Jake Berman
@lostsubways.com
4.1K followers 330 following 840 posts
Wrote and illustrated "The Lost Subways of North America". Lawyer. Californian living in New York. Avid cyclist. Transport + housing nerd. Order the book at: http://lostsubways.com
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lostsubways.com
(I was running errands, I tried following the DOT's detours to get home, and it was hilariously unsafe - this article was the result. Frustration = great source of creativity.)
lostsubways.com
Yeah, but Johnson federalized the local Guard. He didn't deploy another state's Guard against its neighbors!
lostsubways.com
When I visited Paris earlier this year, the comparison with New York (where I live) felt rather shocking.

2nd and 3rd generation immigrants in NYC (myself included!) are just Americans. In Paris the grandchildren of immigrants don't seem to be truly French.
lostsubways.com
Like, that's enough money to extend SMART - the rail system in the Marin suburbs - over the Golden Gate Bridge.
lostsubways.com
For those of you on my feed who aren't from NorCal: this is an asinine construction project. The original SR-37 is built on a mudflat and it'll be underwater in a decade or three. It's a marginal road between two Bay Area suburbs, and they're spending $11 billion on it.
warrenjwells.bsky.social
Caltrans has released a cross section for the ultimate (raised viaduct) version of SR-37.

Now maybe I'm just being paranoid, but if you were building a road that you planned to keep at 4 lanes wide, I don't think it would look like this.
Cross section of 114' wide bridge structure with each direction having a 12' outside shoulder and a 10' inside shoulder.
Reposted by Jake Berman
stephenjacobsmith.com
I can't stop thinking about this. We're pursuing zero fire risk in multifam, while tolerating much more in single-fam. People respond by building and living in single-fam, where they're exposed to not only one of the highest fire death risks in the developed world, but also TONS more car crash risk
ebwhamilton.bsky.social
Love this new report on buildings' relative fire safety from @alexhrwtz.bsky.social and Pew colleagues.

www.pew.org/en/research-...
lostsubways.com
This kind of rethink would be great in Long Island City, Queens and in Brooklyn under the LIRR Atlantic Avenue line.
emmanuelspv.bsky.social
Avant / Après sous le métro aérien près de la Place de Stalingrad dans le 19ème arrondissement de Paris. On est passé de voie générale + bande cyclable + faux trottoir finissant en cul-de-sac à piste cyclable + large trottoir continu. Notez qu'il y a plus de cyclistes au second plan qu'au premier !
Reposted by Jake Berman
lostsubways.com
I've harped on this before: the voters are the best form of community input you can have when it comes to new infrastructure.
nilo.bsky.social
One thing that the Swiss historically pointed to as why transit was so popular in referenda is that people who couldn’t drive (women and the elderly) are far more represented in a referendum than in a legislature or bureaucracy which tend to be filled disproportionately with able bodied men.
awalkerinla.bsky.social
Reflections on last week's #WeekWithoutDriving in a city that still refuses to acknowledge the existence of its nondrivers — which a comprehensive new report claims make up one-third of LA's population
lostsubways.com
I've harped on this before: the voters are the best form of community input you can have when it comes to new infrastructure.
nilo.bsky.social
One thing that the Swiss historically pointed to as why transit was so popular in referenda is that people who couldn’t drive (women and the elderly) are far more represented in a referendum than in a legislature or bureaucracy which tend to be filled disproportionately with able bodied men.
awalkerinla.bsky.social
Reflections on last week's #WeekWithoutDriving in a city that still refuses to acknowledge the existence of its nondrivers — which a comprehensive new report claims make up one-third of LA's population
Reposted by Jake Berman
nilo.bsky.social
One thing that the Swiss historically pointed to as why transit was so popular in referenda is that people who couldn’t drive (women and the elderly) are far more represented in a referendum than in a legislature or bureaucracy which tend to be filled disproportionately with able bodied men.
awalkerinla.bsky.social
Reflections on last week's #WeekWithoutDriving in a city that still refuses to acknowledge the existence of its nondrivers — which a comprehensive new report claims make up one-third of LA's population
One-third of Angelenos do not drive
Walking back the "car-free" games promise is unconscionable in a city where the people who don't drive are also the most vulnerable users of our streets
www.torched.la
lostsubways.com
Good news: a lot of distressed office space in Midtown Manhattan is being converted to apartments. This is the kind of thing SF desperately needs.

Gift link:
www.bloomberg.com
lostsubways.com
That's nuts, but as someone who grew up in CA this is pretty small potatoes.
Reposted by Jake Berman
mtsw.bsky.social
I've said before that the ideal level of fame is to be Gene Hackman's character in THE CONVERSATION - anonymous nobody on the street but treated with awed reverence at your industry's trade show bsky.app/profile/shai...
shaidorsai.bsky.social
Science fiction author John Scalzi talks about the happy medium of fame for him, where people that are really into your work recognize you, and it’s rare enough that it’s generally an enjoyable experience, but you’re completely anonymous otherwise.
lostsubways.com
TL;DR: Mark Sanchez is actually a Real Housewife who gets wasted and picks fights with truck drivers
lostsubways.com
New Yorkers, who are you voting for? Leave notes in the comments.

/4x
lostsubways.com
PROPOSAL 1 (ski trails upstate): Planning to vote no, but up to hearing other opinions.
PROPOSALS 2 & 3 (faster affordable housing/small housing project review): Yes
PROPOSAL 4 (affordable housing appeals board): Yes
PROPOSAL 5 (digital city maps): Yes
PROPOSAL 6 (even-year elections): Yes

/3
lostsubways.com
MANHATTAN DA: Alvin Bragg
MANHATTAN BORO PRESIDENT: Brad Hoylman-Sigel
BROOKLYN BORO PRESIDENT: Antonio Reynoso
CITY COUNCIL DISTRICT 1 (FiDi, LES, Chinatown, Tribeca): I'm writing in Nira the Cat; both candidates suck.
CITY COUNCIL DISTRICT 36 (Bed-Stuy, Crown Heights): Chi Osse

3/
Nira the Cat would make a great city councilor.
lostsubways.com
NYC MAYOR: Zohran Mamdani
PUBLIC ADVOCATE: I'm writing in Abby the Dog, both candidates suck
COMPTROLLER: Mark Levine

2/
abby the dog would make a great public advocate
lostsubways.com
It's common to deploy troops for natural disasters and for civil disorder, like the 1920 Denver streetcar strike, 1992 LA riots, Hurricane Katrina in '05, and the Floyd protests in 2020. But this Portland stuff - like the LA and DC deployments before it - is transparently BS.
lostsubways.com
I'm going to provide some historical context for this in a thread. Bottom-line, up front: it's unheard-of and downright un-American to deploy the National Guard to a state against the wishes of its own elected officials.
govpritzker.illinois.gov
This evening, President Trump is ordering 400 members of the Texas National Guard for deployments to Illinois, Oregon, and other locations within the United States. No officials from the federal government called me directly to discuss or coordinate.