Amtrak's Richmond SFC Station in Philadelphia is the country's largest rail static frequency converter (SFC) station and the sixth biggest in the world. New York City based STV will be tasked with modernizing module #4 (there are 5 total at the facility)

zweiglist.com

STV has been Selected to Modernize Amtrak Converter Station

twp.ai

New report from @jmooreotto.bsky.social on using RRIF and TIFIA to provide a stable source of capital funding for rail electrification and automation projects! Shifting off discretionary grants is one step towards helping agencies build long-term capacity. publicenterprise.org/report/the-t...

The Transit Infrastructure Lottery

Read the full report here. Executive summary Federal transportation investment in the United States suffers from both a quantity problem and a quality problem. The quantity problem is much-d...

publicenterprise.org

“we found that kinetic energy exposure is more strongly associated with transportation safety outcomes than variables focused on roadway behavior such as vehicle speeds, education requirements, enforcement efforts, alcohol involvement or seat belt use.” This is so intuitive and logical! ♥️

Wes Marshall@wesmars.bsky.social · yesterday

Got a new paper out today... "Urban areas with lower commute mode share by car and, to a lesser extent, lower VMT are most strongly associated with lower per capita transportation fatality rates." (and it's open access if you are the type of person who wants to read a research paper)

ATTENTION TO ALL DEM TAX CUT SLOPULISTS

‘A gateway for African trade’: work starts on latest phase of Tanzania’s standard gauge line https://www.railwaygazette.com/news/2026/08/05/a-gateway-for-african-trade-work-starts-on-latest-phase-of-tanzanias-standard-gauge-line/

‘A gateway for African trade’: work starts on latest phase of Tanzania’s standard gauge line

TANZANIA: President Samia Suluhu Hassan has officially marked the start of construction on the sixth phase of the country’s Standard Gauge Railway by laying a foundation stone in Kigoma. Valued at TSh7.5tr (€2.5bn), the Lot 6 contract covers the construction of the Tabora – Uvinza – Kigoma section, which will extend the strategic Central Corridor…

railwaygazette.com

"In Mexico City, a pedestrian activist called Peatónito, a mix of the Spanish words for pedestrian (peatón) and astonished (atónito), is famous for walking over cars. He wears a Mexican wrestler mask, a cape and proclaims himself to be a superhero for pedestrians."

fema 🚲@fema.monster · 3y ago

"carwalking" has been added to the Urbanism+ feed. "Carwalking is the act of stepping onto and walking across a stationary car...a response to cars being parked illegally in areas exclusively allocated to pedestrians and a protest against the negative impacts of high motorization rates..."

Prime example of where Philly's local media should really take a look 90 miles to the north where a mayor is going all in on containerized residential trash to greatly increase pickup efficiency and minimize litter & pests. We're missing a critical piece of the solution only looking inwards

Green Philly@greenphilly.bsky.social · yesterday

Carlton Williams is leaving the Office of Clean and Green Initiatives after helping launch Mayor Parker’s anti-litter efforts. Community leaders say his successor should build on that work while tackling the root causes of waste. Read the full story: https://bit.ly/4cmlbqW

It's a great project but severely compromised by sacrificing more plaza space for the eastbound frontage road. I can only hope a future developer and the Mummers Museum will apply to permanently close it in the future

Billy Penn at WHYY@billy-penn.bsky.social · 2d ago

South Philly is about to get a brand new "connector street" to the Delaware River via Washington Avenue — perfect for an afternoon stroll. billypenn.com/2026/08/03/w...

Love how this centers the impact to everyone not storing their metal boxes on the street. Move your car. Don’t block street sweepers. 📸 @emmagf.bsky.social

Hanwha vs Holt: How New Jersey lost a shipyard. My latest: www.inquirer.com/business/han...

Hanwha vs. Holt: How New Jersey lost a shipyard

Hanwha is now looking in southern states for a place to invest a chunk of the $5 billion it has pledged for U.S. shipbuilding.

inquirer.com

Cold urbanist take: ban right turns on red lights Hot urbanist take: ban left turns on unprotected greens

Urban rice paddies in Miaoli City, Taiwan.

Exelon thinks that almost half of the projected data center load growth in its territory* will never be built www.utilitydive.com/news/exelon-... * incl Chicago, Philly, Baltimore, DC

Exelon ‘high probability’ data center load falls 40%

The drop to 11 GW reflects Exelon’s ability to weed out speculative projects through “transmission service agreements,” said CFO Jeanne Jones.

utilitydive.com

Jake is right. I also wrote about this in my book, more from the political angle. I argue that the streetcar conspiracy was actually a convenient scapegoat for those who wanted to minimize government's role in transit's failure, and the racism of whites who abandoned integrated systems.

Jake Berman@lostsubways.com · 3d ago

this is not true. there was no conspiracy. it didn't matter whether the streetcars were publicly owned (seattle, detroit) or private (los angeles, atlanta). a thread (because i wrote a whole-ass book on this): 1/?

Just utterly bleak, what can you say (and "Mi-Place" is a hilarious downgrade from "Mews at Downingtown Heights" or something

Philadelphia Business Journal@philadelphia.bizjournals.com · 3d ago

The recently completed development includes a mix of apartments and townhomes.

In this house we stand the Meridian Archer (Mifram is good too I guess)

Propriety@proprietous.bsky.social · 3d ago

Please someone send the mayor MERIDIAN ARCHER 1200 BARRIER. Cost so sustainable good barrier for reducing police overtime he will not regret MERIDIAN ARCHER 1200 BARRIER.

Grade of Automation 2 cabin video — ME ENCANTA este video porque deja ver la operación automatizada del Tren Urbano con la excepción del cierre de puertas, algo que es fácil de resolver. 👉🏽 Reducir espera a 4 minutos vs 16 👉🏽 Correr trenes hasta las 2am 👉🏽 Viajeros llegan más rápido a su destino

No they couldn't. People unironically get madder about housing than data centers.

GodlessPrimate@godlessprimate.bsky.social · 3d ago

It's all about priorities. The tech bros gave politicians a lot of money.

Investment in people and control systems aims to boost TAZARA performance https://www.railwaygazette.com/tanzania/2026/08/03/investment-in-people-and-control-systems-aims-to-boost-tazara-performance/

Investment in people and control systems aims to boost TAZARA performance

TANZANIA: The Tanzania-Zambia Railway Authority and railway modernisation PPP concessionaire CCECC have begun construction of a training centre and operations control centre in Dar es Salaam. TAZARA Managing Director & CEO Bruno Ching’andu said the two facilities would address the critical requirements for operating a modern railway: skilled people and effective operational control. The Chinese…

railwaygazette.com

But to get back to how badly the trains needed upgrades, let's compare like with like. Here's a sample trip from Downtown LA to Culver City. - LA Metro E line (2026): 30 minutes - Motor Transit Co. bus (1948): 39 minutes - Pacific Electric Railway (1948): 43 minutes 7/

For the Philadelphia Inquirer, Fred Adelson writes of two Thomas Eakins masterpieces, popularly known as The Gross Clinic and The Agnew Clinic. The first took 3 years to sell, for $200. Both drew outrage for "bad taste" when exhibited at 1893 Worlds Columbian Exposition. share.inquirer.com/V9steR

Thomas Eakins turned Philadelphia’s medical history into high art. Philadelphians weren’t ready for it.

The 8 feet by 6.5 feet "The Gross Clinic" and the 6 feet by 11 feet “The Agnew Clinic” are very different paintings that have had a similar history. Both are presently on view.

share.inquirer.com

Transit agency managers always think the solution is overhauling an esoteric in-house app instead of creating robust and functional APIs for third-party apps

NJ.com@nj.com · 6d ago

NJ Transit's new mobile app has problems and lost features the old app had, riders said. Even the state transportation commissioner's family has complained.

6104 MARKET ST

John Snow gentrified SoHo by shutting down the community-serving water pump.

Reforms that anonymized China’s imperial exams and ended local recommendations increased commoner entry into office and reduced, especially scholar-led, social unrest, from Jingjing Chen, Jianlei Han, Shing-Yi Wang, and Yongxiang Wang www.nber.org/papers/w35531

Can't put trash in bins because it'll 'sanitize' the city and cut down on rats is a king ass take, everyone log off and go home, this cannot be beaten

Neil Flanagan 🧱🗃️@jgbollard.bsky.social · 5d ago

This is it boys, the platonic "New York can never get better" piece www.archpaper.com/2026/07/litt...

A big reason for this is that buses stop way too often in North America, so each stop doesn’t have enough riders to justify the expense of a shelter (on top of that, the excessive stopping slows trips, which further depresses ridership generally)

Mac the squirrel :)@macsquirelera.bsky.social · 5d ago

After living in Europe for a while, it really is appalling how few bus shelters there are in the US or Canada. Most stops are just a pole, how sad

Huge L for Atherton NIMBY Marc Andreessen www.vice.com/en/article/b...

Billionaire Marc ‘It's Time to Build’ Andreesen Is a NIMBY

Andreessen, who once declared it's "time to build," railed against building multi-family housing in the wealthiest zip code in America, The Atlantic reported.

vice.com

Jordan Grimes@cafedujord.bsky.social · 5d ago

YIMBYs, a new moment of triumph is upon us! Atherton, the Silicon Valley enclave that prohibits all but single-family homes, one of the most exclusionary towns in the country, has just received its first multifamily housing project (ever!) under @scottwiener.bsky.social’s SB79!

In our new Center City Insights, CCD's research team examines two stories about our office district. While office leasing fundamentals are stabilizing and residential conversions are gaining momentum, return-to-office (RTO) rates are plateauing. Read more ➡️ https://bit.ly/4fz34ig