we discuss in the show.

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 374: Who Represents “The Community” Part 1

March 17, 2022

This week we’re joined by Jeremy Levine, Assistant Professor of Organizational Studies and Sociology (by courtesy) at the University of Michigan. Jeremy talks about his book Constructing Community: Urban Governance, Development, and Inequality in Boston and describes how neighborhood groups, elected officials, and public servants all claim the mantle of representing “the community.” In Part 1 we discuss how he went about his research in Boston, and how groups coalesced around the idea of the Fairmount Corridor.

Listen to the show at the Streetsblog USA podcast archive or our hosting site.

Below is a full unedited transcript.

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 373: Real Talk on Climate Action and TOD

March 9, 2022

This week we’re joined by Adie Tomer from Brookings to talk about how transit-oriented development and active transportation play into climate strategies over the long term. We talk about mitigation versus adaptation strategies and what solutions work best for each.

To listen to the show, go to Streetsblog USA’s podcast page or our hosting archive.

Below is a full (unedited) transcript from the show:

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 372: The Annual Prediction Show with Yonah Freemark

March 3, 2022

This week we’re joined by Yonah Freemark, a senior research associate at the Urban Institute. We chat about the impacts of the pandemic on office work, rethinking federal transportation policy, and make our annual predictions on next year’s transportation policies and projects.

You can listen to the show at Streetsblog USA or on our hosting archive.

Below is an unedited full transcript of the show:

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 371: Transit Project Costs and Solutions

February 24, 2022

This week we’re joined by Paul Lewis, Policy Director at the Eno Center for Transportation. Paul discusses their report on transportation construction costs, Saving Time and Making Cents: A Blueprint for Building Transit Better.  We chat about the project database they created for the research, the different level of scrutiny between highway and transit capital projects, and some of the ways agencies can create better governance structures and lower project costs.

To listen to this show, you can do so at Streetsblog USA or our Libsyn host site.

Below is a full unedited podcast transcript.

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 370: Planning for Underground Cities

February 16, 2022

This week we’re joined by Dr. Asal Bidarmaghz, lecturer in Geotechnical Engineering at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. Dr. Bidarmaghz discusses planning for underground infrastructure and why it’s so important for the future of cities including underground climate change, coordination among long term projects, and putting appropriate land uses in better places.

To listen to this episode, check it out on Streetsblog USA or our hosting archive at Libsyn.

Below is a full unedited transcript of the show.

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Mondays 105: Seamless Transit

February 15, 2022

This week we’re joined by Ian Griffiths of Seamless Bay Area to talk about their work in the Bay Area and we talk about a few news items from the weeks before on housing and transportation.


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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 369: Treating Social Media Like a City

February 10, 2022

This week we’re joined by Sahar Massachi of the Integrity Institute to talk about his piece in MIT Technology Review titled “How to Save Our Social Media by Treating it Like a City”. We chat about the similarities between managing social media’s bad actors and urban problems like black box highway modeling, speed management, and city building.

To listen to this episode, visit Streetsblog USA or our hosting archive.

Below is an unedited transcript of the discussion.

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 368: A Grassroots Bus Network Redesign

February 3, 2022

This week we are featuring a Rail~Volution one on one conversation between Carlos Cruz-Casas, Assistant Director, Department of Transportation and Public Works for Miami Dade County, and Grace Perdomo, Executive Director of Transit Alliance in Miami. Grace and Carlos chat about the Better Bus Project, an advocacy-led community driven redesign of the Miami-Dade bus network.

You can find the audio of the show at Streetsblog USA or our archive at Libsyn.

Below is a full unedited transcript:

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 367: Reimagining Sustainable Cities

January 27, 2022

This week we’re joined by Tina Rosan, Associate Professor at Temple University and Stephen Wheeler, Professor at UC Davis to talk about their new book Reimagining Sustainable Cities: Strategies for Designing Greener, Healthier, More Equitable Communities. We talk about a broad array of topics including rethinking public meetings, urban power dynamics, and structural change in government systems.

You can find the audio of the show on Streetsblog USA or our Libsyn host page.

Below is a full unedited transcript.

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Mondays 104: New Cities, New Towns, New Trouble

January 24, 2022

We’re Han Solo this week on Mondays at the Overhead Wire!  We talk about Jennifer Homendy and the 94% rule, the need to stop fetishizing old buildings, Donald Shoup’s sidewalk fix, and how some non-profits and foundations are taking a greater governmental role as governments atrophy.

We also talk about moving the capital of Indonesia away from Jakarta, the future of underground cities, concrete block alternatives, and Fort Worth’s river redevelopment plan.

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 366: Inherent Transportation Expertise

January 20, 2022

This week we’re joined by Anna Zivarts from Disability Rights Washington and Paulo Nunes-Ueno from Front and Centered. They join us to talk about the Disability Mobility Initiative and story map, as well as the Mobility Bill of Rights.  We also chat about why mobility experiments might make travel harder for disabled travelers and why a core part of anyone’s civil rights should be the ability to be safe on the road.

