Tuesday’s Headlines Are a House Divided
The infrastructure bill finally passed the Senate, and one reason it took so long is the growing gap between blue cities and their rural red counterparts. Meanwhile, the Earth burns.
By
Blake Aued
12:01 AM EDT on August 10, 2021
- At last, the bipartisan infrastructure bill is poised for a final Senate vote this morning, sending it on to the House. (CNN)
- The growing red-blue divide made negotiations over transit and highway spending even more contentious than usual. (NBC News)
- We’ve delayed reducing fossil fuel consumption for so long that we can’t stop global warming, and the longer we wait the worse the disaster will become, according to a new UN report. (New York Times)
- Climate change is already here, writes activist Bill McKibben, and in many ways we still don’t know how it will affect us. (New Yorker)
- The success of this one open street in New York City could be replicated anywhere. (NYT)
- Treasury secretary Janet Yellen visited Atlanta to promote the infrastructure bill with Sen. Raphael Warnock. (AJC)
- Nashville has created a new multimodal transportation department that will prioritize road safety and biking and pedestrian projects. (Smart Cities Dive)
- Seattle’s Sound Transit is accelerating plans to build three new light rail stations, but could delay others up to six years as it wrangles with a $6.5 billion shortfall. (The Stranger)
- Portland’s TriMet and streetcar are finding it difficult to enforce the mask mandate on public transit. (KATU)
- Sactown Magazine profiles Henry Li, the director of Sacramento Regional Transit who rebuilt the system to acclaim five years ago and is now dealing with the COVID crisis.
- Madison is moving forward with bus rapid transit over objections from a vocal minority of downtown businesses (Isthmus). The Wisconsin capital is also lowering speed limits in some neighborhoods to 20 miles per hour (WMTV).
- Richmond will spend $2.4 million to repair eight miles of sidewalks over the next year. (Times-Dispatch)
- Car ads are encouraging Americans to drive recklessly. (Jalopnik)
Blake Aued has been doing Streetsblog's daily national news digest for years. He's also an Atlanta Braves fan, which enrages his editor in New York.
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