Oil dependent economies are vulnerable at all times, but especially during wartime in the Mideast | From energy dominance to energy vulnerability

Gasoline prices here have gone up about 25% since the start of the War with Iran.  And Salt Lake has five refineries refining oil produced in Utah, Wyoming and near by states.

It's hardly news that oil is a worldwide commodity, and even though it is produced and refined all over, world prices are set in Europe and the US and factor in supply risk.

The War ("Why Escalation Favors Iran," Foreign Affairs).  From the article:

The strikes that have killed Iran’s leadership demonstrated tactical mastery. Tactical mastery, however, is not strategy. Iran’s retaliation—geographically broad, economically disruptive, and politically calibrated—aims to reshape the conflict’s structure. By widening the theater and prolonging the war, Tehran is shifting the contest from a battle of military capabilities to one of political endurance.

As in Vietnam, the United States may win most engagements. As in Serbia, it may ultimately prevail after sustained pressure. But in both cases, the decisive arena was not the initial shock of airpower. It was the politics of an expanding war.

The decisive phase of this war began not with the first strike but with the regional crisis that followed—air defenses activated across multiple capitals, airports suspended, markets jolted, and alliance politics strained. Whether this conflict is merely a contained episode or it becomes a prolonged strategic setback for the United States will depend not on the next volley of missiles but on whether Washington recognizes the enemy’s unfolding strategy—and responds with one of equal clarity.

Energy independence as a form of dependence.  Even though the US is now the largest producer of oil in the world, under the Trump Administration it has promulgated policy that prioritizes fossil fuels and diminishes renewable energy sources  ("Trump Returns to Gasoline as Fuel of Choice for Cars, Gutting Biden’s Climate Policy," New York Times, "The owners want to close this Colorado coal plant. The Trump administration says no," NPR).

The Administration is also all in on nuclear energy, which isn't a fossil fuel per se, but is an extremely expensive form of energy, not once a plant is open, but the cost of building fission facilities has bankrupted many firms over the years.

Even though renewable sources diversify the energy mix and reduce system vulnerability ("Trump order halts offshore wind projects for at least 90 days," PBS, "Trump administration quietly canceled the nation’s largest solar project," CNN, "Wind and solar power frozen out of Trump permitting push," Reuters)  For example, electric vehicles are much less dependent on oil as the base fuel for electricity generation.

The Administration calls this "Energy Dominance" but "Energy Dominance" can just as easily be robust and include non fossil fuels as part of the mix ("Energy Dominance or Renewable Resilience?," German Marshall Fund, "Power up! Why the US needs every energy source to stay dominant," ING Bank, "Donald Trump’s call for ‘energy dominance’ is likely to run into real-world limits," AP, "How Trump’s ‘Energy Dominance’ Agenda Is Dominating You With Dirty Energy," The Contrarian).

Plus US nominal control of oil in Venezuela and Canada ("Trump Now Has His Very Own Oil Empire," Bloomberg).

Let’s do the math. Start with the oil production of the US and add Canada. Then include Venezuela and the rest of Latin America, from Mexico to Argentina and everywhere else in between: Brazil, Guyana, Colombia. Like it or not, all of them are living under the “Donroe Doctrine” — an increasingly belligerent Washington’s sphere of influence over the Americas. Together they account for nearly 40% of the world’s oil output.

... Having de facto control of the Western Hemisphere’s petroleum wealth is a geopolitical game changer. For decades, US military adventurism was constrained by the impact of any war on energy costs. Today the White House has primacy over oil-producing allies and adversaries alike — whether it’s Saudi Arabia or Iran, Nigeria or Russia.

The US and China and global preeminence: Does it come down to energy policy?.  Another way to think of this is as looking forward versus looking backwards, a classic example of Alexander Gerschenkron's thesis that over time newer economies have an advantage in being able to invest in new technologies without incurring huge stranded costs.

China still buys a lot of oil, and they use coal powered electricity because of large domestic supplies.  But the focus on EVs is just one of China's green energy policies ("China, the climate superpower," "China, Energy and Climate: The Time has Come," special package, The Economist, "How China came to dominate the world in renewable energy," Washington Post).

As a slogan, “energy dominance” evokes images of the United States towering over the rest of the world, with prodigious production, as what Trump calls “a global energy superpower.” But the truth of energy dominance has nothing to do with empowering folks at home.

The administration has been rigging the game in favor of dirty energy — and giving fossil-fuel producers a license to dominate American consumers. In the process, Trump is boxing U.S. households out of cleaner alternatives and leaving Americans with less choice, higher energy bills, and an overheating climate.

Worse, by hobbling America’s green-energy industries, the administration is destroying jobs, even as it clears a path for China to dominate the next generation of energy production.

... A study out of Princeton University finds that Trump’s signature “Beautiful Bill” will reduce capital investment in our electrical system and clean fuels by half a trillion dollars over the next decade. It will also slash future solar capacity by about 140 gigawatts and wind capacity by about 160 gigawatts. (The Hoover Dam, by comparison, has a capacity of about 2 gigawatts.)

