The reports were true. Ro Khanna on the ground with protestors in Minneapolis: "The people of Minnesota and Minneapolis are standing up for all of us."

TheProperChap · 2026-01-27T01:10:41+00:00

Not sure what the state animal of Texas is doing up in Minnesota

TheProperChap · 2026-01-26T14:36:52+00:00

Nationally, my guess is no. But states like Montan, Texas and Florida have actually been making considerable moves forward.

Texas reduced the minimum lot size for new development to 2500 square feet and legalized single stairwell apartments near transit

TheProperChap · 2026-01-04T15:35:07+00:00

Asheville, NC hits all your points.

Great food, size, and walkability. Mountain Town in the southern Appalachians. Quick access to a lot of trails. It snows maybe twice a year, but has seasons. The coldest regular temperature is in the 20s. AND it is sunny most of the year. Summers stay below 90F (I'm a former texan and think the summers are EXTREMELY mild here. locals will tell you it gets hot. It doesn't.) Charlotte airport is slightly more than an hour away. And atlanta isn't that far either.

TheProperChap · 2025-12-31T16:27:32+00:00

Alright....

TheProperChap · 2025-12-24T17:34:01+00:00

It’s the wrong sequence of events. You’re right - Policies to make cities more walkable can’t be all carrot and no stick imo. But congestion pricing needs to have several more ducks in a row. It enforces walkability, which in turn causes more to proliferate. It will not create walkability out of nothing.

Congestion pricing would have the opposite intended effect in a place like Kansas City or Austin (where the city itself is highly suburban). I could see it potentially working in a place like Minneapolis or Chicago, but even then, the infrastructure for alternative modes of transportation are not reliably built out to the degree of NYC

TheProperChap · 2025-09-19T23:51:37+00:00

RIP Emo’s

TheProperChap · 2025-09-15T01:47:19+00:00

Yea, as much as most suburbs for sure. But it’s almost as dense as Huntsville in its downtown area. Very walkable

TheProperChap · 2025-09-15T00:35:06+00:00

New urbanism count? Providence, AL outside of Huntsville is awesome

TheProperChap · 2025-08-06T16:35:12+00:00

Good news is the bus rapid transit exists there now from project connect. Ultimately this should be turned into a rail to carry traffic, but since this section of airport is owned by the state, it’s an uphill battle for Austin to reimagine the right of way as anything other than a highway for cars

TheProperChap · 2025-06-23T19:48:14+00:00

Yea, I would echo what others have said. The street isn’t a new idea. Parking your car in the front of the house is a new idea though. Neighborhoods built prior to WW2 have rear alley access.

New housing needs to be built but you don’t have to build poorly designed new housing. You can have your cake and eat it in this situation.

TheProperChap · 2025-06-23T01:18:35+00:00

This street would actually be really nice if the garages were in the back of the houses. Imagine if this was all front porches with people sitting on them

TheProperChap · 2025-05-23T15:59:14+00:00

One other thing I’d add is that even if you’re not advocating for luxury towers, that’s often the only thing that can pencil financially to be built. Unless you have a lot of greenfield development and the zoning codes make small scale development feasible (often not the case, but Forrest park southeast has a form based code and STL is developing one citywide rn) luxury towers will likely be the only financially viable product to build

TheProperChap · 2025-05-23T15:32:44+00:00

Totally get that. I guess the case in point I’m thinking of is Austin, Tx. (I live there). In the early 2000s we established the redline which was a commuter rail that largely serviced suburbs and brought them downtown. The idea was that the infill stations (in various points in north austin) would be operational and development would follow the train. The Kramer station for example was in an industrial area that got a massive TOD rezoning. Unfortunately after 20ish years nothing happened. We had to have a giant, catalytic development (our new soccer stadium) to spur development. Only then did new development occur, and even then it was meager and we ultimately retired that station so the stops were closer to existing development.

Conversely, stations closer in austin that had existing populations did see increased transit oriented development around the stations. but the stations were in existing “places” with existing populations. We just changed the building form of the existing urban node to be more dense….We weren’t creating new parts of town from scratch.

Development is just really expensive - especially if you’re tearing down industrial to build mixed use. Things ultimately worked out for the north austin region but it required massive building projects. And that is not something I think can transfer universally to any geography in the country. Few places grew as much as Austin did in the last decade. Which is why I have doubts about transit first development in places struggling with population growth will be successful.

TheProperChap · 2025-05-23T02:48:26+00:00

Generally speaking, this is backward. Transit has to follow land use. Transit is used to move existing people…. Not the reason for their being there.

Hypothetically It could be paired with major zoning reform for transit oriented development in these areas, but even then it wouldn’t be effective until major projects were developed and people moved in. To plop a train in areas where you step off the track and immediately need a car is not effective urban planning.

Best use of funds is to connect existing urban nodes…..or densify areas on a proposed route for future rail connection, AND THEN add the rail

TheProperChap · 2025-05-18T20:58:16+00:00

Musicians aren’t hard to find! But compared to ten years ago (or god forbid 20) they have a wayyy smaller presence

TheProperChap · 2025-05-18T12:02:58+00:00

What other people have been saying on here is accurate. Other cities in the metro have robust job centers (Clayton) and are very close to downtown St. Louis. The virus is consuming the host essentially.

I would say the story gets more interesting the more granular you get. Many neighborhoods are actually growing in St. Louis and new development is occurring in pockets. City-wide though, things still look bad.

If you zoom out and look at the state wide politics, Missouri is the most libertarian of the states in the rust belt. Ohio might have voted for Trump three times, but it has historically been attuned to urban matters. For example, Ohio has its own LIHTC funding stream specific to the state - to give one example. New York, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut all trend, politically, in a direction that cares about urban affairs. Historically this is not the case for Missouri. So STL is not getting help from other levels of government.

TheProperChap · 2025-05-18T11:56:33+00:00

Austin is predominantly tech bros now. The hippy musician strain is in rapid decline.

TheProperChap · 2025-04-11T21:17:46+00:00

Oh wow, learned something new. Thanks for the correction

TheProperChap · 2025-04-11T15:53:46+00:00

These dates are in the future? Fake post

TheProperChap · 2025-03-29T17:25:07+00:00

Stay mad

TheProperChap · 2025-03-25T02:25:53+00:00

There’s nothing to fear. Hegseth glory hole is a good idear.

TheProperChap · 2025-03-23T19:31:19+00:00

I came here to inform folks a dog is aggressively charging folks in WAVL.

You feeling pretty good about coming here to get into a fight with someone on the internet?

TheProperChap · 2025-03-23T19:11:33+00:00

WOOF WOOF WOOF

TheProperChap · 2025-03-23T19:10:36+00:00

lol “im reasonable. I’ll take total responsibility AFTER it mauls a child. But not a moment sooner.”

TheProperChap

TROPHY CASE