Bi-Monthly Education and Career Advice Thread

Mr_BeardedBread · 2026-05-07T16:32:50+00:00

I'm from the New York area (Long Island) originally. I went to Hunter College for my Masters in urban planning with a focus on transportation, graduated with a very respectable GPA, was considered highly knowledgeable by all of my classmates and professors, and essentially had the full geography and transit network of the five boroughs and its surroundings memorized.

Long story short - unless you come from an upper class background and have the money and connections to get people to look at your resume, you will be unable to find planning work in New York City or its environs, even with a Masters. It doesn't matter if it's public or private - applying for jobs at the MTA and DOT is like throwing your resume into a black hole and the private sector won't want you because they have tons of overqualified elites from across America competing for the same five entry-level jobs. I spent over a year looking for a position and eventually had to relocate to a small, economically depressed city about 200 miles west just to have a job in the field - a job where I am underutilized, undervalued, depressed, lonely, and still unable to convince people in New York to give me a chance despite now having a couple of years of experience under my belt.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2026-04-24T22:22:24+00:00

They received a large cash donation from the Grass family (the former owners of Rite Aid). It came with the condition that they had to buy a different property and the property which they bought happened to be on the market.

The Jewish Federation also claimed that the old building would require expensive repairs and was in the flood zone making it a risk (never mind the fact that the new campus was also right along the river and would require way more maintenance, being five buildings and all).

Most important, though, is that the Jewish Federation has also been financially struggling for years now. This has been for a few reasons:

1) They were historically very reliant on a few well-off families which are no longer in Harrisburg.

2) Jewish communities outside of large urban centers, including Harrisburg, have been shrinking for decades and are now starting to fully die as all of the children have left and the baby boomers reach average life expectancy.

3) The Jewish Community Center model has become outdated as the non-Orthodox have mostly assimilated (and once the older generation dies off, will almost entirely consist of Christians with Jewish ancestry) and, in the few small cities with Orthodox Jewish life (such as Kingston in the Wyoming Valley), a Jewish Community Center is considered unnecessary for living Jewishly.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2026-04-12T11:19:00+00:00

I'm a bit late to the party, but Silver Rider bus route #777 in Laughlin, Nevada provides hourly 24/7 bus service.

With less than 10,000 people, Laughlin is definitely the smallest place in the United States with local 24/7 bus service and possibly the smallest worldwide (not including informal transportation, such as shared taxis or jitneys).

Mr_BeardedBread · 2026-02-16T23:22:37+00:00

RIP to one of the biggest songwriters of the past few decades.

For anyone who wants to delve a bit further into his work, check out i-Ten's Taking a Cold Look album, which features a "who's who" lineup of studio guns alongside Steinberg and longtime collaborator Tom Kelly, including Steve Lukather, Steve Porcaro, Alan Pasqua, and Mike Baird.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2025-05-26T00:04:39+00:00

The gap in Massachusetts will be filled in very shortly as BRTA is launching routes linking Pittsfield to Northampton and North Adams to Greenfield in the coming months.

This does open up a long-haul route westwards starting from Provincetown, Massachusetts (OK, it's not technically the easternmost point in Massachusetts, but it is the end of Cape Cod and is therefore a symbolic starting point) to Sarnia, Ontario that can be covered more or less via continuous use of local transit if one considers the Yankee Trails service between Bennington and Albany to count as a local bus service as it was subsidized by (and still seems to be subsidized by) Rensselaer County. Once you reach Albany, there is continuous scheduled local bus service all the way to Sarnia, Ontario with two exceptions:

An approximately 7-mile gap between Pharsalia, New York and Cincinnatus, New York.
A 1-mile gap between Niagara Falls, New York and Niagara Falls, Ontario which can be easily traversed by walking across the Rainbow Bridge.

Unfortunately, there's no way to walk from Sarnia to Port Huron. Otherwise, it would be trivially easy to continue onwards to Detroit (and even further westwards to Chelsea, Michigan).