You can listen to the episode at Streetsblog USA or at our hosting site.

A full unedited transcript is below:

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 365: A City is Not a Computer

January 13, 2022

This week we’re joined by Shannon Mattern, professor of Anthropology at the New School for Social Research. Shannon talks with us about her new book A City is Not a Computer: Other Urban Intelligences.  We discuss the ideas of smartness versus wisdom, the idea of maintenance as a way of absorbing information, and the city as a processing machine, just not in the ways you might automatically think.

You can listen to this episode at Streetsblog USA or the Libsyn Archive.

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 364: Creating a Better Transit Board

January 6, 2022

This week on the podcast, we’re back at last fall’s virtual Railvolution conference. Former BART GM Grace Crunican moderates a panel discussing the role of board members in transit agencies with Former MBTA board member Monica Tibbits-Nutt and former Houston Metro board member Christof Spieler. They talk about how to deal with board members with opposite ideas, how to help agency staff, and using the budget as a policy document.

To listen to the episode, find the audio on Streetsblog USA or our Libsyn archive.

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 363: Not Just Wires, Pipes, and Roads

December 16, 2021

This week we’re joined by Michael Spotts, a senior visiting research fellow at ULI’s Terwiliger Center for Housing and head of Neighborhood Fundamentals. Michael chats with us about takeaways from the Shaw Symposium on Urban Community Issues, the definition of infrastructure, and the importance of taking a systems approach to important interconnected topics like transportation, education, and health care.

Below is a full unedited transcript.  If you wish to listen to the show you can do so at Streetsblog USA or our hosting archive.

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 362: The Traffic War is Never Won

December 8, 2021

This week we’re joined by University of Virginia Associate Professor Peter Norton, to talk about his new book Autonorama: The Illusory Promise of High-Tech Driving.  Peter discusses the false promises of auto makers and technologists and the mobility solutions that are already in front of us.

To listen to this episode, find it at Streetsblog USA or the Libsyn hosting page.

Below is a full and unedited transcript:

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Mondays 101: Auto Nostalgia and the Oil Crisis

December 7, 2021

This episode of Mondays we’re joined by Gabrielle Esperdy, a professor of architecture at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, and a contributing writer for Places. This episode was produced in partnership with Places Journal.

Gabrielle discusses her piece ‘Twilight of Autopia‘ in Places, which includes a deep dive into nostalgia, thoughts on the word sprawl, and the ultimate cultural impact of the 1970s oil crisis.


(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 361: Infrastructural Optimism

December 2, 2021

This week we’re joined by Linda Samuels, associate professor of urban design at Washington University in St. Louis to talk about her book Infrastructural Optimism. We chat about how growth for growth’s sake is not the answer, learn from post modernist urbanism, and why systems should be more connected.

Listen to the audio of this episode first at Streetsblog USA or in the Libsyn archive.

A full unedited transcript is below:

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 360: Transit Expansion and Service in the Pandemic

November 17, 2021

This week we’re at the 2021 Virtual Railvolution conference. Adelee Le Grand, CEO of the Hillsborough Area Regional Transit System in Tampa moderates a panel featuring Debra Johnson, GM and CEO of RTD in Denver and Peter Rogoff, CEO of Sound Transit in Seattle. Johnson and Rogoff discuss transit expansion plans and progress in their respective regions as well as how they kept things going during the pandemic.

To listen to the audio of this show, you can find it at Streetsblog USA and at Libsyn.

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(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 359: Streets are Not Just Pipes

November 10, 2021

This week we’re joined by Miami of Ohio Geography Professor David Prytherch. David chats with us about his recent journal article in Urban Geography: Reimagining the physical/social infrastructure of the American street.  We talk about businesses newfound interest in the street, equity and ethical discussions about rights to the street, and the new pandemic paradigm of open streets.

You can listen to the show at Streetsblog USA or on our libsyn archive.

Below is a full unedited transcript:

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Mondays #100! Double Infrastructure All the Way

November 9, 2021

Well it’s finally infrastructure week. We definitely timed it to coincide with our 100th episode of Mondays. Tracy and I get into some of the lesser discussed details of the IIJA bill while also covering a few stores from the newsletter including, French bookshop protection, Vienna’s urban flood protection, housing rejection in SF, indoor methane issues, and the idea of cluster commutes. And Chrissy joins us towards the end to celebrate it being episode 100.

Infrastructure details from the National Association of Counties.


(Unedited) Podcast Transcript 358: A National Perspective with Jannet Walker Ford

November 4, 2021

This week we’re joined by Jannet Walker-Ford, National Transit and Rail Lead at WSP. We chat about high speed rail around the country, the benefits of trade and research groups, escalating transit project costs, and our current transport policy environment.

To listen to this episode, you can find it on Streetsblog USA or at Libsyn.

For a full unedited transcript, check below the fold.

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