Plus the effect on jobs ("‘Deeply demoralizing’: how Trump derailed coal country’s clean-energy revival," Guardian).

Ethanol and other bad decisions.  Granted the US has some dumb policies.  One is the support of ethanol production as a feedstock for gasoline.  Unlike in Brazil, where the feedstock is used up sugar cane, here we spend money growing corn to convert to ethanol.  

Ethanol has less energy compared to gasoline.  So we're dedicating farmland to gasoline, which has a negative cost benefit.

And EVs primarily powered by coal and natural gas are less sustainable than those pow ered by renewables.

Ending EV tax credits forces the US automobile industry to double down on gasoline powered cars, while China and increasing Europe are shifting to EVs in substantive ways.  (Part of the concern in Europe is getting cleaner air--many of their cars are diesel, and comparatively high when it comes to polluting).

The Strait of Hormuz is extremely vulnerable.  While only 20% of the oil produced in the Mideast passes through the Strait, 80% goes to Asia, and 100% of Liquid Natural Gas to Europe, airplane fuels too.  Also 33% of fertilizers ("American farmers dealt new blow as Trump's Iran war escalates," Newsweek), and of course other goods.

That increases vulnerability across the globe, separate from the impact on the US economy, which isn't just on the cost of gasoline, but on farming, the transport of goods, the production of chemicals and other products, etc. ("Saudi Arabia Starts Oil Cuts as It Races to Reroute Exports" Bloomberg).

The lessons from the 1970s oil shock.  During the Israeli-Arab War and later in the decade, Middle Eastern Countries significantly raised the cost of gasoline, and took control of production and sale from the multinational oil companies.

I have often written that the US mobility paradigm is pretty much homogeneous in that it decidedly supports automobility and provides dribbles of support to other modes.  

By contrast, Germany, a leading car manufacturer (but not much of an oil producer), has a heterogenous policy.  It supports cars to the max, especially with its no speed limit autobahns, but recognizes cities are best served by transit, supports regional rail service despite its love of autobahns, and walking and biking--the Federal Biking Plan for the county is one of the best.

I contrast Denmark and Netherlands to the US in terms of response.  Not producing oil, and not having much of a car industry, Denmark and the Netherlands recognized that shifting to an automobile centric mobility paradigm made them vulnerable to cuts in supplies.  

An analogous example is how in the US, gasoline supplies are often interrupted during extreme weather events, leading to long lines and disruption in all sorts of activities, because people seemingly lack alternative ways to travel ("Oil dependence | The US as a Petro-state and gasoholic | and war").

Being poor before WW2 and for awhile after, the countries had been more walking (compact cities, no sprawl), biking and transit oriented.  They were giving this up in favor of the automobile as their economies became more successful.

Amsterdam.  Bike parking, lots of bikes, and transit in the background.

Not only cuts in supply but a significant raise in prices made their countries extremely vulnerable.  So they shifted away from the car and back to transit and biking in the development and transportation policies and practices.  

Unlike the US, which says transit and biking is okay, but primarily invests in automobility, they made their policies congruent with the new paradigm, for example significantly increasing gas taxes and car registration fees.  

Of course, the countries like others in Europe also refocused attention on energy efficiency in all elements of their economy.

The US: Still vulnerable to oil shocks.  By contrast, while the US did adopt some energy efficiency mechanisms, including mpg standards for cars, mostly the US focused on maintaining access to oil supplies.  

That meant refocusing military resources on the Mideast ("There are two winners in Iran. Neither one is America," Washington Post) and creating the Strategic Oil Reserve which bought and stored oil for use, holding it for sale when prices get "too high."  

A Permian Basin oil pumping station.

And increased production, which was was boosted on steroids in the late 1990s with the invention of fracking ("The economic benefits of fracking," Brookings, "How Has Fracking Changed Our Future?," National Geographic).  

Note that fracking has major environmental effects, the use of water, contamination of the aquifer, and air quality.

Article.  Another side of dependence.

But it didn't make the US less vulnerable to the fissures in the supply chain, not so much with access to oil, but in all the other ways an oil dependent economy experiences higher costs as increased oil costs make their way through the supply chain of various goods.

Soon to be history: The Olive trees of Las Olas Boulevard, Fort Lauderdale

 Apparently, the Black Olive trees linking the median of Las Olas Boulevard are aging, wracked by termites, etc.  But they are beautiful trees.  All will be removed over the next two to three years in favor of the construction of a new road pattern. ("Las Olas tree — doomed by termites — to be chopped down Thursday," "Fort Lauderdale to bid farewell to beloved black olive trees on Las Olas," South Florida Sun-Sentinel).

Photos: Amy Beth Bennett, South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

Shade is a valuable commodity in climate change scenario when temperatures keep climbing.  Especially in the hot climes of Florida.  Photo: Carline Jean, South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

Unlike the majority of the Fort Lauderdale Commissioners, I don't think I would have voted in favor of the destruction.  The median will be eliminated in favor of wider sidewalks ("Famous tree-lined median on Las Olas needs to go, Fort Lauderdale commission agrees" ).

