'Traveling Together Alone and Alone Together' 1/🧵
"Different mobility practices offer different conditions for being exposed to other people and the environment. Such exposure influences a sense of being connected to places, communities and societies."
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Charles Montgomery
@charlesincities
Author, Happy City. New book examines how we can redesign our world to repair broken social trust.
@charlesincities@urbanists.social
Founder: happycities.com
Charles Montgomery’s Tweets
The Sith Lords have implemented Dark Side urbanism across this planet.
Nice work
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In honour of #MayThe4thBeWithYou here's our essay on the urbanism of #StarWars.... createstreets.com/wp-content/upl
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Replying to
Drawing by Matthew Thomson Design in collaboration w
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Dear Shaughnessy. Some people are dreaming of a future where mansions have neighbours….
Credit and…?
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Replying to @michael_wiebe @charlesincities and @uytaelee
do i have some renderings for you!
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Replying to @JenStDen
Cheekier: showing tiny townhouses providing winter shelter for 200 people in Shaughnessy Park...
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Vancouver planners make it exceedingly complicated to add housing, and then complain about the work they have created for themselves. And instead of simplifying approval processes, they ask council for direction how to ration housing. In a housing crisis.
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After watching video about the stupidity of 'mansion preservation' I asked Midjourney AI to imagine apartments mixed in with mansions of Vancouver's Shaughnessy. I asked and I asked. The AI imagination failed, just like public policy.
Here's what it offered...😢
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If our heritage policies end up creating exclusive neighbourhoods that discourage people from living or even visiting them, who are we really protecting heritage for?
My case against Shaughnessy: youtu.be/Re_mShtG0-4
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Density of housing, jobs and cool stuff…these are the things most likely to get people walking.
Some people didn’t get the study link. Here it is…
linkedin.com/pulse/what-mak
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What makes us walk?
They used AI to determine how much people walk in any neighbourhood. Density of population, jobs and points of interest are key.
Key insight: people walk more when there's no more than 30% detached housing.
linkedin.com/pulse/what-mak
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From 1970-1979, Vancouver averaged 12.8 housing construction completions per 1000 people.
From 2010-2019, it was 7.7.
Vancouver averaged 18,693 completion/year in the 2010s.
If Vancouver had been building at the same rate as in the 1970s, it would have been 31,130 per year.
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Vancouver. 1980 vs now. A very amazing urban development. Succesful in every way except one. Its no longer affordable. Adding density did not lead to affordability. The reverse happened. NA's most expensive housing.
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El Urbanismo, la localización de la vivienda, la gestión del suelo …Luego de leer “la fórmula de la ciudad feliz”, y de repensar la ciudad, coincido con el urbanista sobre la importancia de la “localización de la vivienda“
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“We can either keep the buildings exactly the same, or we can keep the people. But we can’t have both.”
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The reality is that our residents are moving away. Hawaii has had seven straight years of population decline. it is long past time to address Hawaii's housing shortage.
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What makes us walk?
They used AI to determine how much people walk in any neighbourhood. Density of population, jobs and points of interest are key.
Key insight: people walk more when there's no more than 30% detached housing.
linkedin.com/pulse/what-mak
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Yes people, transit keeps you trim, if that’s your goal.
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Replying to @JohnVaillant and @charlesincities
Dedicated ‘diet and exercise’ fails to cause long term weight loss for >90% of people. What does?
Taking public transit to work rather than driving thelancet.com/journals/lanpu
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¡Ya está aquí la edición española de Happy City!
The Spanish edition of Happy City is here!
Gracias a
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NOVEDAD
Un viaje, una exploración y una propuesta para que los espacios urbanos nos reporten más felicidad y más bienestar.
'Ciudad feliz. Transformar la vida a través del diseño urbano', de Charles Montgomery - @charlesincities.
#YaEnLibreríasShow this thread
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Shaughnessy's heritage policies encourage hedges and gates to be built around its historic mansions and limits traffic in the area. What's the point in protecting heritage if we hide it from public view?
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If our heritage policies end up creating exclusive neighbourhoods that discourage people from living or even visiting them, who are we really protecting heritage for?
My case against Shaughnessy: youtu.be/Re_mShtG0-4
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Here’s the Social Security office in Chattanooga, Tennessee. It used to be next to a transit hub, but they moved it here. I see these decisions all the time. Each time, the transit agency is then required to run wildly inefficient service to get to these marooned locations. 9/
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Replying to
I already read you in English, dear Charles , and now I can even read you in Spanish.
Thanks. You know how much I admire and appreciate your work, which has inspired me for a long time too.
Gracias por tus palabras y hasta pronto
Un abrazo
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Who knew that nuts, aside from being delicious, are one of most climate-friendly ways to get your protein. Not me.
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El secreto de la ciudad feliz: por qué vivir en un barrio con tiendas, zonas verdes y gente diversa beneficia seriamente la salud.
#ciudades
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What’s better than finally seeing Happy City published in Spanish?
