Most significant micromobility transportation event in 2026: Pedestrianizing Oxford Street in London

Reddit photo.

Last year in January I wrote the most significant transportation happening of the year 2025 was the imposition of congestion charging in New York City ("The most momentous transportation story of 2025 has already occurred: imposition of NYC's congestion zone," "Big transit/sustainable mobility stories of 2025").

After years of trying starting in 2017 ("London’s Oxford Street to be pedestrianised by the end of 2018 under plans by Mayor Sadiq Khan," CityAM), Mayor Sadik Khan of London, with new authority given to his position, was able to put into place Oxford Street pedestrianization, despite years of push back from the Borough of the City of Westminster.

-- Oxford Street area works, Transport for London
-- "Oxford Street pedestrianization is coming to London" (2018/2026).

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Well, maybe just wrt micromobility.  Spain's continued crashing of high speed rail trains on a line that hasn't installed advanced signaling could be considered a top issue.  

I'd say the most momentous decision was going into the Iran War, the subsequent "seizure" of the Strait of Hormuz by Iran, the reduction of oil and other shipping through the Strait, constraining supplies, abetted by Iran attacks on oil and gas infrastructure elsewhere in the Mideast, and the subsequent rise in oil and gas prices in the US and around the world.

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This pedestrian scramble intersection on Oxford Street was an early attempt at rebalancing favor towards pedestrians. 

Cities like Paris, London, Montreal, Thessalonki have city-wide mayors with specific powers, but at the same time the city is organized into sub-city districts with mayors and councils and more significant powers when it comes to local affairs.  And Westminster has been against for some time.

Mayor Khan's main power has been control of transit, Transport for London, and with a Labour Government after years of the Conservatives, he has more national support for this function.

Oxford Street attracts more than 500,000 visitors each day. Taxis make up around 1/3 of the traffic on the street, but only account for 2% of the people throughput (10,000 people).  Most people walk or use the subway.  

The closure was implemented overnight on October 26th.  Reddit photo.

Making this a reality took a change in national law.  Mayor Khan's authority didn't extend to roadways and to overturn Westminster Borough said no ("Banning cars in city centres has worked around the world. Why isn’t London’s Oxford Street pedestrianised yet?," Guardian).

But it required action by the national government to do so.  From "Oxford Street transformation – the state of play as 2026 gets underway":

On 17 September 2024, he revealed that the then brand new Labour government was backing his desire to bring “the nation’s high street” under his command.

BBC photo.

One of the justifications of the change is the now not so new Elizabeth Line adds more transit-based footfall to the district.  

Another is the decline of retail and the belief that more purposeful activation of the street can help revive it.  With the change, buses are shifted to other streets.  

And it seems to be having positive effect already ("How is Oxford Street one week into pedestrianisation?," BBC, "London’s Oxford Street Gets Spending Boost After Going Car-Free," Bloomberg).  From Bloomberg:

The number of transactions in stores jumped 19% in the seven days starting Oct. 26 compared with the prior week and from a year earlier, according to data from technology company Adyen. Overall spending value also reflected the surge in visitors, rising 28% from a year earlier and 12% on the previous week.

The figures, from 40 stores on Oxford Street, provide an early test of whether banning traffic can boost an area struggling to regain its pre-pandemic pulling power, where spending is recovering more slowly than across the wider West End district.

One problem is cyclists riding through, rather than walking their bikes.  

Even though I am a staunch cyclist, I believe mixing cycle riders with pedestrianized streets is a problem and shouldn't be allowed because cyclists tend to travel much faster than walking speed.

In short, not every micromobility intervention is designed to be primary for every mode.  Just like bike lanes aren't for walking nor cars.

Lessons

Paris was the first city to introduce wide scale dock based bicycle sharing.

World class cities. I have a line about how "world class cities don't just take, they give" in that their introduction of innovation in turn allows other cities that aren't "world class" to experiment similarly ("World class cities and the development of new transportation technologies: Paris and electric cars," 2011, "How Paris beat the car," 2026).

London has plenty of pedestrian districts already, so do so many cities throughout Europe.  But like bike share--Paris wasn't the first, but it was the first city to implement bike sharing at a major scale--this is a highly visible change that over time will have impact on US cities, even "world cities" like New York.

Lots of pedestrian activity in the Financial District.  MIT graphic.

Like in NYC there is talk about more pro-pedestrian interventions like multiple blocks in the Financial District ("Data Show Why Mamdani Must Pedestrianize the Financial District," StreetsblogNYC) but no action.

The same went for congestion charging.  London wasn't first, but it was more visible than Stockholm or Singapore, and it led to "diffusion of the idea" in the US, to the point where NYC, after years of back and forth, implemented it to great success.

Tokyo's Shibuya District has foot traffic equal to Oxford Street but still cars are privileged.

Density and a shopping core are key to success.  But most Western cities don't have a street section less than a mile in length with 500,000 daily users on foot.  Oxford Street has 120 million visitors each year and 85% arrive by transit.  