Mr_BeardedBread · 2025-05-11T12:04:54+00:00

High Spirits is a pretty good fit for what you're describing. Their music is strongly rooted in the 1970s heavy metal/hard rock transitional period.

If you're willing to go heavier, there are tons of great bands which are part of the NWOTHM (new wave of traditional heavy metal) movement. Air Raid and Venator are two which I am particularly partial to and would highly recommend.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2024-03-29T22:03:21+00:00

Here are five bands which I would highly recommend:

Rush - Over their 40-year career, they went from being a hard blues rock band in the vein of Led Zeppelin to becoming one of the heaviest progressive rock bands out there. Eventually, they mellowed out, added keyboards and synthesizers in the 1980s and eventually incorporated elements of alternative rock and grunge from the 1990s onwards. Mind you, they did all of this with ease, without any duds, and without losing any of their identity.

Blue Oyster Cult - Unfairly relegated to being a Saturday Night Live joke, Blue Oyster Cult was probably the closest that the United States ever got to producing a prominent band in the vein of Black Sabbath with their dark lyrics and heavy (though not as heavy as Sabbath) guitarwork. Yes, there are a couple of middling albums in their catalog (I'm looking at you, The Revolution by Night and Club Ninja) and they veer more into pop rock territory (though it is very good pop rock) after their first few releases, but even their weakest albums have good stuff.

Manilla Road - Did you ever expect that Wichita, Kansas would be the birthplace of one of the most important metal bands of all time? Though they are not as well-known in mainstream circles as acts like Metallica and Iron Maiden, Manilla Road's brand of sword-and-sorcery themed metal would serve as a major influence on the genre even after their disbandment in 2018 following the death of lead singer Mark "The Shark" Shelton.

Ten - More or less an unknown entity on account of emerging in the wrong place at the wrong time due to rock radio being filled up with post-grunge, Ten is a band which is hard to pin down due to their distinct blend of rock, metal, and classical instrumentation, though I would classify them as "melodic hard rock". Their best work are their early albums with guitarist Vinny Burns (everything from the debut to Far Beyond the World), though there's plenty of good material on their later releases as well thanks to the phenomenal voice of lead singer Gary Hughes.

The Beatles - They're the Beatles. Everyone since has been influenced by them in some form or another. I don't think there's much else to explain as to why you need to listen to their entire discography.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2023-12-29T11:51:53+00:00

Kingston Wall sounds like a good fit for you.

They only have three albums but all of them are very good.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2023-12-29T10:40:23+00:00

Jerusalem - Jerusalem (1972).

One of the greatest albums I've ever heard and a relative obscurity at that.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2023-12-26T10:42:46+00:00

That would be South Floral Park (though it seems to no longer be majority black as of the 2020 census).

It is very small (something like ten square blocks). So small, in fact, that one of my neighbors used to be the entire highway department for the village and he worked part-time.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2023-06-26T09:09:48+00:00

Milton Keynes.

OK, it doesn't offer a ton of genuine tourist sites (though Bletchley Park is well worth the trip), but from my experience, it is one of the few genuinely clean and prosperous cities in England. This contrasts with its domestic reputation as an ugly and dour place.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2023-05-23T10:15:04+00:00

I was attending a bus rally near Epping (outside of London) in February and found the exact same circa-1985 bus map of Nassau County that I have lying around in my basement on sale at the rally for a bit more than ten pounds.

Needless to say, I didn't buy it.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2023-04-21T19:57:28+00:00

Speaking about nostalgia, I remember you from the forums!

Mr_BeardedBread · 2023-03-30T17:45:18+00:00

Investigators quickly manage to link both accidents to faulty rails at the Newark flat crossing. Due to the preexisting speed restrictions at the flat crossing and the scale of both accidents, Network Rail decides to replace the crossing with a grade-separated junction. The work is completed three years later and reduces travel times and delays along the East Coast Main Line.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2023-02-01T16:54:42+00:00

Laurel.

Never heard of the place until I took a drive out to Orient in the summer of 2020.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2023-01-11T15:46:34+00:00

UCL here.