Highway departments don't like such urban design treatments because they see the immobile objects of big trees as hazards if automobile operators lose control and crash. Still they are a distinctive feature that is unduplicated elsewhere ("Take out trees on Las Olas and you’ll turn into Anywhere, USA, critic warns Fort Lauderdale").

Washington DC area railroad commuting schedules: July 1972

 A two page newsletter from the Maryland organization, Rail Ways of America, promoting passenger railroad service, with a focus on commuting.  Probably the organization ended up becoming Rail Passengers Maryland, affiliated with the National Association of Rail Passengers.

Commuting services existed from West Virginia to DC and between Baltimore and Washington.  Non-commuting rail service did connect Richmond and Charlottesville to DC.  The association called on Northern Virginia to advocate for commuter service, to not give into "automobile masochism."

About 20 years later, the Virginia Railway Express launched service on June 22nd, 1992.

-- History of commuter rail in Northern Virginia, 1964-present, VRE

Three ways to put additional checks on professional sports facilities after a contract is signed

The arena is pictured towards the bottom right of the photograph, as a round building.

1.  Conditional Use Permit.  Madison Square Garden has a conditional use permit to operate an arena on top of Penn Station.  

The original term was 50 years.  The permit was renewed for 10 years in 2013.  MSG asked for a permanent permit before its expire in 2023.  This obtains from the Zoning Regulations Section 74-41.

Stakeholders want MSG to accede to new developments in and around Penn Station to make it function better as a railroad passenger station.  This would include land transfers and other acts.  MSG hasn't been cooperative.  The station's location on top of multiple railroad and subway lines means that a majority of its patrons use transit to get there.

Because of MSG's recalcitrance about redevelopment, the most recent renewal was only for five years to put pressure on them to participate ("Five-Year Madison Square Garden Permit Inflates Pressure to Play Ball," The City).

In any case, a conditional use permit provides the opportunity to renegotiate elements of the original agreement, in line with current conditions.

Photo: Danielle Parhizkaran / The Boston Globe.

Annual license.  A provision in the State of Massachusetts code provides that arenas and stadiums are licensed annually for the program they present.  The World Cup is a modification.

The license gives the locality extraordinary opportunity to manage and mitigate elements of the operations of the stadium and its effect on the community.

Much to the chagrin of Kraft Enterprises..  Annual license.  The town of Foxborough, Massachusetts refuses to agree to a license for the soccer World Cup until they receive the money they requested for police and other security measures that would have to be provided by the town ("The $90-a-month Foxborough Select Board members taking on FIFA’s Goliath," Boston Globe).  

Kraft Enterprises pays for security costs for football, concerts, and other large events held at the stadium complex.

Kraft Enterprises and FIFA are up in arms about this ("Boston’s World Cup games still in doubt after funding shortfall proposal rejected," The Athletic).  Foxborough hasn't budged.  From the CBS News story "World Cup security update: Foxboro "shocked and dismayed" by Kraft Group's latest statement on funding":

The town insists that FIFA and Boston 26 pay the $7.8 million security bill upfront ahead of the matches, but the organizations have said that they will reimburse the town, or that the equipment they need for security will be available by June 1.

... “The Town’s public safety team has spent thousands of hours in conjunction with regional, state and federal partners to develop a comprehensive security plan. While the total cost for such services is a microscopic fraction of the revenue that the events will generate, the Town has been met, at every turn, with resistance from the Kraft Group and other event organizers.

“That such entities may have miscalculated the cost of hosting the World Cup is not a reason to compromise on event security. The Town cannot and will not finance the Kraft Group’s losses by sacrificing public safety.”

It turns out that Kraft Enterprises operates Gillette Stadium in part through an annual license wrt the number of events, and other conditions.  It can be modified during the year, e.g. to add a concert to the list of events, etc.  From the license agreement:

In accordance with Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 140, Section 183A, Chapter 136, Section 4, Chapter 140, $181, and Chapter 229, Section 6 of the Code of the Town ofFoxborough (the “Governing Law") the Board of Selectmen of the Town of Foxborough (the "Board") licenses Kraft Sports and Entertainment LLC and its affiliates (collectively "KSE") to conduct live entertainment and sporting events at the premises controlled by KSE inside Gillette Stadium, including activity in the parking areas and plazas surrounding the Stadium that is incidental to events being held inside it, subject to the following terms.

El Paso claims President Donald Trump's political campaign owes more than half a million dollars for police and public safety services from a February campaign rally. REUTERS/Leah Millis.

An aside: Trump and his rallies.  The license approach is interesting.  

If cities had used such a process for dealing with Trump rallies for his election/re-election, they wouldn't have been stiffed ("Cities seek more than $750K in unpaid bills for Trump campaign events since 2016," NBC, "Why the Trump campaign won’t pay police bills," Center for Public Integrity).  From the CPI:

That depends on who you ask. The cities are adamant Trump should pay up. But in many of these cases, there are no signed contracts between the municipal governments and the Trump campaign. The cities dispatched police officers to secure Trump’s events because they believe public safety required it — and the U.S. Secret Service asked for it.

Transportation demand management plans. In "Framework of characteristics that support successful community development in association with the development of professional sports facilities" (2021) one of the sections is on transportation, with examples.  