Similarly, Asian cities like Tokyo's Shibuya district, Hong Kong, and so many in China do have that kind of foot traffic, and could pedestrianize similarly. Also see the Bloomberg article "London's Oxford Street Has a Message for the UK."

These days cities in the US no longer have shopping cores dominated by multiple different department stores.  If they have one, usually a Macy's, it's a big deal.

Better to take it slow if your city isn't super dense.  Start with one block in an area where it can be very successful and go from there ("Extending the "Signature Streets" concept to "Signature Streets and Spaces"").

Mayoral development corporations as implementers.  The second Bloomberg article makes the point that what we would call in the US "community development corporations" ("Ah, the H Street Community Development Corporation") are a way to cut through opposition, red tape and fear and make change happen.

Scary pumpkin carved for Halloween, "Bike lanes" for people who oppose them

From the BikeLA Reddit.

Yesterday's Election

I saw this yard sign yesterday, while out doing errands.

WRT the Election results ("Angry Voters Usher in Beginning of the End to the Trump Era," New York Times), it wasn't because of this kind of thinking, but it'd be nice to think so.

-- Country First website

I'll take what I can get...

I'm not going to say this is a reset.  I will say though that if the Democratic Party in some of these surprising wins (Texas, Iowa, Kansas, some South Carolina, etc.) continues to organize and develop the "ground game" then some of these "miraculous reversals" can become more permanent.

In Salt Lake, I participate on the community whining site Nextdoor, and while the State is very Republican, Salt Lake City and to a lesser extent the County are strongly Democratic.

That means the County Attorney and Sheriff positions are Democrat and they've been in office a long time.  One strongly Republican participant on Nextdoor kept pushing their Republican opponents as an alternative, saying "it's time for a change."

New Yorker Magazine cartoon by Ben Chase.

I jokingly responded, "why is it in all those Republican House and Senate districts across the state, that have been electing Republicans all this time, they aren't saying 'it's time for change, why don't we vote Democratic for once'?"

Well, in this election it seems like many did ("North Carolina Republicans might have had the worst night of all," Washington Post, "Florida Republicans narrowly avoid blue wave but feel impact," South Florida Sun-Sentinel), even in Utah, a bunch of hard core Republicans seem to be on their way to losing--some really bad ones, like the landlord lawyer writing tenant legislation ("As Utah continues counting votes, Democrats are on the path to flip seats in GOP-dominated Legislature," Salt Lake Tribune).

Anti-James Talerico mailers sent to a Reddit member in Texas.  

We'll see if these trends hold up through the full ballot count--Utah is/was a leader in mail in voting, although they're dialing it back because of the Trump sycophants. A lot of early ballots in Utah are Republican.

Free transit (and bike) rides to the polls on election day

The US Supreme Court continues to support voter suppression by declaring sections of the Voting Rights Act Unconstitutional ("Whites Only," Mother Jones).

Many transit systems like Nashville, the systems in Los Angeles County, Wichita, San Antonio and many others offer free rides on election day, with the goal and objective that people can get to polling sites without having to pay.

Lincoln, Nebraska takes this a step further, adding the local bike sharing program, BikeLNK, to free election day service ("Free rides to the polls: Lincoln waives bus, bike fares Nov. 3," Lincoln Journal-Star).

It turns out that while the BikeLnk offer is rare, Metro Bikes in LA County are offering free rides too.

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Francis Silva on a BikeLNK bike.  A senior membership is half off, $50 per year.

One of the things I say bike share systems need to do is trainings and group events, tours etc., for promotion.  BikeLnk has such a program targeting seniors ("Aging Partners, BikeLNK bikeshare learning sessions begin Monday," Journal-Star), "Educating Older Adults on Bike Share," Better Bike Share Partnership).

European Prize for Urban Public Space

Zuidpark is the conversion of a multi-block parking lot into a park with climate change elements.  Before that it was a section of shipping docks supporting Antwerp's port.  Photos: Isabelle Pateer Photography.

An annual competition sponsored by the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona, the 2026 winner of the European Prize for Urban Public Space is Zuidpark, a public park in Antwerp, Belgium. 

-- Architect's write up of the project

  There were 25 finalists

The organization has a number of publications, of the biennial competition, and lessons learned.  Some are published books, and hard to get in the US.  The report for each biennial competition is downloadable as a pdf. 

October is National Community Planning Month: A program for Citizen Involvement

I never did get a PhD in planning (a big regret) but I wanted to do my dissertation on better citizen involvement processes, because outside of families with children in local schools, land use issues were the ones most likely to get the average citizen involved in local civic affairs.

I've been busy travelling or being sick or tired, so I haven't been writing.  I try to write pieces based on a theme, like National Public Lands Day in late September, or National Community Planning Month in October.

The American Planning Association webpage has some resources.  Next year's conference is in Houston in the Spring.  

They used to have a membership tier for community representatives on planning commissions and similar public bodies with review responsibility for planning and zoning issues that was individually based.  Now the planning organization joins, and individuals join under the group.  I don't know if planning groups at the sub-city scale qualify for this type of membership.

While I can be very voluble, I joke that I follow the lyric from the Talking Heads song, Psychokiller, "When I have nothing to say, my lips are sealed.  Say something once why say it again?"

