Today’s Headlines
Basics
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
Monday’s Headlines
Bike commuters arrive at work happier than those who drive or take the bus, according to an obvious University of Minnesota study. (Minneapolis Star-Tribune) Most Uber rides are trips that would otherwise be made by transit, bike or on foot. (NBC News) Thousands of Uber and Lyft drivers are planning to go on strike in … Continued
April 29, 2019
Friday’s Headlines
President Trump, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer are scheduled to meet Tuesday to talk infrastructure. (Transport Topics) Former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood — a Republican who worked in the Obama Administration — called the U.S. “one big pothole” and endorsed a hike in gas taxes in a Bloomberg interview. St. … Continued
April 26, 2019
Thursday’s Headlines
With scooters surpassing docked bike-shares as the car alternative of choice, Curbed highlights five cities — Boston, Philadelphia, Detroit, Memphis and Ithaca, N.Y. — that are expanding bike-shares into underserved communities, for example by reaching out to seniors and Spanish speakers, investing public money and offering more types of bikes. In addition, Indianapolis’s Pacers Bikeshare … Continued
April 25, 2019
Wednesday’s Headlines
Fining poor people for walking won’t keep them from dying — only redesigning roads to be safe for everyone will do that. (Talk Poverty) Now that Uber and Lyft have shareholders who will pressure them to turn a profit, the era of cheap fares is over. (Fox Business) A Georgetown University study of Washington, D.C. … Continued
April 24, 2019