Notices by 𝚃𝚊𝚛𝚊𝚜 𝙶𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚌𝚘𝚎 🚇 (straphanger@urbanists.social)

Then it's not a priority, is it?

"The Martinez Ferrada administration intends to make improving safety on Parc Ave. a priority — just not yet."

More foot-dragging—typical of Ensemble #Montréal, who achieve nothing, slowly.

https://montrealgazette.com/news/parc-ave-overall-will-come-after-public-consultation-mayor-says/

#Bogotá, capital of #Colombia, + Latin America's next mega-city, is famous for TransMilenio, one of the world's most extensive bus rapid transit systems.

But now, the city is getting a metro. The trains, driverless, elevated, and Chinese-made, are already being tested.

Why the mode change?

🧵

A while back, a man in his 70s looked at my bike skeptically.

"Why do your ride it?"

When I said "saves money," "doesn't pollute," he scoffed. But he agreed when he said it was good for my health.

I forgot to tell him real reason: Joy.

Day in, day out, my bike makes me happy.

🧵

🧵

...no regrets. Not owning a car allowed us to buy an apartment in a walkable part of a great city.

Staying active has kept me fit in adulthood.

Saying "no" to cars may be difficult where you live. (Especially in car-centric North America.) But saying "yes" to the alternatives led me to interesting places.

More in this High Speed dispatch:

https://www.highspeed.blog/no-regrets/

When I was in my 20s, I decided that I was going to get through life without owning a car.

It's a choice that kept me exploring the world by train, bus, subway, bicycle...and even camel.

Four decades later, I have...

🧵

Those who don’t know the past are doomed to repeat it.

Case in point: Friday, May 9, aka Black Friday.

On that day, in 1873, everything in the world changed.

It started at the #Vienna stock exchange, but soon spread to Berlin, Paris, + London.

It provoked first “Great Depression” in the US…

🧵

“Schwarzer Freitag” began when European investors realized US prosperity was a mirage.

After Civil War, robber barons, whose railroads were the engine of economic growth, raced to lay tracks. But they built railroads to nowhere, duplicated existing services, and exaggerated revenues...

#Finland opens world's longest car-free bridge, intended for bicycle riders, pedestrians and mobility device users, and transit riders.

#Helsinki's Kruunuvuori Bridge is 1,191 metres long, and will soon be served by trams.

https://newatlas.com/architecture/finland-helsinki-pedestrian-bridge-kruunuvuori/

Attacks on #Canada's Alto high-speed rail project all seem to start with the declaration:

"Now, I've ridden bullet trains in Asia or Europe"—the editorialist doesn't want you to think he's unworldly—"and sure, those ones are great, but...

🧵

...Canada clearly isn't Japan, or Spain, or France...or any of the 25 other countries that have gotten around to building high-speed rail."

It's voices like Andrew Coyne's, echoing Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre's talking points, that stop ambitious transport projects going ahead.

I took a cold-weather journey north from #Montreal on VIA Rail’s Train 601, bound for Jonquière.

It’s cheap, fun and, thanks to the roomy 1950s rolling stock, very comfortable…

🧵

As humans around the world look to the skies in hope and wonder, one very sick man is trying to drag humanity with him into the gutter.

This may turn out to be another #TACO Tuesday. Or it may prove to be a day that will live in infamy. If the latter, all those who had the power to prevent it, yet did nothing, will be forever damned by the generations to come.

I took a wintry ride north from #Montreal on VIA Rail train 601 to Lac St-Jean and beyond.

Cheap, cheerful, and very comfortable, thanks to the mid-century Budd passenger cars with deeply reclining seats.

Join me on board...

🧵

The hilly city of #Chongqing #China opens the Wushan Goddess, world’s longest outdoor escalator.

Equivalent of an 80-story building!

https://parametric-architecture.com/china-worlds-longest-outdoor-escalator/

NEW RESEARCH: Major paper by John Pucher et. al. shows that 4 cities that invested in bicycle infrastructure ( #Berlin, #Paris , #NYC, #London) saw cycling increase, crash rates decline.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15568318.2026.2649315#d1e1634

"I hope gas goes up to eight bucks a gallon!"

It's 2026, and I've turned into Calvin's Dad.

There are worse fates, I guess...

"A passionately argued and important book." —The Guardian

My book #Straphanger, in which I travel world looking at best (+ worst) in transportation + urbanism, is now available as an e-book—at a nice price.

(New: I'm the rights holder! So buying here directly helps the author—i.e., me...)

https://shorturl.at/oJpZu

"The Jetsons Lied to Us."

Twonks on the AI Revolution.

A+, no notes.

What does new #Paris mayor's victory lap on a Vélib' bike have to do with the war on Iran launched by the demented grifter in the White House?

A lot, it turns out.

More on connections between the Hormuz Shock + Mayor Grégoire in this week's High Speed dispatch:

https://www.highspeed.blog/pariss-bicycle-mayor-and-the-hormuz-shock/