Most contracts between a locality and the sports team don't have detailed requirements for transportation planning, and the contracts can't really be changed after the fact.

The Washington Wizards and Capitals have an informal agreement to pay for Metrorail service after the system closes, if games go late.  But this doesn't extend to playoffs.  The Washington Nationals baseball team has no similar agreement, formal or informal.

OTOH, the Chicago Cubs are required to have a transportation demand management plan, and it has been tweaked for improvements over time.  The codified document is difficult to find.  The 2018 Cubs Neighborhood Report describes the traffic measures on pages 1-6, including remote parking, shuttles, bicycle valet services, and a focus on CTA rail transit.

The 161st Street Subway Station is directly across from Yankee Stadium.

The Barclays Arena/Brooklyn Nets have a TDM requirement.  Yankee Stadium has a more informal agreement, with possibilities outlined in the environmental impact statement, but it has no public parking lots or garages, and most people arrive by subway and CitiField (NY Mets).  MTA provides extra express subway railroad trains on game days.

Meadowlands Stadium in New Jersey has the Meadowlands District Transportation Plan 2045, but it doesn't always work ("‘Mass-Transit Super Bowl’ Hits Some Rough Patches in Moving Fans," New York Times).

Other arenas that have investments in transit, including free transit fares to and from games and non-sports related concerts include Chase Arena (Golden State Warriors), Climate Change Arena (Seattle Kraken), and Talking Stick Arena (Phoenix Suns).

Other teams have contributed to transit stations and other facilities. Facilities in Australia even include extensive special bus and train services, including for concerts ("Transperth transit (Perth, Western Australia) provides free transit to certain events, like the Red Hot Chili Peppers concert on 2/12/2023," "Perth traffic: TransPerth offers range of travel options for Ed Sheeran concert attendees," Perth Now).

Some casinos too.  While not a sports team, the Springfield Massachusetts MGM Casino was required to create a TDM plan too, although they call it a Traffic Mitigation Plan.  

They complement public transit ("Despite Low Ridership, Springfield's Casino-Funded Bus Service Keeps Moving," WBUR/NPR) with special shuttle transit services ("MGM Springfield launches new shuttle service to Connecticut," Fox61)..  

Springfield doesn't have the same array of transit services as the casino in Everett (next paragraph) so it makes sense that the primary focus is on vehicular transit.

There is also a TDM plan for the Wynn Casino in Everett, although some complain that it maximizes the benefits to the casino, and doesn't work to extend transportation infrastructure improvements beyond the casino site ("New transit links could transform Everett’s access to Boston," Boston Globe).  A soccer stadium will be constructed proximate to the site as well.

However, the state is interfering with these programs to capture the revenues otherwise diverted from the state budget ("‘It couldn’t come at a worse time’: Legislature strips casino mitigation funds amid municipal budget woes," CommonWealth Beacon).

10 good things about Metro Transit (Minneapolis) — including one that’s simply priceless

Article 

Chances are if you’re reading about Metro Transit in the Minnesota Star Tribune, it’s because something bad happened. The system’s been plagued by high crime, low ridership, rampant fare evasion and an ever-ballooning billion-dollar budget. But there are good things to be said about the buses and trains, and at the risk of looking for lutefisk at a taco truck, I went out to find them.

My goal was to find 10 such positives — and who would know better than those who regularly ride the system? To my surprise, riders unhesitatingly offered them to me when I asked around one day last week. Here are their responses

1. Help is never far away
2. It's sometimes faster than a car
3. It goes to all the right places and you can track it

Target Field Station.

4.  It's clean and warm

5.  It's clean and there's usually someplace to sit (bus shelter improvements)

6.  Bikes are welcome (bike + Transit a good combo)

7.  Some buses run faster than trains

8.  It runs frequently enough

9.  It gets us everywhere we need to go

10. It's Cheaper than owning a car

Posters as an element of marketing transit stations and neighborhoods

I can't say I've thought about this much.  I do think about it terms of parks, and using National Park Service style posters with a design language created in the 1930s.

Original poster design, 1938.

Modern version.  Poster not produced by the National Park Service.

A Reddit user, u/Coup-de-Cous, in Los Angeles has produced similar designs for LA Metro stations and neighborhoods.

Now that I think about it, they are reminiscent of the transit marketing posters produced by railroads, and for transit specifically, the London Underground ("Birth of the London Underground Posters," Art Institute of Chicago, "Frank Pick: the forgotten genius of the London Underground," Gallery, Telegraph, "The Hidden Women Behind London’s Beloved Modernist Transit Posters," Bloomberg), and Chicago Transit.

London Underground Poster.

Modern CTA poster promoting rehabilitation of Wilson Station.  

Making these kinds of posters could be a way to engender goodwill for transit infrastructure projects.

Non CTA poster, done in the 1930s National Park style.

Promoting the Lincoln Square neighborhood.

This series of posters by the Chicago Neighborhoods Project

 is comparable to those by u/Coup-de-Cous for Los Angeles.

Art deco style railroad poster.

I know that I sound like a broken record: The importance of planning in government | property development in Portland, Bilbao, Liverpool, Salt Lake, Washington, DC

Some cities plan.  Some cities release RFPs.  Others do "stuff."

When Obama got elected, and seemingly was interested in focusing on urban issues, I thought about the Pasteur quote: Chance Favors the Prepared Mind.

What I took it to mean was that if you are prepared (with plans) you can pounce on opportunity.  

The difference with a plan is you come up with a vision, ideally with creativity and positive public input.  An RFP asks others to come up with a vision, which may or not be a good fit.  

A good example is with Kennedy School in Portland.  The community came up with a some ideas for what they'd accept.  What they got was a great bed and breakfast, music venue and brew pub, by the McMenamin Group ("Fall Asleep in Class at Portland, Oregon’s Kennedy School," NTHP).  

Sketch by Marlena Wyman.

Not an terrible outcome, but a similar Catholic facility deaccessioned in the Brookland neighborhood became a charter school.  When being located one block from the district's Main Street, 12th Street, it could have become a broader destination.

Later I codified this point as a part of best practice revitalization planning and in my concept of Transformational Projects Action Planning.  

-- "Updating the best practice elements of revitalization to include elements 7 and 8 | Transformational Projects Action Planning at a large scale"  (2022)  [this entry has other related links to other examples and iterations of the development of the TPAS concept]
-- "Why can't the "Bilbao Effect" be reproduced? | Bilbao as an example of Transformational Projects Action Planning" (2017)

Not only was Bilbao quick to act to land the Guggenheim Museum, they realized after it opened, that despite being close to the city's subway, they needed better surface transit to link various attractions, and added a tram within 4 years of the museum's opening.  The system continues to be expanded.  

It took DC 13 years to open its streetcar, and because the system never expanded (and because DC's elected officials were indifferent) the service will close this year, after a ten year run.

A couple examples are how, having a city revitalization plan in place, with an implementation organization and financing, Bilbao jumped on the decision of Graz, Austria to not host a Guggenheim Museum, and ended up with the Gehry designed international attraction instead, thereby rebranding and positioning the city as an international destination.

Liverpool's 2001 plan called for the city to be designated an EU Capital of Culture, when at the time in the current cycle, the UK wasn't even on the list as a participating country ("Liverpool regeneration as a process for regaining relevance at the regional, national, and global scales").  

A statue of the Beatles.

By the time UK was selected, Liverpool had at least four years of planning when other cities had none, so Liverpool was best positioned to be picked, and it was ("Almost two decades on, this vibrant UK city is still a ‘Capital of Culture’," Metro, "Liverpool event strategies," Spirit of 2012). 

Although there are differing viewpoints ("Liverpool’s European Capital of Culture legacy narrative: a selective heritage?," European Planning Studies, "The 'Liverpool model(s)': cultural planning, Liverpool and Capital of Culture 2008," International Journal of Cultural Policy, "‘Capital of Culture—you must be having a laugh!’ Challenging the official rhetoric of Liverpool as the 2008 European cultural capital," Social & Cultural Geography) which is true for Bilbao too.

Or, sometimes it's scenario planning wrt to potential for austerity and acts by other governments impacting local governments.  

-- "Contingency planning in parks planning: Montgomery County Maryland edition," 2013
-- "Federal shutdown as another example of why local jurisdictions should have more robust contingency and master planning processes," 2013

Sugar House Park, Salt Lake City.  I mention I'm on the board of a park.  While it's jointly owned by the city and county for reasons of history, it's underresourced.  We don't have the money to do a full blown plan.  We do have a planning framework from 2008, but there are many gaps.

As I outlined in 2024 in a series on gaps in park master planning  I try to use objective frameworks for decision making in that context.

-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part One | Levels of Service"

-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Two | Utilizing Academic Research as Guidance"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Three | Planning for Climate Change/Environment"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Four | Planning for Seasonality and Activation"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Five | Planning for Public Art as an element of park facilities"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning, Part Six | Art(s) in the Park(s) as a comprehensive program"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Seven | Park Architectural (and Landscape Design) History" 
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Eight | Civic Engagement"
-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Nine | Second stage planning for parks using the cultural landscape framework" 

-- "Gaps in Parks Master Planning: Part Ten | Park transportational access (2025) 

This is the last month of my first term--4 years.  And we were talking about it in a meeting.  I mentioned my biggest learning is that so much of our agenda is externally driven.  Anyway, we have lots of projects to pursue, some quite major, and we need to have formal plans to move forward.  

A rendering of a proposed 89-foot, seven-story hotel on the corner of 2100 South and 1300 East next to Sugar House Park. A plan to rezone the lot received support from the Salt Lake City Planning Commission.

On a really big issue ("Plan to build a 7-story hotel next to Sugar House Park gets key endorsement,"  "New Utah law could address remaining issue in proposed hotel next to Sugar House Park,"KSL ) where the board is split, me and another person have created a great vision plan for an alternative to the site--hopefully the lessee will entertain it, especially if the hotel project isn't approved.  

(The final decision will be made by the City Council over the next couple months.  I'm in the "no" camp as it punctures forever the perimeter of the park, and no major urban public park in the US has a similar commercial puncture within the park.)

