The Texas A&M Transportation Institute has released its 2021 Urban Mobility Report, which provides traffic data for the pandemic year of 2020. Throughout much of the year, traffic congestion fell materially. This is confirmed by the 2021 Travel Time Index, which the report defines as the “The ratio of travel time in the peak period to travel time at free‐flow conditions. A Travel Time Index of 1.30 indicates a 20‐minute free‐flow trip takes 26 minutes in the peak period.”  read more »

The COVID-19 pandemic has left pain and tragedy in its wake. But it has also created a unique opportunity to address the country's persistent class divides, thanks to a persistent lack of labor resulting from the pandemic.  read more »

Even though Californians are the most environmentally regulated population on the planet, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD is proposing a new Rule 6-5 to further reduce particulate emissions from some of the cleanest refineries in the world.  read more »

There’s a tendency today to see Benito Mussolini as a pathetic sideshow, an incompetent blusterer who went from Adolf Hitler’s idol to his lapdog. Yet in many ways, Mussolini’s notion of fascism has become increasingly dominant in much of the world, albeit in an unexpected form:  read more »

Back in 2008 I labeled Cincinnati “a Midwest conundrum.” The city is a sort of counter-example to all the claims that urban design is a shaper of urban destiny. If high quality traditional urbanism made a city prosperous, Cincinnati would be a boomtown. In reality, it’s a relatively prosperous but merely stable city.  read more »

Last week I got a call from young friends who wanted my opinion on whether or not to buy a particular house. It was a simple two bedroom one bath 943 square foot (87 square meter) cottage that was built in 1895. The location was in a fashionable small semi rural town in Sonoma north of San Francisco. It was on the market for $600,000. I said I couldn’t make that choice for them, but I could give them my interpretation of the pros and cons.  read more »

In an age of canceled college speakers and political indoctrination in K-12 schools, I am often asked where college students can go to be exposed to real viewpoint diversity and avoid a liberal monoculture.  read more »

After a year of violence and unrest, large American cities serve as a cautionary tale for the progressives in Washington who want to move the country further to the left.  read more »

As the food industry followed American consumers into better-for-you eating, and Silicon Valley turned dietary consumption – like everything else – into a digital pursuit, the nation’s breadbasket lost relevance to the coasts.  read more »

What happens in California matters well beyond its borders. The Golden State’s cultural and technological influence on America, and the world, now could provide the nation’s next political template.  read more »