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The latest streets and transportation news from Streetsblog USA.

We’re back at it on this Monday morning! Here are today’s top stories:

A lawsuit in New York is raising important questions about how Uber’s in-app navigation system works after a driver hit a scooter rider after making an illegal u-turn that was ordered by Uber’s own GPS. When drivers (who Uber makes pains to point out are NOT employees of the company) fear getting “deactivated” from the app for not following the navigation to a T, who shoulders the blame? Streetsblog NYC’s Sophia Lebowitz explores this contradiction, in print and on video.

And as the Trump administration is getting ready to send federal troops into their latest targeted “urban hellhole” (Portland, Oregon), the Put-a-bird-on-it city is fighting back with a plan to file a “land use violation notice” about ICE’s alleged zoning violations in the southwest part of the city. Given its usual scorched-earth approach to everything, the Trump administration will undoubtedly continue to ignore Portland’s land-use conditions – and most likely challenge them in court. The question is what the challenge will look like. The administration could simply claim the feds are not subject to local control even though the facility is on leased property from a private property owner. And/or it could challenge Portland’s whole land-use regulation regime, most likely in federal court. And that would be where this whole thing gets interesting.

Read all that and more below.

  • The Forgotten History of ‘Bloody 66’ And How Public Memory Helps Perpetuate Traffic Violence
    by ren1
    May 25, 2026
    Centennial events downplay the violent history of one of America’s most “iconic” highways, and obscure how that violence persists to this day.
  • Friday’s Headlines Are in Decline
    by Blake Aued
    May 22, 2026
    The U.S. is becoming a dying petrostate, while China leads the world in renewable energy.
  • Spirit’s Shutdown Exposes America’s Fragile Affordable Travel System
    by ren1
    May 22, 2026
    “Affordable travel is not a fallback. It is what makes broad mobility possible.”
  • A train passes over the Downtown Greenway in Greensboro, North Carolina.
    Talking Headways Podcast: Greensboro’s Downtown Greenway
    by J.K. Trotter
    May 21, 2026
    Dabney Sanders explains how Greensboro’s Downtown Greenway came together.
  • Can Neighborhood Block Parties Unite A Broken America?
    by Kea Wilson
    May 21, 2026
    The best way to celebrate the nation’s birthday might not be a road trip to a national treasure; it might be just a few steps outside your front door.
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