But that's just a vision, it would need detailed planning and design to move forward.   

And we have up to three other projects requiring a similar process of vision plan + detailed plan.  Not to mention a bunch of other projects.  I liken us to beggars, doing a form of barter to get what we want when working with other entities.  And the amount of time I spent on the vision is considerable, and came out as fast as it did only because of prior knowledge.  The other plans will require more research.

Photo: Joanne Lawton, WBJ.

Washington DC.  The Washington Business Journal reports that Ward 3 Council Representative Matt Frumin wants the city to buy a building in foreclosure, 4000 Connecticut Avenue NW.  It's huge. ("Frumin rallies District to snag former Whittle School building as foreclosure auction looms").  From the article:

A D.C. councilmember is renewing his push for the District to acquire the leasehold interest in a high-profile Northwest D.C. mixed-use building that’s scheduled to be sold at a foreclosure auction next month.

In an interview Tuesday, Councilmember Matt Frumin, D-Ward 3, described the 666,202-square-foot 4000 Connecticut Ave. NW — formerly home to Intelsat’s headquarters, then the Whittle School & Studios — as an “amazing location” that he expects will be sold for “far lower” than it would have a few years back when he unsuccessfully rallied the District to acquire the property for use as a vast civic center.

“How could we leverage this building at a key site to the benefit of the city?” Frumin said. “There's lots of possibilities, and if it could be gotten for a very attractive price, I hope the city will think about it.”

The leasehold interest in 4000 Connecticut — the State Department owns the land under the building — is scheduled to be sold at an April 8 foreclosure auction at Alex Cooper Auctioneers D.C. office. Affiliates of New York-based investment firm 601W Cos. and commercial real estate developer Berkley Properties co-own the leasehold interest and owe $132.2 million on the note held by an affiliate of Jericho, New York-based Winthrop Capital Partners, according to a foreclosure notice filed Monday with D.C.'s Recorder of Deeds.

It's an interesting idea.  BUT 

• THE CITY HAS A POOR TRACK WITH PROPERTY MANAGEMENT (e.g., Eastern Market, "Eastern Market DC's 150th anniversary last weekend | And my unrealized master plan for the market")
• THE BUILDING IS F* EXPENSIVE
• ON EQUITY GROUNDS, PEOPLE OUGHT TO ASK QUESTIONS ABOUT SUCH A BIG INVESTMENT IN THE CITY'S WEALTHIEST WARD
• THERE IS NO PLAN.

Plus, usually with white elephant projects like this (and note the property is proximate to the University of the District of Columbia), the cost of the building is minimal, and an arts use gets developed like Cabelfactory in a former Nokia manufacturing plant in Helsinki, La Friche in Marseille (Design Handbook for Cultural Centres, Trans-Europe Halles), or smaller projects in the US, like GoggleWorks in Reading, Pennsylvania ("GoggleWorks finances go back to black," Reading Eagle, "Next phases of GoggleWorks development include apartments, educational space," WFMZ-TV).

Since "the arts and culture don't make a profit" it's best to start with low cost buildings ("Arlington's Artisphere, cultural planning and Arlington's identity").  And Artisphere was 1/10th the size of the former Intelsat building.

It's unfair to suggest that Frumin should do this but.... In my entry, "Outline for a proposed Ward-focused (DC) Councilmember campaign platform and agenda," one of the points was that a Councilmember should have a thumbnail plan (basically a vision plan) for commercial districts.  

I should have also included "and for big buildings that might become vacant."

Councilmembers don't do planning independent of the Executive Branch.  This is an example where it could and should be done.

But basically, while CM Frumin has ideas, he hasn't further developed them over the two years the building has been vacant ("First Intelsat HQ. Then failed Whittle School. What’s next for D.C.'s 4000 Connecticut Ave. NW?," WBJ), which is opposite of "Chance Favor[ing[ the Prepared Mind." So opportunity doesn't favor this project.  Especially when the city budget is being compromised by the Republican Congress in multiple ways.  And the need to get a majority of Councilmembers to agree.

Former Imperial Sugar Plant, Fort Bend, Texas.

Note that governments buy sites and buildings not infrequently, to control their development ("Mayor Elicker Announces Propospal to Transform the Former English Station Power Plant Property into Mill River Park,"City of New Haven, "Erie County acquires 148 acres of industrial land at the former Bethlehem Steel site in Lackawanna for redevelopment," "Sugar Land Acquires Historic Imperial Sugar Site for $50 Million Redevelopment Project," Covering Katy News, "After closed-door meeting, Salt Lake County buys former corporate headquarters outside Utah’s capital,"Salt Lake Tribune, "Utah to buy US Magnesium plant for $30M," KSL, etc.).

BTMFBA.  I myself am a proponent of arts organizations owning their own buildings.  And recommend that the locality set up a CDC to buy, hold, develop, and rehabilitate properties to preserve their use outside of the normal market forces of real estate.  While I often tout SEMAEST, the Paris CDC that does this with retail properties, Helsinki as a city does this with an agency called Kaapelli.  I've written about this in Philadelphia ("BTMFBA + programs to lease the properties to local businesses | Philadelphia").  And there are other examples.  