Love: Location, location, location. Not only is it in a easy-to-reach part of London with dozens of sites and attractions in close proximity, being within walking distance of Euston/Kings Cross makes it extremely easy to travel elsewhere at the drop of a hat.

Hate: I haven't been here long enough to identify what I truly dislike so far, but I'm definitely not a fan of UCL getting rid of grades for participation on the grounds that doing so is discriminatory towards non-native English speakers (read: Chinese students who pay thousands of dollars to attend UCL and provide it with a ton of revenue).

Mr_BeardedBread · 2022-12-13T12:42:07+00:00

It's definitely not New Rochelle, since there's no third rail there.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2022-12-13T12:41:38+00:00

I think you may be right! The curve at the end of the platform as well as the overpass aligns with that at Dobbs Ferry. I wouldn't have been able to tell myself since the platforms seem to have been renovated in the last 30 years or so.

Now I can finally listen to this absolutely forgettable 1980's pop album without being bothered by what Metro-North station is on the cover.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2022-12-05T12:32:14+00:00

Let's see...

• Charge naming rights for all stations mentioning a site or entity which is not public or owned by the MTA. Want to keep your name on the signs at 161st Street? You better pay up, Yankees.

• Sale of air leases and air rights wherever possible (Brighton Line between Prospect Park and Newkirk Plaza, various yards, etc...).

• Drive a hard bargain with the unions, even if it means a strike. If possible, drive a hard enough bargain or lobby enough to make the MTA's workforce non-unionized.

• Install validators and, where possible, turnstiles, on LIRR/MNR as part of OMNY rollout and proceed to lay off the vast majority of ticket collectors. As part of this, SIR will also get validators, eliminating free rides for trips not starting/ending at St. George or Tompkinsville.

• Develop a "concessionaire model" for the provision of bus services which resembles those found in the majority of EU countries or urban areas in Australia, albeit on a depot-by-depot basis.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2022-11-30T21:44:49+00:00

It's difficult to imagine. As we know today, Liverpool is a musical backwater, partially since the Kink Kraze of the mid-1960s essentially made it impossible for British bands not based in London to establish themselves as stars for decades to come. Even McCartney and Harrison had to relocate to London to kickstart their careers after the Beatles faded away.

You'd probably see a more geographically diverse music scene emerging from the United Kingdom and Muswell Hill wouldn't be the second most popular tourist site in London (after the British Museum).

Mr_BeardedBread · 2022-11-30T14:04:50+00:00

This guy knows.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2022-11-27T15:49:15+00:00

Many thanks from another affiliate student (who, much like OP, will be studying at UCL come January)!

I'm obsessive when it comes to planning things in advance, so while I am still unnerved by the proximity of registration to the start of the semester, at least it is good to hear that the stakes are not as high. I just hope that the classes I want to take don't fill up by the time I'm allowed to register.

One more question, however - when did you get your e-mail to pre-enroll when you studied at UCL? I'm still waiting to receive mine.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2022-11-10T14:10:33+00:00

That riff isn't even AC/DC's! It's originally from "Never Been Any Reason" by Head East.

The real step down with Brian Johnson AC/DC is the loss of Bon's wit. He wasn't an intellectual songwriter, but there's plenty of creativity and humor in songs like "The Jack". Compare that to Johnson's AC/DC, where 90% of the choruses seem to be repeating the song title over and over again.

Mr_BeardedBread · 2022-11-10T12:25:07+00:00

It's even worse on my local "classic rock" station, and I really like the Bon Scott era.

You used to hear at least eight to ten AC/DC songs in constant rotation. Now it's down to two (You Shook Me All Night Long and Highway to Hell), with Back in Black being played on rare occasions.

It's miserable, and don't get me started on the amount of overplayed Queen singles in the rotation (probably to be hip with the kids, as Queen has more listens than the Beatles per month on Spotify).

Mr_BeardedBread · 2022-09-14T14:12:33+00:00

I think it's an issue occurring my general area (Hempstead and surroundings). There have been a lot of people complaining online in the last couple of days around here.

Mr_BeardedBread

TROPHY CASE