Yes I joke I write the same stuff over and over, albeit with redos and expansions and even reversals over the years, because mostly my insights are the same.  And sometimes I have to change my mind, based on new information and experiences, which I try to do as well.

A public planning meeting in Montgomery County, Maryland.

The necessity of capacity building.  My biggest take away from 25 years involvement with a citizen advocacy perspective is that cities don't invest in capacity building and training to help citizens be better at involvement.  

To me it's damning that with each additional planning engagement they participate in, they don't become more knowledgeable, creative, and "better."  I have written about this a lot, and this is as good a sum up as any. 

-- "National Community Planning Month | Civic Involvement" (2025)

A few cities, notably Minneapolis with a program that doesn't exist anymore, Seattle, and Calgary, Alberta, are quite good at it, many aren't.  (In parks, the City Parks Foundation in NYC has a workshop and training program for park-involved citizens.)

Some communities have citizen academies, but I'll call that an idiosyncratic approach, because it's individually focused, not individually and organizationally.  Organizations as a whole need capacity development and the ability to pass on programs and best practice even as older members leave and are replaced by younger ones.

Plus groups tend to be somewhat hermetic and that needs to be addressed as well.  

Of course, the Internet is a great source of information on urban issues.  Urban Land Magazine is published by the main real estate development trade association and is a good way to begin to understand how developers think.

Libraries can be a way to organize and deliver such training, and create special collections of books, periodicals, and other resources on all aspects of urban planning.  Dallas offers the Grants Information Center and the Urban Information Center as part of the Government documents section, as a resource along these lines.

Originally established to strengthen the informational foundation for community development and urban revitalization efforts, the center provides tools, specialized resources, and subject guides tailored for researchers, city planners, and local residents

Money for travel/training.  Off site training is usually criticized as junkets.  People don't seem to have much respect for it.  When DC's Main Street program started out, they provided some funding to attend the Main Street conference.  But not anymore.  

My going to various conferences, on my own dime, like National Trust for Historic Preservation, Congress for the New Urbanism, APA and American Society of Landscape Architects when they cycled through DC, of course the Main Street conference, Urban Land Institute meetings, and other trainings lwas invaluable.  It accelerated my learning greatly, especially doing field trips as part of the conference.  

NRPA Exhibit floor at a past conference.

Oh and many such conferences come with exhibit halls and exhibitors and you can learn a lot from what you see there as well.  I just sent back over 50 pounds of literature I picked up at the National Recreation and Parks Association meeting in Philadelphia.

Maybe it has to be done through philanthropy and creating an endowment, but involved citizens in recognized groups should be able to get at least some financial support to go to such meetings, with requirements to do "after action reports" to share the learning with others.

Placemaking workshop as a training platform.  I don't think Project for Public Spaces does this workshop, "How to Turn A Place Around" anymore.  

They used to do one every year in NYC and then out in the field when asked to do so as consultants--I participated in one for Scenic America in DC in like 2004 ("write up").

I think every city should do a workshop like this every year, moving it around the city.  

Obviously, it would be held at a particular project or site, or more generally in a specific neighborhood, with groups in that neighborhood being co-sponsors and the lead participants, but also have the workshop open as a training bed, to other interested citizens, organizations, and city/county staff as informed participant-observers.  

One thing I found is that having a mix of people with deep local knowledge, and less local knowledge but more technical knowledge is that the "new people" help the long time neighborhood residents in seeing a place differently, with possibilities, rather than the "same old, same old."

The workshop is great for helping to develop a consensus about community priorities and initiatives, but not so detailed as a full blown neighborhood plan.

Together Bay Area conference.

Annual community conference.  Some parks friends organizations like Park Pride in Atlanta have an annual conference.  It's more for professionals but interested members/residents are welcome.  Friends of the Parks in Chicago includes community awards for people and programs, so there is a celebratory element.  The Together Bay Area open space group's annual conference sometimes includes advocacy activities as well as field visits.

At the state level, most bike advocacy, historic preservation, and commercial district revitalization programs (Main Street) have conferences too, and these can be particularly good.

Past entries on Community Planning Month.  Rather than write something new, past entries related to the month are still fully relevant and worth (re)reading.  Here goes:

-- "National Community Planning Month | Civic Involvement continued, Orange County Register's Be the Change" (2025)
-- "National Community Planning Month | A Planner's Bookshelf" (2025)
-- "National Community Planning Month | Citizen advocates matter" (2025)
-- "National Community Planning Month | Civic Involvement -- Sometimes you lose" (2025)

-- "National Community Planning Month: Resource | Planning Whole Communities Toolkit, Puget Sound Regional Council" (2022)
-- "National Community Planning Month: Schools as community anchors" (2022)
-- "Community Planning Month and transportation" (2022)
-- "October is National Community Planning Month" (2022)
-- "Planning books to read for National Community Planning Month" (2020) [to the public safety section I would add Peter Moskos Back from the Brink, an oral history of the implementation of Broken Windows policing theory in NYC, blog entry]

-- "Community planning, capitalism, and housing/real estate development" (2020)
-- "October as National Community Planning Month (and "defund the police")" (2020)

Hourcar: Minneapolis-St. Paul nonprofit car share to shut down

Hourcar is a nonprofit car share organization serving Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota.  Since 2005-21 years--it has been a rare non profit organization in the field that has survived

Most of the initial firms sold themselves to for profit providers around the time that they needed to raise funds for the first wholesale replacement of the original fleet of cars as they aged.