SEMAEST also has a retail incubator program allowing short term leasing in order to develop and test proof of concept ("Testing your business with Semaest: the example of Alma Grown in Town dedicated to urban agriculture" City of Paris).

-- "BTMFBA: the best way to ward off artist or retail displacement is to buy the building," 2016

-- "From BTMFBA to "community right to buy"," 2024
-- "BTMFBA: maintaining arts spaces in the face of rising real estate values | Seattle, New York City," 2024
-- "New form of BTMFBA in San Francisco," 2023
-- "A wrinkle on BTMFBA: let the city/county own the cultural facility, while you operate it (San Francisco and the Fillmore Heritage Center)," 2021
-- "BTMFBA: Baltimore and the Area 405 Studio," 2021
-- "Revisiting stories: cultural planning and the need for arts-based community development corporations as real estate operators," 2018
-- "BMFBTA revisited: nonprofits and facilities planning and acquisition," 2016
-- "BTMFBA: artists and Los Angeles," 2017
-- "BTMFBA Chronicles: Seattle coffee shop raises money to buy its building," 2018
-- "Dateline Los Angeles: BTMFBA & Transformational Projects Action Planning & arts-related community development corporation as an implementation mechanism to own property," 2018

But in the DC case, taking on a 660,000 s.f. building is pretty daunting.  Especially in that location.

Conclusion.  Without a good business plan, what Frumin proposes is a folly.  

Good/bad government -- murals in Seattle

The Seattle Times calls our attention to a set of murals in the law library of the William Kenzo Nakamura U.S. Courthouse in Downtown Seattle ("These Seattle murals speak to the Trump era. They're hiding in plain sight").

“The Effects of Good and Bad Government,” two 9-foot-tall panels featuring well over 200 figures, dramatize in intricate, elaborate, painstaking detail the tangible impacts government has on people’s lives.

In the “Good Government” painting, people are thriving. Under “Bad Government,” they’re dead-eyed, smoking and drinking. (Ellen M. Banner / The Seattle Times

Is our federal government making America “bigger, better, richer and stronger than ever before,” as Trump claimed in his State of the Union? Or has Trump “endangered the long and storied history of the United States of America being a force for good,” as Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger said in the Democratic response? Either way, you’ll find a rich allegory in the paintings.

They are not always accessible, within the sporadically used Sixth Avenue downtown courthouse. But this week the four-decade-old paintings will be on display for all to see, showcasing the work of an artist who was thinking deeply about timeless themes of good and evil, justice and tyranny and how our American experiment in self-governance plays out every day in ways big and small.

The article introduces us to the artist, Caleb Ives Bach, once a very successful CIA agent, who left the profession somewhat disillusioned, and he became a teacher and artist.

The murals are open to the public monthly, but only when the Court is in session, which is about once per month, as the Court moves to a different part of the state other weeks. 

Great line about high quality definitional elements in waterfront development planning

A rendering of Hariri Pontarini’s proposed Ontario Science Centre design for Ontario Place. "Doug Ford’s new Science Centre: How the architects came up with the design of the $1-billion building," Toronto Star.

John Lorinc has a piece, "Underneath the shiny renderings of Doug Ford’s Ontario Place is an idea worth taking seriously," in the Toronto Star about the proposal for a new Ontario Science Center on the Lake Erie waterfront.  From the article:

[...] I’d also argue that this project, now tendered to a consortium and estimated to be worth more than $1 billion, represents something that has long been missing in almost three decades of waterfront revitalization: a signature cultural or social institution on the lakeshore.

That idea — wish? — goes back to Robert Fung’s waterfront task force, circa the late 1990s, and is still on the planning books, with proposed locations on or near the Port Lands, but without funding or a prospective tenant.

Photos: DTAH.

Queens Quay Boulevard abuts the Toronto Waterfront. 

Toronto being a keeping-up-with-the-Jones’ kind of place, we have often looked to other cities with such architecturally distinctive structures for inspiration — the Sydney Opera House, London’s Tate Modern, Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art, and Hamburg’s exuberant concert hall in the revitalized harbour district known as Hafencity.

There’s a good reason why these landmark buildings have come to define their urban surroundings: post-industrial waterfronts demand more than glass-walled condos, office towers and parks to create a sense of place suited to the unmistakable drama of the water’s edge.

The architecture-urban design point he makes in the last cited paragraph is key.  It takes special buildings:

to create a sense of place suited to the unmistakable drama of the water’s edge.

-- Making Waves: Principles for Building Toronto's Waterfront 
-- Central Waterfront Secondary Plan
-- Central Waterfront Public Space Framework
-- Transforming the waterfront into a quintessential destination, DTAH design firm
-- Queens Quay Boulevard: Toronto's most democratic street, DTAH design firm

The boring stuff: government job pensions | Boring but an obligation that overwhelms many governments

San Diego went bankrupt over pension liabilities.  Chicago keeps doing budgetary dancing wrt their pension liabilities ("Chicago's Pension Debt Decreases $1.3B in 2024 to $35.9B," WTTW, "A new bill would force Chicago Public Schools to pay into municipal retirement fund," Chalkbeat), as does the State of Illinois.  As part of getting DC out of bankruptcy, the federal government took over the city's pension obligations.  Etc.

