Today’s Headlines
Basics
Tuesday’s Headlines
Bloomberg labels Uber’s initial public offering a “flop,” as the company’s stock price lost 9 percent off its already-low price of $45 per share. Meanwhile, more bad publicity for ride-hailing companies: According to USA Today, the back seats of ride-share cars have 35,000 more germs than a toilet seat, and 219 times more than the … Continued
May 14, 2019
Monday’s Headlines
Cleveland Heights, Ohio, topped Smart Growth America’s list of 10 communities that passed the best Complete Streets policies of 2018, followed by Des Moines, Iowa; Milwaukee; Baltimore; Madison, Conn.; Neptune Beach, Fla.; Fairfield, Conn.; Huntsville, Ala.; Amherst, Mass. and Walpole, Mass. (Smart Cities Dive) Now that they’ve gone public, a MarketWatch analyst expects Uber and … Continued
May 13, 2019
Thursday’s Headlines
Because Uber and Lyft drivers are contractors rather than employees, their strike Wednesday was really more of a boycott (Jalopnik) aimed at hijacking the PR narrative surrounding their initial public stock offerings (The Verge). USA Today says it was kind of a bust, while New York magazine reported that Democratic politicians are starting to take up … Continued
May 9, 2019
Wednesday’s Headlines
Jacobin offers a convincing argument that Uber is a scam: It’s losing billions with no end in sight, susceptible to PR hits, undercharging customers, susceptible to regulations that would increase costs and admits autonomous cars are unlikely to save the day. Plus, most “unicorn” IPOs wind up failing. In other words, the demands of Uber … Continued
May 8, 2019
Tuesday’s Headlines
Uber drivers are planning a strike Wednesday — the day before the company’s initial public stock offering — to protest low wages (CNN). A recently passed law in New York City sets their minimum wage at about $17 an hour, but drivers there want greater job security. Other cities where strikes or protests are planned … Continued
May 7, 2019
Monday’s Headlines
The common 30 percent standard for what people should pay for housing doesn’t account for transportation costs. Owning two cars and commuting might take up another 20 percent of a suburban family’s income. (City Observatory) A new CDC study found that an alarming number of people involved in e-scooter crashes in Austin, Texas, suffered head … Continued
May 6, 2019
Friday’s Headlines
President Trump’s acting chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, is skeptical his boss will reach a deal with Democrats on infrastructure, despite Trump agreeing with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi to spend $2 trillion (Salon). In fact, as always, nobody really knows what Trump’s going to do (Roll Call). Reminder: “Infrastructure” is not just some magical … Continued
May 3, 2019
Thursday’s Headlines
More on Tuesday’s big infrastructure meeting among the powers that be: Politico, Washington Post, McClatchy, Streetsblog. Sidewalk Labs, Google’s sometimes-creepy sister company, has a common-sense plan for designing modern city streets: Recapture the space for the public, while separating modes and speeds. (Fast Company) Uber and Lyft have stopped hiring drivers in New York City, … Continued
May 2, 2019
Wednesday’s Headlines
Is “Infrastructure Week” no longer a joke? Axios reported Monday that President Trump hated his own public-private infrastructure proposal and secretly wanted to spend $2 trillion in actual tax dollars. Sure enough, when Trump left a meeting with Democratic leaders Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer on Tuesday, they’d agreed to $2 trillion in spending to … Continued
May 1, 2019
Tuesday’s Headlines
Bicycling delves into the brake problems that led Lyft to pull thousands of e-bikes from New York, Washington, D.C. and the Bay Area, but broke little new ground that StreetsblogNYC didn’t already report. Quartz recaps Uber’s often bumpy 10-year rise from San Francisco startup to $90-billion behemoth. But how much longer will it last? Ride-hailing … Continued
April 30, 2019