But now, faced with significant increases in repair costs, insurance, and recission of federal grants to the organization as well as to government partners led to a triple whammy--a $1.1 million deficit that the board was not able to raise funds for and cover ("HourCar calls it quits, Evie electric carshare ends Oct. 15," St. Paul Pioneer-Press).  From the article:

To maintain and expand operations over the years, the car-sharing service — which allows members to book a fuel-efficient car for hourly use via an app — has relied heavily on financial support from St. Paul, Minneapolis, Xcel Energy and other public, private and philanthropic partners, as well as federal grants.

LaGrange said the board convened Tuesday night and determined that while they had made headway on a $1.1 million budget gap, some $625,000 remained to be raised to complete a $5 million budget and keep the organization afloat. With most fundraising avenues already exhausted and cities, counties and fellow nonprofits expressing alarm about their own finances, finding the extra cash seemed unlikely.

So now it's going to shut down. From the Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal ("Hourcar, facing budget gap, will end car-sharing service"):

HourCar was launched in 2005 by Neighborhood Energy Connection (now the Center for Energy and Environment). It outlasted some early rivals, such as Car2Go (which left the market in 2016) and expanded with partners including Xcel Energy Inc. 

According to a 2025 Community Impact Report, the service was used for 196,220 trips the past year. Most of the users responding to a survey in March 2026 said the used the service for entertainment reasons and for household tasks like grocery shopping. Forty-one percent said they used the service to get to medical appointments.

One of the problems with transportation demand management systems is that it's comprised of a mix of private, government and nonprofit providers.  US government actors aren't prepared to step in to cover losses, even if the service is worthwhile.

The Veo Trike ("Is the Electric Trike the Next Big Thing in Shared Micromobility?," Wired Magazine).

-- "Further updates to the Sustainable Mobility Platform Framework" (2018) [this entry needs an update compilation within the framework, like Veo trikes]

Maybe not in Minneapolis-St. Paul, but I know in DC, another problem is that car share is seen not so much as a mobility resource and as a way to reduce parking demand, but a profit center to be charged high rates for the use of public spaces.  And taxes.  In DC, a car share trip costs more in taxes than a trip on Uber or Lyft.

It's possible in a place like Hamburg or Berlin, where the city government is the main actor through a transit subsidiary, that agencies there could step in if there are problems, seeing the value of continuing the service.  But it's not guaranteed.

Similar problems have come up with bike share, as the way it usually works is that systems serving multiple cities are really set up behind the scenes, city by city, and this can lead to sub-optimal outcomes.

And the dockless systems, which pay cities a license fee.  But aren't always sustainable.  Also with the White's Ferry in Montgomery County, Maryland.

-- "Another example of the need to reconfigure transpo planning and operations at the metropolitan scale: Boston is seizing dockless bike share bikes, which compete with their dock-based system" (2018)
-- "New Jersey still has private transit carriers providing "public transit"" (2023)
-- "Revisiting the need for comprehensive transportation planning at the metropolitan and regional scales | For profit services, and White's Ferry, Montgomery and Loudoun Counties" (2022)

Scenario planning, like what I recommend for parks master planning in jurisdictions with parks operated by multiple agencies, is absolutely necessary in maintaining and improving the sustainable mobility platform/MobilityAsAService (MaaS).  DC was and somewhat is a leader, but it's not planned (this piece needs an update too).

-- "DC is a market leader in Mobility as a Service (MaaS)" (2018)

That way they are prepared for changing circumstances.  Ideally, in a system with various profits and losses, profits in one area could subsidize losses, with the aim of maintaining the ideal system.

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Berlin's integrated transit app: integrated apps as an element of brand leadership.  In Berlin, they've created a mobility app that integrates transit modes provided by the transport association and non-transit modes offered by private firms ("Berlin's new transit app Jelbi connects all modes in one place," Fast Company).

The app, Jelbi ... connects services that currently each have apps of their own, making it difficult to plan a trip or buy tickets given the number of choices. “We have eight bikesharing companies in the market, alone,” says Christof Schminke, the managing director in Germany for Trafi, the tech company that built the platform for BVG, Berlin’s public transport company. “I think it’s a good sign that Berlin has all the mobility options, but for every service you need a separate app on your smartphone.”

BVG, which runs the city’s subways, trams, buses, and ferries, wanted to become a broader mobility provider for Berlin. “They also saw a competitive threat, because there are also other players, like automotive companies or the Ubers of the world, that are also starting to integrate other modes of mobility… they didn’t want to leave it to private players to [take on] this integrator role,” Schminke says. Other companies, like the startups offering bikes and scooters, saw the benefits of connecting with a public transit platform and getting more riders.