To get away with not necessarily paying market rate wages for jobs, government agencies have provided good benefits packages including lifetime pensions.  But mostly cities never put away enough money to cover fully these obligations and now pension overhang is a serious problem in many cities ("What a $1.48 trillion pension gap means for cities and states," SmartCities Dive).

Oddly, Philadelphia, not known for being best practice in municipal management, is on track to have its pension obligations fully funded ("A decade ago, Philly’s pension fund looked like it could sink the city. Now it’s on pace to be fully funded by 2032," Philadelphia Inquirer).

A decade ago, the pension fund was only 45% funded and appeared to pose a significant threat to the city’s fiscal health. But a series of reforms carried about by successive mayors, state and city legislators, and municipal labor leaders have fostered a remarkable turnaround.

The city’s pension system pays for retirement benefits for city workers. Benefits vary based on when employees were hired. About 35,000 people are currently receiving benefits, according to the pension board’s most recent newsletter. That includes retirees, their beneficiaries, and disability claimants.

“The fiscal health of the Pension Fund continues its relentless upward climb since many reforms were put in place 10 years ago,” Brady, who sits on the city Board of Pensions and Retirement, said in a statement. “We’ve made smart investments, doubled our assets, reduced investment manager fees — resulting in a large reduction of the overall liability for taxpayers."

The reforms included increasing annual contributions from the city budget to the pension fund beyond the minimum amount required by state law; negotiating union contracts with higher employee retirement contributions; moving away from high-fee investment managers; and dedicating revenue from a 1% sales tax in Philadelphia to the pension fund.

Basically, they used all the tools at their disposal to make it work.  They made it a priority.  And the priority stayed a priority even as Mayoral administrations changed.

School closures and neighborhood effects

Given the decline in the number of school aged children, and outmigration from cities, school districts such as in Washington, DC, Chicago, and Philadelphia have been closing schools for decades.

The rational planning part of me is in favor because of the need to spend money efficiently, have enough students to be able to offer a wider range of programs, etc.

But the other side of my rational planning part also acknowledges that school closures have negative impact on neighborhoods, that elementary schools in particular are building blocks for neighborhoods (along with libraries).  

And that sports programs at the high school level can engender community pride, etc.

I pointed out this contradiction starting in 2011:

-- "One way in which community planning is completely backwards," 2011
-- "Missing the most important point about Clifton School closure in Fairfax County," 2011
-- "Rethinking community planning around maintaining neighborhood civic assets and anchors," 2011
-- "The bilingual Key Elementary School in Arlington County as another example of the "upsidedownness" of community planning," 2019
-- "National Community Planning Month: Schools as neighborhood anchors," 2022
-- "School closure and consolidation planning needs to focus on integration planning at the outset as a separate process," 2023

I suggested that cities ought to consider subsidizing continued school operation in some communities as a stabilization and revitalization measure.

Philadelphia is going through another round of school closure ("City Council members grill school district officials on plan to close 20 schools — and superintendent says he could have closed 40." Philadelphia Inquirer) and an op-ed about this "It’s not just about schools. It’s about neighborhoods," makes the same point as I did, but she describes better the effects of a school within a neighborhood beyond the curriculum.  From the article:

The conflict playing out in Philadelphia isn’t only about schools. It’s about the fact that the school district and City Council have different responsibilities for the same places, and the new facilities plan brings that conflict into sharp focus./p>

The facilities plan is doing exactly what it was designed to do. The trouble is that everything it was not designed to do.

A Philadelphia neighborhood school isn’t just one institution. It’s four, sharing an address. There’s the instructional platform: courses, teachers, schedules, the district’s domain. There’s the civic anchor: the building that signals to a neighborhood that its children count, and they belong. There’s the distribution node: where meals are served, where social workers operate, and where there is, most days, someone watching. And there’s the pathway to the future: where a counselor knows a family by name, where a student learns there’s a college or a trade or a life beyond the block.

... When that school building closes, all of those other things close with it. Some of those functions were formal educational programs. Others accumulated because families had nowhere else to go for them. The school became the place where paperwork was explained, problems were addressed and solved, and someone always knew which door to knock on next.

City Council doesn’t get to vote on the facilities plan, but it funds roughly 40% of the district’s $2 billion budget.

... What closes with a school building is not limited to instruction. Council’s budget is the instrument for the functions the facilities plan does not govern: housing investment, community infrastructure, colocated services, and neighborhood anchors that exist independent of school enrollment.

The conclusion to the article is succinct.

The district’s plan answers an educational question. What replaces the neighborhood functions housed in those buildings is a civic one.

That answer does not sit with the school district.

Recommendation.  School systems need to work more closely with city planning departments, to ensure decisions are made in a manner that promotes neighborhood stabilization and improvement.  If necessary, could funds be identified that could be provided to keep certain schools open, and to improve enrollments to make it more financially efficacious for doing so.