I am attending this meeting and will live-whatever-this-is (seriously, did we come up with a name for posts here?). I live down the street and I will be disappointed if we end up with more parking and 3-4 stories. I want a big tower!
Join me: www.somervillema.gov/events/2026/...
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I cannot tell you how many policy conversations I’ve been privy to where the central dilemma is “we need to incentivize private actors to do something, but for unclear reasons they cannot be permitted to earn any sort of profit by doing it.“
This happening right next to the ‘raised crossing - 10mph’ sign is certainly making me feel a way
(Per Reddit, the helicopters are for car into the dentist office next to orleans on holland)
We talk a lot about the importance of redesigning streets to make them safer and encourage better driving, but sometimes it feels very futile when you see a street with a good design and protected bike lanes and raised crosswalks and some asshole has still managed to crash into a building
we keep finding this but free fares discourse just will not end
The implicit media consensus is that urban voters should not be able to overrule rural voters, but that rural voters should be able to overrule urban voters, an assumption so axiomatic and unquestionable that nobody even understands they're making it.
Good thoughts on planning and public outreach here.
Also good for agencies to be clear with the public about the purpose of the meeting - is it to ask about X? Or is it to inform about a decision or a proposal?
Impressive that Toner has time to put this together and also prepare for his trial. Or did he end up deciding to take the pre-trial probation deal after all?
time for that classic game: who on the block knows tomorrow is a holiday and there's no trash pickup
“Frustration with modern dating” feels like an awfully charitable phrasing for what’s motivating these guys
Is it a loophole when the law does what it’s supposed to?
Give us good service that is worth the fare instead of bad service that is free.
If your response is "false dichotomy, those are not the only two choices," OK, are there any places making transit free reduced onerous headways and got more drivers & buses on the road? Sincere question!
Mamdani hasn't had time to really think about all that space he now has, because he spends most of his time at City Hall and around New York City. He tries to keep a semblance of his old life by getting around the city on foot, by bike or train. "If you spend every single day driving around in a tinted window security detail, you will have a very specific view of the city," he said. "You actually meet other New Yorkers and you break out of the bubble that so many have come to expect of politics, where politicians only seem to be spending time with other politicians or the people who donated to make them politicians."
I'd say that this applies to anyone traveling in a car in any city. Being in a car versus walking, riding, or taking transit fundamentally changes how you view a place and your relationship to it. I wish more leaders set this kind of example.
www.npr.org/2026/04/16/n...
Oh no our reforms to allow for more housing are resulting in more housing
if i ever run for office it will be on a “tax the rich assholes” platform, specifically
-second homes
-helicopters
-private jets
-luxury cars (based on weight and MPG, with extra fines for loud cars or motorcycles)
-yachts
-crypto/gambling profits
-expensive clubs (zero bond, things of that nature)
Folks, it is -heartbreakingly- beautiful outside, but for reasons known only to me I am LIVE AND IN THE CHAMBERS for tonight's joint session of City Council and School Committee - at which we are going to get the bad news about our financial situation.
It's a $5.9M shortfall vs. level funding.
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i will vote for any candidate who offers up this slogan
MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT 350 RINDGE AVENUE Please join to learn about our proposed 100% affordable rental project to be permitted through the City's Affordable Housing Overlay • 92 New Construction fully income restricted affordable and workforce units • Preservation of Ferro's Foodtown supermarket • All electric, Passive House construction WEDNESDAY, APRIL 15 6:00 PM - 7:00 PM ® www.bostoncommunities.com/350-rindge © info@bostoncommunities.com Join on Zoom: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/81909662495 Meeting ID: 819 0966 2495 Call In: 1-305-224-1968, 81909662495# JOIN US AHSCI AFFORDABLE HOUSING AND SERVICES COLLABORATIVE, INC. DOStOn communities •
By-right, 92 passivehaus units of affordable housing being proposed along Rindge Ave! Ferro’s Foodtown retained in new ground floor!
Hopefully a great upcoming example of Cambridge’s affordable housing overlay delivering.
A lot here, but the part I really want to draw attention to is that xenophobia can creep in when you talk too much about “place” and “rootedness.” I’m not accusing anyone in particular of doing this but it is a pathway/connection to be cautious of. www.thedeletedscenes.com/p/nimbyism-a...
To all who celebrate!
The "you can even get great *bagels* in Boston" claim was too hard for a NYer to make that they had to edit the abstract
The reason I don’t work in PR is because my answer would be, ‘no, you lost, get over it, we’re moving forward’
These people who sued the church with the homeless shelter multiple times and lost every time, being like, ‘we hope the church is ready to work with us and hear our concerns’ ….
Massachusetts Land Court has affirmed at Somerville ISD permit is good to go. The case, Becker et al. v City of Somerville ZBA and Somerville Homeless Coalition, had blocked the shelter from opening.
First Congressional Church of Somerville will finally be able to open to people who have no housing
I find it fairly interesting that in Cambridge they’re not concerned that these are uninspectable or w/e it was that ISD determined, and it raises questions for me whether city by city inspectors are serving our best interests
A better world is possible
(Except in Somerville where a building inspector has decided these aren’t permissible)
the fascists frankly don't care that much about marriage or birth rates except as a tool they think will allow them to achieve changes in society that will make it easier for them to enslave and rape women (the thing they actually care about)
Transportation politics is about dragging people kicking and screaming into change that results fairly quickly in a widespread consensus that we can't imagine going back to the way it was before.
