YIMBY News for 12/19

[Eric Budd]

Op-Ed: Defer Seattle’s Second Downtown Rail Tunnel to Save ST3

The Urbanist

---

KEYWORD SCORE: 21.95. construction, development, downtown, house, project, rent, urban

Sound Transit is dismissing the idea of a single downtown tunnel too quickly. In late August, Sound Transit revealed a financial crisis: a shortfall of more than $30 billion in its operating and capital budget through 2046. Since then, Sound Transit staff have steered the board to consider a variety of scope reductions *except the biggest ticket item: *tabling a second light rail tunnel through Downtown Seattle and redesigning Ballard Link to use the existing tunnel. Cutting the second downtown tunnel (for now) could save as much as $4.5 billion, according to preliminary estimates by agency st

Share via:

This Rural County is Taking Notes from Iceland’s Drug Prevention Model

Next City

---

KEYWORD SCORE: 20.59. development, downtown, project, rent, transportation, urban

CELT students participated in the Kentucky Retail Survey Project by touring and investigating different tobacco vendors across town. (Photo courtesy Estill Development Alliance) *This story was produced as part of Next City’s joint **Equitable Cities Reporting Fellowship for Rural-Urban Issues** with **Kentucky’s **CivicLex* *.* While serving a three-year prison sentence for meth trafficking, Matewood Gerald got the call that she’d soon be a grandmother. Gerald started abusing drugs when she was just 13, and she says everyone in her small town of Irvine, Kentucky, has seen her at her worst. Bu

Share via:

Post-COVID Recovery Is Helping Some Downtowns, Frustrating Others

Governing

---

KEYWORD SCORE: 19.72. apartment, development, downtown, growth, hud, mixed-use, urban

Market crashes and steep declines produce shakeouts in business, weeding out weaker firms and benefiting the strong that remain. This can play out in cities too, and is happening right now among central business districts, with New York and San Francisco leaving other downtowns behind. It’s not so unusual. The 1980s oil crash nearly destroyed Houston, but also laid the groundwork to cement its dominance as the capital of the energy industry. Today, it’s almost inconceivable that entertainment executives would create a TV series about a wealthy oil family and call it *Dallas*, as they did in 19

Share via:

Brandon Johnson’s Woes

Governing

---

KEYWORD SCORE: 19.47. downtown, house, housing, housing authority, project, real estate, rent

This article is part of Governing’s Inside Politics newsletter. Sign up to subscribe. In Brief: Chicago’s mayor has so far not been able to get city council approval for a new tax on big businesses. It’s a cornerstone of his plan to fill a $1.15 billion budget hole. Mayor Brandon Johnson has weathered a string of crises and low approval ratings. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson is not having an easy time. Johnson’s proposed “head tax,” a per-employee tax on Chicago’s largest businesses that he’s promoted as the centerpiece of a plan to plug the city’s projected $1.15 billion budget gap, appears t

Share via: