A New DIY toolkit helps neighborhoods and cities measure the state of their civic commons At City Observatory, we’re all about metrics, and especially keen on metrics that help us better understand the function of cities. We’ve mapped everything from…
It’s a long road to redressing inequality A half-century ago, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. addressed the stilted rhetoric used use to talk about public spending to promote the social good: Whenever the government provides opportunities in privileges for white…
What City Observatory did this week 1. Scooters are a success in Portland, but there’s an insidious double standard. A new report from Portland’s Bureau of Transportation details the success of the city’s 120-day long experiment allowing about 2,000 scooters…
Data shows Portland’s scooter experiment worked. Maybe it’s time to critically appraise the failed 110 year experiment with cars. Starting in July, Portland, Oregon began allowing fleets of e-scooters, as an experiment, to see how they would work. Portland’s Bureau…
Why predicted gridlock almost never happens and what this teaches us about travel demand Seattle has finally closed its aging Alaskan Way viaduct, a six-lane double-decker freeway that since the 1940s has been a concrete scar separating Seattle’s downtown from…