Jelbi shifts, adds mobility hubs.  Photo: IMAGO/Funke Photo Services

The thing for me, is that while transport associations need to organize as systems, I don't think it matters as much to users.  They don't need an app with every possible option.  Instead, they are content to have apps for the services that they regularly use, which is a small subset of the total. 

But in Berlin, the transport association takes a more direct role in coordinating private services ("BVG keeps Berlin mobile – with a pleasing year-end result ," BerlinLive).

Parks Week... I give up

 I will write more pieces.  But I'm too tired to stay up and write and illustrate after long days.

Parks Week #2: Gaps in Parks Master Planning

Parks Week.  I am calling this "Parks Week" because for the first time I will be attending the National Recreation and Parks Association national conference, in Philadelphia.  I hope to learn a lot and write some posts too.

Looking southeast across Sugar House Pond.

Based on my experience as a board member of Sugar House Park, a park in Salt Lake City that is jointly owned by the city and county, and overseen by a proto-land trust ("the board") I wrote a ten part series on "gaps in parks master planning."

Not every park master plan has these gaps, but enough do, or the way that they address one of the gaps may be inadequate, hence the list.

-- "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)

Children playing at the Parley's Creek Playground.

I have two more in (desultory) progress, one on park equity, the other on recreation center planning in downtowns.

The first piece is definitely out of my experiences both in DC and on the east coast, as well as the tricky intergrovernmental relationships in Salt Lake.

It's on "Levels of Service," the basic point is that urban parks have more needs for maintenance, perhaps programming, security, and other elements compared to most suburban parks.  This creates a problem with the County because most of their experience with parks is suburban.  E.g., they have limited problems with homelessness (so do we, but it's purely out of luck--geographical and topographical elements of the park make it not particularly attractive for the homeless).

The other thing is that as a well-situated urban park, it's used all year long, even in the winter the playgrounds are used.  And that we should have more staff in keeping with this demand.

Business districts address having greater needs than a city is prepared to provide by creating business improvement districts, which provide additional services, especially on "clean and safe issues" which is funded by a small tax on property in the defined geographical area of the district.

Parks can be funded similarly.  There is a property tax that helps to fund Bryant Park in NYC.  But a similar tax proposed for the High Line failed.  Not quite the same, SF has "green benefits districts" which fund public space improvements and maintenance.

What parks have as a form comparable to a BID is a conservancy, which raises money independent of the city and uses those funds to supplement funds that the city continues to provide for operations and capital improvements.  Generally, the conservancy is the lead on managing the park day to day.

The first entry goes into this in detail.

Tree climbing at Sugar House Park.

Other entries that are really specific to my experience are on using academic research and best practice to guide action on matters not covered by a master plan, planning art programs systematically, programming, including public art as a element of parks, using park architectural history as a way to guide building design issues, and managing the park as a cultural landscape:

e.g., Sugar House Park has six primary features defining the Park--what we call "Big Field" a large grassy bowl which abuts (2) Parley's Creek, (3) which in turn feeds Sugar House Pond, (4) the sledding hill, (5) the sledding hill on the east side of the park; together they illustrate that Sugar House Park is hilly compared to many other parks in the area, and (6) the view to the east of the Wasatch Front Mountains, although from some parts of the park the view to the west includes the Oquirrh Mountains.

The planning arts programs systematically entry is also very good.

Separately, I haven't written about it in the blog, but an article in the Washington Post, "Forget rest stops. Plan your road trip around playgrounds," gives us a lot to think about, especially because the park abuts I-80.  

It shapes the idea of having a visitor center on private property abutting the park--I wrote about that issue here, "Learnings from a recent zoning issue I've been involved in."

Land We Share Summit, Salt Lake City, Friday October 2nd

Given that this past Saturday was National Public Lands Day (blog entry), and the issues I wrote about concerning Utah, it's great timing that the second Land We Share Summit on public lands in the state of Utah is coming up later this week.

The sessions look amazing

--Morning Plenary: "Threats to the National Monuments"

-- Breakout: Rural organizing

-- Breakout: Economics of open space

-- Breakout: Wildland Fire, Wildlife and Watersheds

-- Breakout: Indigenous Co-Management

-- Lunch Plenary: "The State vs. The Environment"

-- Breakout: Running for Office

-- Breakout: Attacks on Public Landsiv>

-- Breakout: "Wild" Places in the 21st Century

-- Breakout: Your Brain Outside

-- Session: "Wild" Places in the 21st Century

-- Keynote from Winona LaDuke

-- Happy Hour and Networking

Unfortunately I will be out of town.

Wild Turkeys sitting on a bench on 200 South in Salt Lake City

 

A less dangerous form of the urban-wildlife interface.

Valvoline Oil Change Shop puts tongue in cheek ad on their sign about "pumpkin spice" oil changes

September and October is the time where all kinds of food markets, coffee shops, etc., get on the pumpkin spice bandwagon, offering items featuring the spice.

This Valvoline Oil Change marquee sign ad pokes fun at the practice.

