US DOT's new "Freedom to Drive Initiative" focuses on addressing congestion by:
—"Building new roadway capacity"
—"Recover[ing] roadway capacity from other purposes [e.g., biking & transit] to support driving"

[There is no evidence that either of these strategies work to address congestion.]

Apple's lobbying spend in 2025 was $10 million.

It's a MAC machine. It's Delaware Avenue. This is canon.

We still tap MAC and go to concerts at Spaghetti Warehouse. Philly doesn’t accept new names. Our defiance builds community. Don’t like it? Go pound sand up Delaware Avenue.

"Developers love renaming Philly neighborhoods and the Philadelphians who live and work in these neighborhoods love ignoring that marketing hogwash because ew. What’s Newbold? Does anybody even know? No, because it’s Point Breeze."

share.inquirer.com/4Igcpw

Inside the NYC Power Stations That Keep Trains Moving — or Bring Them to a Halt (Gift Article) Transit officials are spending billions of dollars to upgrade New York City’s aging electrical substations, the mostly invisible backbone of the subway system.

Some good old fashioned infrastructure porn for a Monday morning. @stefanoschen.bsky.social goes inside the subway substations powering your rides.

www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

all hail the Dutch

Damn right we did.

+100

Mamdami’s pied a terre tax is just going to further squeeze working class commuters who had to buy a Greenwich Village row house to avoid paying the congestion charge every day.

"Without those sales to other Musk-run companies — which included xAI, Boring Co. and Neuralink, in addition to SpaceX — Cybertruck registrations in the fourth quarter would have fallen 51%."

I would.

I don't know if young people these days understand that this kind of grotesque gutter racism was simply not acceptable in public... not that long ago!

Katie Robertson @katie_robertson More: A source told me that the other, higher bidder for The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette was Alden Global Capital (which did not respond to comment request). PG owner Block Communications went with the nonprofit Venetoulis Institute instead

And this is even better news.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette sold to a responsible owner, and not the ravenous vultures at Alden.

Kernan on an impressive Getting Owned run

Hall of fame FT correction

It’s not news that there’s a reality distortion field around Musk, but I don’t think people quite realize how big the gap between reality and expectations has gotten (gift link) www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Elon Musk’s Boring Company Ghosts Cities Across America The tunnel venture has repeatedly teased local officials with a pledge to ‘solve soul-destroying traffic,’ and then backed out when confronted with the realities of building public infrastructure.

(The doubters in Chicago had a point.)

www.wsj.com/articles/elo...

This is a really incredible answer. "He had an innovative technology." No, he didn't. It didn't exist then. It doesn't exist now. It was a stunt, just like the doubters said.

No one likes admitting they fell for a stunt, but it seems like table stakes for a Hard Truth Teller candidate to do so.

US Agencies Leave About 70% of Office Space Unused, Data Show The US government is using less than a third of its office space, potentially costing the federal government billions in annual real estate expenses, according to a new congressionally mandated accoun...

NEW: The US government is using less than a third of its office space, potentially costing the federal government billions in annual real estate expenses, according to a new congressionally mandated accounting released Tuesday.
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Trump’s God Squad Exempts Gulf Drilling from Endangered Species Protections The Endangered Species Committee, a little-used panel of US senior federal agency leaders, on Tuesday exempted oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico from sweeping endangered species protections, ...

The Endangered Species Committee, a little-used panel of US senior federal agency leaders, on Tuesday exempted oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico from sweeping endangered species protections, citing reasons of national security.

Gift link: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

underrated Christie scandal (in part because running that agency into the ground is such a long-term, bipartisan project)

LOL

vacuumaxxing

operator: 911, please state the nature of your emergency
me: there’s a site i go to a lot that isn’t the best way to follow breaking news
operator: is it a news site
me: not really
operator: why don’t you go to a news site
me: i don’t know
operator: jesus. ok. how many ambulances do you want
me: 75

You see this in Comey’s memos describing his 2017 interactions with Trump—on a profound level they literally do not understand one another

Reupping this for Monday, one of the best data-driven deadline stories I've ever seen.

I have to know what phishing email he opened to make this happen

DC Metro vault

Happy 50th birthday to Metro, the best Washington monument and a vital part of this city and my own life

A Push to ‘Level the Playing Field’ Threatens Minority- and Women-Owned Businesses The DBE program no longer considers gender or race as evidence of disadvantage.

When Trump froze $$ for the NY-NJ Gateway tunnel over possible “illegal DEI,” the pretext only lasted until he offered to restore it in exchange for naming Penn Station after him. But there WAS a program to help disadvantaged businesses. Here’s what’s become of it www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...

Teach your kids about subway signaling and interlockings at home before they learn it from someone else on the playground