Edmail: a peek behind the deliberative curtain Explore three months of emails sent and received by the Edmond City Council.

more about why here: mackeyguenther.com/writing/edma...

edmail interface

built Edmail, a tool to read every email sent/received by the Edmonds City Council from January-April 2024

The Biggest Myth About the YIMBY Movement There’s nothing centrist or conservative about the push to lower housing costs.

YIMBY is progressive, populist and antitrust. Not centrist. Not Reaganite.

The Atlantic published my piece and I’ve included a gift link.

www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

Bothell Drops Parking Mandates, Legalizes Neighborhood Corner Stores Citywide » The Urbanist # Bothell becomes the first city in either King or Snohomish County to fully eliminate off-street parking mandates in order to reduce costs for homebuilding. The move clearly solidifies the city as a ...

The elected leaders of Bothell, WA, a city of 51k just north of Seattle, rank among the biggest YIMBY heroes nationwide.

There's no lack of evidence that reforms like this are the right thing to do.

But in most cities there's a lack of leadership.

www.theurbanist.org/2025/07/10/b...

dynamicland.org/2024/Computa...

this is a work of art 😍

Don’t forget to come hang out on Saturday evening w @theurbanist.org and a bunch of awesome folks who are making our north sound communities more liveable! Coolest thing to ever happen in Mountlake Terrace? Possibly! www.eventbrite.com/e/north-soun...

We’ve got some good momentum and energy going up here, come hang w us and @theurbanist.org.web.brid.gy on March 15 and let’s see what we can build together!

www.eventbrite.com/e/north-soun...

I just got this email from our statewide city association about @jessdbateman.bsky.social's parking bill, and boy it’s frustrating to see the org we pay dues to sending emails like this out. So frustrating that I will address their local control talking points in a thread.

Why Seattle’s housing density plans are a disability-rights issue The city’s comprehensive plan would shift zoning rules to allow more multifamily and mixed-use buildings, which have accessibility requirements.

New @cascadepbsnewsroom.bsky.social: For disability rights advocates, Seattle's comp plan is seen as a chance to improve accessibility in the city because it will allow more apartments in more neighborhoods. www.cascadepbs.org/politics/202...

The prophet of parking A eulogy for the great Donald Shoup

Today in @worksinprogress.bsky.social, I reflect on Donald Shoup's legacy. Perhaps the most interesting question: how did the most unlikely professor kick off an international parking reform movement?
substack.com/home/post/p-...

🙌🙌🙌

Whoever headed up the redesign of the Washington legislature's website should get a statue on the capitol grounds

Imagine using the word "hyperdensification" and what you're talking about is LYNNWOOD WASHINGTON.

A new bill just dropped in #waleg to require the state building code council to allow smaller, internationally best-in-class elevators to be built in small apartment buildings.

Read #SB5156 here: app.leg.wa.gov/billsummary?...

Riders Plan Vigil for Metro Bus Driver Shawn Yim Following Stabbing - The Urbanist # The Transit Riders Union is hosting a vigil tonight, Saturday, 7pm at 15th Avenue NE and NE 41st Street in the U District, near where King County Metro operator Shawn Yim died in a recent stabbing.

NEW STORY // Riders Plan Vigil for Metro Bus Driver Shawn Yim Following Stabbing www.theurbanist.org/2024/12/21/r...

Killzone

screenshot of IRS website reading "Photographs of Missing Children The Internal Revenue Service is a proud partner with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children® (NCMEC). Photographs of missing children selected by the Center may appear in instructions on pages that would otherwise be blank. You can help bring these children home by looking at the photographs and calling 1-800-THE-LOST (1-800-843-5678) if you recognize a child."

fascinating pattern here: the IRS sprinkles in photos of missing children to fill blank pages in documents

Name the Puget Sound municipality that has this in their 2024 Comprehensive Plan.

“Shared lanes have become the nationally accepted method to improve bicycle mobility through urbanized areas.”

citymeetings.nyc Browse and research NYC council meetings quickly and easily.

hey, thanks! (hopefully) transcripting/parsing/affiliating them with agenda/packet/other city data, into a very janky younger sibling of @vikramoberoi.com's citymeetings.nyc or @calmatters.org's digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org ... emphasis on janky though 😅

spending friday night downloading video of every single Edmonds City Council meeting since 2015 🤠 only 500gb to go!

a bunch of cooking stuff on a table at a campsite, in front of a bike

a bike parked on a water taxi vessel, docked at Vashon Island near Seattle

shockingly (to me), yes! everything on this table, too 🙂 made it home with 30 miles left in the tank after a 40 mile trip!

😍

this clip from @worrydream.com in the recent @dynamicland.org intro video (dynamicland.org/2024/Intro/) discussing the importance of interactive, IRL systems for computation to solve real world problems is just... so good!!!

A picture of Seattle Link ridership, which spikes from 30M annualized to 40M as the 2-line opens and the 1-line is extended to Lynnwood

The 2nd big recent US transit expansion is the Lynnwood extension of Seattle's Link. Ridership on the system is now at a record high and is up 35% year-on-year!

except the the tables are @dynamicland.org (via x.com/Hansenq/stat...)

Conversation pit at The Miller House, Columbus, Indiana, 1957 (via Indianapolis Museum of Art)

this is what legislative deliberation rooms should feel like

just joined, thanks for the link!

long term, i hope the derivatives of these tools (and the processes that use them) enable more people to see other people, and their stories, in collective decision-making.

starting to use them w/ "smaller" problems will be the most realistic institutional uptake anyway - so promising nonetheless!

agree agree agree on re-affirming the bedrock assumptions. imo, that will require deliberation at scale, in a way that still satisfies participants, which seems way more feasible with this kind of assisted facilitation. excited for more work on this concept!