This article in Forbes Magazine "American Airlines Joins $500 Million Pumpkin Spice Fall Flavor Trend," make the point that the flavor is big business. From the article:

First introduced by Thompson & Taylor Spice Co. and McCormick & Company in the 1930s as a quick ingredient blend for pumpkin pie, the spicy mix remained quietly tucked away on kitchen shelves and was generally reserved for the holidays until Starbucks introduced its Pumpkin Spice Latte in 2003.

 

"Parks Week": Yesterday was National Public Lands Day

Parks Week.  I am calling this "Parks Week" because for the first time I will be attending the National Recreation and Parks Association national conference, in Philadelphia.  I hope to learn a lot and write some posts too.

National Public Lands Day is Today.  Throughout the year I collect stories relevant to National Public Lands Day, which is the last Saturday in September.  Sometimes I manage to publish a piece in advance, sometimes not.  This is pretty late in the day but just read something that blew me away even more, so here goes.

National Public Lands Day is focused on but not exclusively oriented to federal public lands.  There are many types: National Park Service, US Fish and Wildlife Service, USDA National Forests, Bureau of Land Management, the Bureau of Reclamation--dams, but often with recreational elements, the Army Corps of Engineers, dams some with recreational elements.

On this day, many federal installations have volunteer opportunities and entrance to federal public lands is free.

Some only some of the bad s*** Trump is doing to public lands

So the Trump Administration has been doing its best to f* up federal lands, and the supine Republican Congress seems to be just fine with it.  Of course, the year started out with Trump's face put on visitor passes.  

2.  I hope the Democrats make a law preventing a president from trying to put his name on f* everything.  This week there were reports that since he isn't getting his way with the Kennedy Center, nor the Institute of Peace--what a laugher, that there's consideration of renaming Ford's Theatre in DC--where Lincoln got shot!  Why the f* should his name have anything to do with it? ("Why does Trump want to name Lincoln assassination venue after himself? Dem strategist has a theory," AL.com).  Remember, every accusation by Trump is an admission ("Trump erupts after report claims aides want Ford Theatre renamed for him: ‘Ridiculous lie’s," NJ.com).

Parenthetically, a Canadian Substack, Dean Blundell's "Canada Versus Everybody," ("MAGA Is Losing The Senate And The House, But America Doesn't Get Its Allies Back Until Every Crook, Coward And Crypto Dollar Is Dragged Into Court") points out that the US will still not be trusted after Trump is gone unless there is true deep cleaning, on the scale of the Nuremberg Trials.  

He says that every time bad stuff happens, people get pardoned, so there are no long term repercussions and each bad administration takes it up another level.  An example is how Scooter Libby unveiled a CIA agent for political reasons and was convicted but then got pardoned.  He had an op-ed in the Washington Post this week, "America needs to destroy what really sustains the Iranian regime."  Not much of a punishment.

I'm fine with renaming all the toilets in federal buildings after Trump, along with sewage treatment centers and landfills, but that's it.  

3.  Whitewashing American History.  The Trump Administration has been "white washing" American History to diminish the stories and experiences of people who aren't white ("This article is more than 2 months old ‘A sanitized view of America’: inside Trump’s campaign to erase US history from national parks," Guardian), like Blacks and slavery--over the worry this could unduly hurt white people.  Talk about snowflakes.  The right calls the left snowflakes but they're the ultimate ("Are Conservatives the new snowflakes?," Free Press).

Workers remove displays from the President’s House Site in Independence National Historical Park. Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

This started with interpretation boards at federal public lands, mostly National Parks, including the President's House in Philadelphia ("Slavery exhibits at the President’s House have been swapped for the Trump administration’s version," "Centuries of controversy at the President’s House," Philadelphia Inquirer) and now extends to the National Park Service, which controls the National Mall space on which Smithsonian Museums abut, putting up signs warning people about the false histories presented by the various Smithsonian Museums ("Trump administration plans ideological warning signs for Smithsonian," NPR).  Trump also wants an abstract sculpture replaced with a 30 foot tall George Washington. 

FWIW, this has been a conservative issue for decades, I wrote about it in 2008, "Dancing with the one that brung ya and challenging the dominant narrative." Then I termed it a battle between American hagiography and stories (e.g., George Washington and the cherry tree) and a deeper interpretation and narrative.  My joke was imagine if we reinterpreted the exhibits at the National Museum of American History in terms of American Imperialism.  

This time the White House released a report, Saving America's Story, which was countered by premier historians ("Historians Reject White House’s Criticism of Smithsonian Museum," New York Times).

Tired, the leader of the Smithsonian has resigned ("Why Lonnie Bunch Is Leaving the Smithsonian," Atlantic).  Even though Trump fired him when he canned board members at the Kennedy Center, I think David Rubenstein would be good.  He's not a cultural historian, but he funds culture and understands politics and turnaround situations ("Smithsonian leadership changes give Trump an opening for control," Post).

Photo: Jose Luis Magana/AP.

4.  (I forgot) The Reflecting Pool and DC Lands, Potomac Park golf course, the White House Ballroom and the Arch... and National Security.  Yes, Trump wants to makeover DC.  Earlier this summer we had the debacle of failed improvements to the Reflecting Pool, which he blamed on vandals.  It and big parts of the National Mall are fenced off.

