Thursday’s Headlines Shake and Bake
An obsession with performance — and the heavy batteries required — have turned electric vehicles into "rolling bank vaults," Autoblog reports.
By
Blake Aued
12:47 AM EDT on July 2, 2026
- In the past decade, electric vehicles have gone from slow, boring cars focused on range above all else to torque monsters that are too fast for their own or anyone else’s good. Most drivers can’t handle the power, nor is it necessary to go from 0 to 60 in two seconds, and automakers’ focus on speed requires heavy batteries that make EVs even more dangerous. (Autoblog)
- Demand for transit doesn’t disappear after dark, but it is different than during the daytime. (ITS International)
- A federal judge ruled that President Trump illegally froze funding for the Gateway rail tunnel project underneath the Hudson River. (NJ.com)
- The Trump administration is not coming through for Los Angeles, which hoped to host a “car-free Olympics” in 2028 but has received less than $300 million of the $2 billion it requested for transit projects. (Semafor)
- Successfully implementing Vision Zero is one of the challenges faced by new Charlotte Mayor Robert Harrington. (Observer; paywall)
- A Utah developer broke ground on a new walkable community at the site of a former prison. (KSL)
- The Kansas City streetcar set a single-day ridership record during the World Cup. (Fox4KC)
- Higher parking rates took effect in Portland on July 1. (KGW)
- Denver Mayor Mike Johnston wants to encourage more people to drive downtown by convincing private parking lot owners to charge just $5. Apparently restaurant owners have been telling Johnston it’s too hard to find a parking spot downtown, but how is charging less going to fix that? He also said it’s “not our strategy” to encourage biking and riding transit. (Denverite)
- Miami is closing in on a deal with Brightline for a new commuter rail line. (Miami Times)
- Wyoming is drastically slashing transit funding. (Wyoming Public Media)
- Savannah launched an online map highlighting traffic safety improvements. (WTOC)
- High-speed rail projects should be “impossible to stop,” says a high-ranking UK official. (New Civil Engineer)
- Copenhagen is a great city because it learned from mistakes like building wide roads and bland architecture. (Monocle)
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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