Warren Wells, AICP
@warrenjwells.bsky.social
Policy & Planning Dir. @marinbike.org • UCLA Urban Planning • AICP Planner • Baltimore ➡️ LA ➡️ East Bay • 🚫🚗Car-free commuting since 2015 • Missing middle renter. 📍Berkeley, CA
Dear Bluesky, If you post a thing that is very wrong, particularly something that highlights an irony or contradiction between your opinion and your profession, and then spend the next 24 hours doubling down... ... posters will post about it. Be warned!
This story is the gift that keeps on giving.
David Zipper@davidzipper.bsky.social · 15h agoIncredible
YIMBYism is correct on the merits, example one million
Jeff Baker@jwbee.bsky.social · 15h agoSome of the strongest evidence I can come up with to rebut "rents never go down". This newer building—1122 University Ave. in Berkeley—saw all but one unit decline in price compared to the same unit rented last summer. This is in nominal dollars.
$276M for the Caldecott Tunnel but zero from the state to rescue Bay Area public transit, even though Caldecott Tunnel traffic is projected to become 3X worse if the Connect Bay Area transit ballot measure doesn’t pass in November. www.mercurynews.com/2026/09/03/c...
A $276 million project will be Caldecott Tunnel’s biggest upgrade since 2013. Here’s what it will do.
The project will be the most extensive investment in the tunnel since the addition of the fourth bore, completed in 2013.
mercurynews.com
TIL that Rancho Cucamonga has Temu Zohran running for mayor except instead of building more housing his entire housing platform is pure NIMBY
Ditto, criminology / crime prevention scholars. In the UK - while in the midst of a huge prison crisis - motoring offences represent 60% of sentences, and there are roughly as many cases on causing death due to illegal driving as there are murders. Yet not many seem to care about these.
Warren Wells, AICP@warrenjwells.bsky.social · 2d agoIt is truly crazy-making how many public health and climate researchers *do not seem to understand* the impact that cars have on the field they study.
Ultimately, this is just massive loser behavior. There was a very clear election in 2024 that indicated where the people of Berkeley want to see the city go, and the NIMBYs and their goofy candidate for mayor lost.
Max Dubler 🏳️🌈@maxdubler.com · 3d agoThe California Environmental Quality Act is bad for the environment because it gives litigious busybodies the power to delay and block environmentally friendly projects like bike lanes on the grounds that the government has not sufficiently analyzed the bike lanes’ “environmental impacts.”
It is truly crazy-making how many public health and climate researchers *do not seem to understand* the impact that cars have on the field they study.
Research climate solutions globally. Oppose climate solutions locally. ✊🏻
Peter Gleick@petergleick.bsky.social · 2d agoA. It's a small parking lot & usually full. B. The bike lane doesn't go to the school unless it was another block south. C. Most shoppers buy far more than an ebike carries, are elderly, or come a far distance. D. Literally the only beneficiaries are a small # of bikers. No one else in the community
Michelle Wu — still killing bike lanes in the wake of Louisa Gag’s death — getting the climate mic isn’t just.
Gretchen Goldman, PhD@gretchentg.bsky.social · last wk.Join me for #ClimateWeekNYC Climate Desk Live event with @tishmancenter.bsky.social. I'll be joined by Dr. Ana Isabel Baptista, @billmckibben.bsky.social, and Boston Mayor Michelle Wu on a panel on "Power in Our Hands: Solutions for an Affordable, Just Future." event.newschool.edu/climateweek2...
it’s crazy how Michelle Wu ran on being the transit mayor and then turned around and started governing like Doug Ford
Alaina Pitt@alainapitt.bsky.social · 2d agoMayor Michelle Wu billed the plan as a “generationally transformational” layout. 🫠 www.bostonglobe.com/2026/09/04/m...
When I see this I hear the distress signal in Sunshine (2007).
Paul Byrne@theplanetaryguy.com · 3d agoThat small black circle is the planet Mercury, seen crossing the face of the Sun by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory on 9 May 2016.
Obviously so embarrassing from the US. My only reaction is that Africa looks so skinny now! Gotta update my shape priors! I do find Equal Earth to be very pleasing though, unlike the horror that is Gall-Peters.
Petter Hellström@nphellstrom.bsky.social · 3d agoThe United Nations has voted to formally phase out the #Mercator #map of the globe in favour of one that more accurately displays the relative size of #Africa. 164 countries voted in favour of the resolution. Only the US voted no There were six abstentions.