He's put money into some improvements in what DC locals consider local parks but they are run by the NPS because of the federal relationships.  For years, many of us criticized the Park Service, partly because they are more focused on big national parks, but they do have a lot of knowledge still, it's just not been funded (Small Park Management Strategies, NPS).

So why the press and the rest of the country was critical about park entrance fees being diverted to DC, I thought it was okay because of the decades of under investing in NPS's DC installations ("National Park Entrance Fees Are Funding Trump’s D.C. Projects," NYT).

A banner in Logan Circle with a graffiti tag on it Wednesday May 5th, 2026. (Maxine Wallace/The Washington Post)

Of course, Trump had to put his name on the improvements, at least on banners ("Trump demands gratitude in D.C. So he put up banners thanking himself.," Post).  People fought back, as they have in terms of specious prosecutions, opposition to National Guardsmen in the city, etc.

Instagram photo from Popville.

I meant to write about the Ballroom debacle and the Arch but I haven't gotten around to it.  Trump appointed lackeys to the Commission on Fine Arts and the National Capital Planning Commission, removing that level of what had once been judicious and careful oversight ("Trump has gotten rid of many of the checks and balances that could stop him from demolishing the Kennedy Center," Conversation).  

He tore down the White House Ballroom without authorization to build a much bigger one, intending for it to be paid "by contributors" (more grift) but with the American People with the final bill.  To get out of oversight he's claiming national security ("Trump’s Shoddy Ballroom Design Is the Real National Security Threat," New York Magazine).  Which isn't a winning argument so far.  But of course the Supreme Court lets construction continue despite the lawsuits.

Same with "the arch" a 250 foot monstrosity modeled after the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.  To get away with it he claims it can house snipers and drones so it's national security too ("Trump says his ballroom will house a drone port. The Secret Service has one next door," ABC-TV, "How Militarizing the Triumphal Arch Could Backfire for Trump," Atlantic). 

Pristine is not a word that marks Trump's treatment of golf courses.  

Caption: The East Potomac Park Golf Course is seen from the Washington Monument, Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

The golf course at East Potomac Park was first targeted as a place for ballroom demolition construction debris.  Now he's taking that over too.  Again, the Department of Interior is his lapdog, plus NCPC, so there are no checks and balances ("Park Service quietly awards contracts to work on Trump’s takeover of East Potomac golf course," AP).

Signage in Washington, D.C., stating "The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts" on June 11. Photo: Alex Wroblewski/AFP via Getty Images

5.  And the Kennedy Center.  This mess is pretty damning and widely covered ("How President Trump Broke the Kennedy Center, NYT, "What the Kennedy Center’s Tax Return Reveals," Atlantic).  

The latest is threats to demolish the building while they blame safety reasons they've known about and failed to address ("Kennedy Center put off planned repairs despite known structural issues, former employees allege," PBS).

6.  But hey, what about public lands?  How about the National Forests.  The Administration has already fired bunches of FS workers.  Now they are downsizing the department and moving it to Salt Lake, with the justification that it's closer to where most of the forests are ("The Forest Service is moving its federal HQ to Salt Lake City. Here’s why," Salt Lake Tribune, "Understanding The Forest Service Move To Utah," Flylords,) 

While taking other destructive measures ("U.S. Forest Service to Open Millions of Acres to Off-Road Vehicles, Memo Shows," "Trump Administration Moves to Allow Logging in National Forests," "Forest Service Will Close Research Stations That Study Wildfire Risk," New York Times).

Utah is the center of opposition to public lands under federal control ("Utah files ambitious lawsuit to take control of 18.5 million acres of federal public land," Utah News Dispatch, "Inside Utah’s PR campaign to seize public lands," HighCountry News, "Utah wants more control over federal lands. Here’s how lawmakers are advancing the fight," Salt Lake Tribune).

The reality is that there are national forests in 40 states and Puerto Rico, so a Western location is more about making it easier to f* with the lands.  

Besides the firing of workers, closing of offices, elimination of research programs, they are trying to open up forests to road building, when the prevailing authority is that forests should be wilderness where they can, hence no roads ("Trump administration moves to open untouched national forests to logging," NPR).

More Than Just Parks is a great Substack about public lands. Their coverage is astounding in its detail and insight.

Crowds hike their way up the Mist Trail, one of the more popular trails in Yosemite National Park. Photo: William Hale Irwin for the LA Times.

7.  Yosemite National Park in California.  It's well known that the parks experiencing the most visitors are overwhelmed.  Yosemite is one of them.  Not only did they fire a bunch of workers.  They ended the reservation system, so the park is overwhelmed still ("Crushing crowds turn Yosemite into ‘Disneyland.’ Can visitors still have fun?," Los Angeles Times).

To make it worse, the Trump Administration wants to give part of it to a private developer to enable them to monetize proximity to the Park ("Map shows where Yosemite developer wants to build private road," SFGate).  

The first Trump Administration tried to give a lot more concessions to the private sector in National Parks, but they didn't have enough time.  This Administration, mostly they've been too busy focused on eliminating workers, research programs, and checks on overtourism.