A kind word from el maestro de la Ciudad de 15 Minutos! Gracias a
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« El secreto de la ciudad feliz: por qué vivir en un barrio con tiendas, zonas verdes y gente diversa beneficia seriamente la salud ».
La Ciudad Feliz, libro de @charlesincities 
Y con reseña de la Ciudad de 15 Minutos 
Por @josmrobles @elmundoes
elmundo.es/papel/historia
Y con reseña de la Ciudad de 15 Minutos
Por @josmrobles @elmundoes
elmundo.es/papel/historia2
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Treat yourself to this incredibly wise, beautiful, cheeky video about the dark side of “heritage protection” by
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When a proper country realizes that the future is not electric cars, but fewer cars.
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“This month Norway implemented new taxes on car purchases that scale with vehicle weight. Although the fees are much higher for gas guzzlers, EV buyers must now pay them too. An Audi e-tron now costs around $2,600 more than it did before.” 
@DavidZipper
slate.com/business/2023/
@DavidZipper
slate.com/business/2023/6
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I actually like this incoming Twitter feature. I am happy to pay for good journalism and happy that publishers will have a way to collect from readers other than subscriptions.
What’s not to like, ?
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Congrats on shipping this exciting, new pre-failed product!
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read image description
ALT
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On schools, as with other policy issues, Americans think things are generally crap, despite their own experiences being not so crap.
Telling polling by Gallup:
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Replying to @profsamperry
Great points. Similar to the way "everybody knows" that public schools are failing. Except for the actual schools that actual families actually go to.
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If you care about nurturing trusting, productive teams, I urge you to read The Social Brain asap!
I just had a fascinating conversation with co-author who got me thinking about how we can build belonging at work and in our neighbourhoods.
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✊🏽 Con motivo de la coincidencia del próximo lunes con el 1º de mayo, festividad de la clase trabajadora, nuestra novedad semanal saldrá oficial y excepcionalmente el martes 2 de mayo.
Un libro muy municipalista cuya lectura recomendamos antes de las elecciones del 28 de mayo 🗳️
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It was a glorious day to visit 210 Gorge, the home of new mixed supportive housing and affordable rental (and I mean truly mixed 😍).
The only downside was learning about the loss of one floor and 17 homes due to community opposition. 😣
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Winnipeg is very lucky to have this visionary planner on board!
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Delighted to be taking the role of Director, Planning, Property & Development at the City of Winnipeg! Excited to walk, bike, or bus to work, joining our strong community of designers and builders to make our city even more livable and lovable. Here we go! cbc.ca/news/canada/ma
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How many times we gotta say this? More lanes don’t solve traffic jams.
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I don’t follow the guy. I don’t read the guy. I don’t follow conspiracy content.
Why the hell is Twitter putting this disinformation king at the top of my recommendations?
My trust jar is almost out of pennies.
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It is a VERY GOOD THING that politicians are reading these books.
Kudos to for paying attention to the evidence.
Canada desperately needs both nonprofit housing and more abundant market housing.
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I love a good book and I love working on developing good housing policy that delivers the solutions Canadians need.
These new ones should help!
What other housing books should I read next? Leave a comment and let me know! #cdnpoli
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Here are two ways that arterial streets can grow. We can create hollow neighbourhoods, or we can create places where neighbours have the freedom to walk to shops and services.
I live between these streets. Main offers me freedom and joy. Cambie feels empty and alienating.
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Here are two ways that arterial streets can grow. We can create hollow neighbourhoods, or we can create places where neighbours have the freedom to walk to shops and services.
I live between these streets. Main offers me freedom and joy. Cambie feels empty and alienating.
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People who live in cities tend to get more exercise AND more benefit from visiting green spaces than people in rural areas.
theconversation.com/mental-health- via
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I live on 33rd and Cambie, and being unable to walk for those basic needs is literally our only problem with this neighborhood. This area needs more stores and more commerce!
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Still think this is one of the wildest things Vancouver planners have done in recent years:
1. Allow a bunch of condos along a train line and arterial road
2. Write a unique zoning bylaw for every building... with commercial uses banned in every one
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It is astounding that in Vancouver's new "corridor of urbanism," with thousands of condos, there is just ONE storefront business.
How many residents at 33rd and Cambie actually walk to shopping or services?
This lack of complexity leads to car dependency.
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Curious to see if the new Heather Lands plan will deliver the shops and services this area really needs:
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Replying to @OnfromGambier @gtjoe88 and @charlesincities
There is a lot more commerce coming W of Cambie on 30th or so, big development about 5 blocks west. Former RCMP grounds; will have a lot of commercial activity. vancouverisawesome.com/local-news/hea
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One more thing. At the centre of this zone of empty urbanism in Vancouver is a location for a planned future rapid transit station.
I'm sharing this not to shame past planners, but to ask how we can avoid this mistake on Vancouver's other corridors.
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It is astounding that in Vancouver's new "corridor of urbanism," with thousands of condos, there is just ONE storefront business.
How many residents at 33rd and Cambie actually walk to shopping or services?
This lack of complexity leads to car dependency.
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