Sarah and I just recorded our helmet episode, to be released on Tuesday. Hope folks are ready for a seven-hour podcast episode with more disclaimers than a pharmaceutical ad.
90% of legislative jobs in California are either “the Flower Power Children’s Coalition for the managed decline of California” Or “the Joseph Goebbells Institute for Killing Homeless People”
It's all so incredibly senseless. The 59-year-old woman killed while walking her dog last week had worked at the Mill Valley Safeway for 30 years and had been the sole provider for her two sons, now in their early 20s, after their father died when they were children. www.sfgate.com/news/bayarea...
Novato: Gofundme Started For Sons Of Woman Fatally Struck By Car Monday Night
A 59-year-old woman and her dog were tragically killed Monday night after being struck by a car and a GoFundMe has been started to raise money for the woman's sons.
sfgate.com
Warren Wells, AICP@warrenjwells.bsky.social · 2w agoA 59-year-old woman and her dog were killed in Novato, CA while crossing a 5-lane unsignalized crosswalk. This stretch of Novato Blvd goes to 1 lane in each direction half a mile to the east and half a mile to the west. But for some reason 5 lanes and no pedestrian refuge is viewed as acceptable.
Got some photos of the new LADOT Toronto Barriers on Imperial Highway near LAX. They on both eastbound and westbound sides - near Pershing Drive.
Three day weekends just hit different when you have young kids. Oh great, I don't have to work! Instead I get to be a clown/nurse for 72 hours. Let's go!
This is insane. When I was in first grade my parents let me walk 3 blocks to school in the mornings, and home after it was over. The independence that I got as a child helped me so much in my life. No parent should face charges for something like this, let alone be convicted!
Reason Magazine@reason.com · 5d agoA mom of five was convicted last week of delinquency of a minor. Her offense: allowing her 5-year-old son to walk about a half-mile by himself in their gated community. The government also placed Karyann Parkinson on its child abuse and neglect registry, where she will remain for seven years.
Today in bike plan status updates: In February 2018, the Marin County Board of Supervisors adopted the Unincorporated County bike/ped master plan. It included an ambitious list of 50 projects across the county to improve walking and biking. By my count, only 4 are now complete.
Even Congressmember @friedman.house.gov thinks SB 194 is bad!! 👏🏽
Streets For All@streetsforall.org · 4d agoTELL @gavinnewsom.bsky.social to VETO SB 194, a targeted attack on the Forest Lawn Safety & Mobility Project. This law would set a horrible precedent where any wealthy Californian can write and pay for their own law, at the last minute, without debate. actionnetwork.org/letters/tell...
TELL @gavinnewsom.bsky.social to VETO SB 194, a targeted attack on the Forest Lawn Safety & Mobility Project. This law would set a horrible precedent where any wealthy Californian can write and pay for their own law, at the last minute, without debate. actionnetwork.org/letters/tell...
Tell Gavin Newsom: Veto the Forest Lawn Amendment
After years of work, LA finally has a plan to make Forest Lawn Drive safer. Mayor Bass paused it in May. Now Sacramento is threatening it again with SB 194, which passed the Assembly on Monday and n...
actionnetwork.org
Reading historical bike plans is often heartbreaking. This is the Marin Countywide Bike Plan from 1974. We had landed on the moon 5 years ago. Gerald Ford was president. The 900' project described in the highlighted area below is being built by Caltrans staring this fall, 52 years later.
This is great for anyone living in Baltimore who wants a one-seat ride to the C&O Canal Trail.
Edward Russell@byerussell.com · 4d agoThis is cool, @mta.maryland.gov is adding a direct train from Brunswick to Baltimore via Silver Spring. 2h end to end, and the train has to come all the way into DC to go back out to Baltimore. www.mta.maryland.gov/Brunswick-Ca...
On a nighttime walk with the baby and saw a pair of senior citizens blast past in a new SUV, their faces fully illuminated by the in-vehicle display, which was bright white. How well could these 70-somethings see out the windshield when their already compromised vision has to compete with that?
Let's flip this on its head. California has 37 cities over 150k population. Which of them has the *lowest* rate of fatal or serious injury crashes/100k population?
Warren Wells, AICP@warrenjwells.bsky.social · 5d agoTraffic violence trivia: California has 21 cities over 200k population. Which of them has the highest rate of traffic fatalities per 100k? (at roughly twice the state average)
Traffic violence trivia: California has 21 cities over 200k population. Which of them has the highest rate of traffic fatalities per 100k? (at roughly twice the state average)