8.  WTF?  A baseball stadium in Grand Tetons National Park.  Ironically I was at that park a couple weeks ago.  

It's beautiful, and poking in the museum shop at the city history museum I came across some interesting books on its history--land was acquired by the Rockefellers and given to the federal government to create the park.  

The museum has a small but detailed and thorough thematic presentation of the history of the area, from the Native Americans to Hollywood and tourism, and how the recreation industry--skiing and whitewater rafting sectors--got their start in the Tetons.

We didn't see as much as the park I would have liked, but it's close, about a 4 hour drive.

Anyway, apparently Major League Baseball has the insane idea of desecrating a national park by playing a baseball game in one.  

My photos aren't as good as this.  Caption: A view of Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming. (Daniel Slim/AFP/Getty Images).

Trump seems to think it would be fine at the Grand Tetons National Park (" Trump administration considers building baseball park in Grand Teton National Park that could host a Major League Baseball game." Post, "The real Field of Dreams: MLB has a new stadium opening—in an Iowa cornfield," Fortune).  

I don't think a fiction writer can come up with the narratives the Trump Administration performs in real life.

From the article:

An MLB official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly, said the league approached the administration after the success of MLB’s other stand-alone events, such as the recurring Field of Dreams game in Iowa. The idea of playing a game in a national park is one of several that MLB is exploring.

... National Park Service Deputy Director Frank Lands visited Grand Teton National Park this week and looked at three potential locations for a baseball park within the park’s boundaries, the two people familiar with the matter said.

... A prized national park like Grand Teton is not an appropriate place for a baseball park, said Betsy Buffington, Northern Rockies regional director for the National Parks Conservation Association, an advocacy group.

“It is irreplaceable. There is no other Grand Teton that is home to bears and wolves and bison, elk and pronghorn,” Buffington said in an interview. “So the idea that we would put a baseball stadium in Grand Teton National Park is just — what would the word be? — ludicrous. Crazy. Ridiculous. I mean, I just can’t fathom.”

Probably it would be a simple field, like the Field of Dreams stadium.  But it's still a desecration, and the transportation complexities of holding such an event there would be considerable.  The roads do not have that kind of special event capacity.  Plus it's just wrong, interfering with the principles of why National Parks exist.  From the law creating the National Park Service:

"....to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wild life therein and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations. 

 —National Park Service Organic Act; August 25, 1916

A baseball field is not congruent with the law guiding the creation and management of national parks. 

Photo: On the Road Facebook Page.  Driving through Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument from Kanab to Page, Arizona, on US 89A.

9.  Speaking of Utah, the Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears National Monuments battle continues.  Republicans in the state were fine with the Trump Administration reducing the land reserved for the monument ("Utah Delegation Welcomes President Trump's Monument Proclamation," Rep. Celeste Maloy).  The Obama Administration increased it, after a many year public process, the first Trump Administration reversed, the second Trump Administration again reduced it.

(Brooke Larsen | The Salt Lake Tribune) Autumn Gillard and others protest President Donald Trump's shrinking of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Ecalante national monuments in St. George on Monday, July 20, 2026.

But a majority of the state's citizens prefer it remain as it was, and not be unreasonably developed ("Most Utahns want Trump’s cuts to Bears Ears, Grand Staircase reversed, survey finds," Salt Lake Tribune), which is the agenda of the State Government and the Utah Congressional Delegation. 

For example Utah's Senators were the leaders in the successful fight to reverse BLM's designation of conservation as a worthy use of public land under their purview, "Independent Petroleum Association of America backs Trump administration rollback of BLM public lands rule," World Oil, "Mining Claims Staked on Land That Trump Cut From Monuments," NYT).

10.  State Public Lands.  I haven't yet read The Other Public Lands: Preservation, Extraction, and Politics on the Fifty States' Natural Resource Lands by Steven Davis. It seems an essential book to understand the state side of public lands policy, the good and the bad.

Professor Davis also wrote In Defense of Public Lands: The Case against Privatization and Transfer, which these days is worth a read too.  We can call what the Trump Administration is doing as creeping privatization, if not in form, substance, where the private sector receives prioritized access with the aim of monetization of public lands for resource extraction, harmful recreation (off road vehicles), and monetization of park lands in surreptitious ways.

11.  City Public Lands.  Some cities are distinguishing between parks and other types of spaces in their organization of public parks agencies. 

For example, Salt Lake City's Department of Public Lands has seven separate units: planning, parks, trails and natural lands, urban forestry, recreation, the Salt Lake City Cemetery, and golf courses.

Hoover Dam, Nevada.  It turns out all the dams and hydroelectricity generation created in the 1930s became essential to powering US war production in Southern California and the Pacific Northwest.

12.  Are public waters "public lands"?  Meanwhile Bureau of Reclamation dams at Lake Powell and Lake Mead are reaching historic lows, which threatens their ability to generate electricity ("Lake Powell Hits Record Low and Lake Mead Could Fall Nearly 40 Feet, Straining Water for 40 Million," MedicalDaily).