New York City’s Flower District by Adam Kuban licensed under Creative Commons.

When land for public space is scarce, look inward. Is the reign of rush hour coming to an end? Being mayor isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

A novel proposal to increase public space in New York: New York architect Eran Chan proposes that Manhattan’s city blocks could be split open to provide more available public space. By breaking up some of the 100 foot blocks with courtyards, gardens, outdoor cafes and public space, the city could build a new network of green space that improves the lives of residents. (Nate Berg | Fast Company)

Will rush hour stay flat?: Rush hour has been the bane of transportation planners’ existence since the industrial revolution. But during the pandemic a new trend of flattened rush hour peaks emerged, and some transportation experts think rush hour could continue to be flat because of remote work. This could offer opportunities to better overall transit access, as agencies could schedule consistent service all day. (Emily Badger | New York Times)

It’s lonely at the top: Mayors around the country have struggled over the past year and become the scapegoats of urban problems like coronavirus lockdowns and racial justice crises. Mayors of the largest 25 cities are largely Democrats, but are dealing with an unstable and fractured populace. These issues are making being mayor less and less desirable, and many are calling it quits and opting not to run for re-election. (Alan Greenblat | Governing)

Local zoning control creates regional and national problems: Local zoning control can create massive macroeconomic impacts by underminding federal fiscal policy and misallocating labor, Will Wilkinson argues. Giving zoning power to states over municipalities could allow more projects to get built, building up housing stock rather than wasting precious time on debate and local homeowner infighting. (Will Wilkinson | Model Citizen)

The “false prophets” of sustainable transportation: The rhetoric around electric vehicles is far too focused on how EVs will prevent emissions and doesn’t begin to address the real problems of autocentricity such as sprawling land use patterns and unsustainable infrastructure. The author argues the “EV Revolution” is preventing society from taking off the shackles of car dependency that make the U.S. economically, environmentally, socially and physically weak and disconnected. (Coby Lefkowitz | Marker on Medium)

Alissa Guther contributed to these summaries.

Quote of the Week

“Both the settlement and the ISR are designed to get money into the community. There was concern about having people pay a fee to pollute and not give back to the communities bearing the brunt of the emissions.”

Attorney Adrian Martinez in Bloomberg CityLab discussing a recently negotiated environmental settlement with a planned major California logistics center.

This week on the podcast, we’re joined by Sharon Roerty, senior program officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and Maki Kawaguchi, a director at Gehl, to talk about the Inclusive Healthy Places Framework.

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Jeff Wood is the Principal of The Overhead Wire, a consulting firm focused on sharing information about cities around the world. He hosts a weekly podcast called Talking Headways at Streetsblog USA and operates the daily news site The Overhead Wire.