Talking Headways: A Streetsblog Podcast

This week on Mondays at The Overhead Wire we're joined by Kate Gasparro, host of the Building Better Cities podcast! We talk about the first transit system invented by mathematician Blaise Pascal, whether design is making the housing shortage worse, LA Metro's new Care Based Services Division, and whether Chicago should have taken back it's parking meters from private equity. 
Below are the items we discussed in greater detail:
The first transit system - France Today
LA Metro's new Care Based Services Division - Los Angeles Sentinel
Ugly buildings and the design shortage - Vox
Mayor Johnson won't try to buy back parking meters - Chicago Tribune
Denmark's red lights - Daily Galaxy | Frank Markowitz and Leni Schwendinger's Lighting Episode 379
Puppies and Butterflies 
Star Wars Maul Trailer
The Pitt is an example of "Competancy Porn" - Washington Post
Many thanks to Bob Nanna for our music.
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This week Talking Headways is being hosted by our friend Anna Zivarts who guides a panel of elected officials and advocates to talk about the impacts of the Week Without Driving. They look back at 2025's activities and look forward to this year's version.
Featured guests include:
Arizona State Senator Analise Ortiz (Referenced Videos on TikTok and Instagram)
Rochester MN City Council Member Nick Miller
Alice Hilton and Quinn Mulholland Living Streets Lexington
Kai Hall of Greater Greater Washington
Ruth Rosas of Nondrivers Alliance
 
Listen to Anna speak previously on Episodes 366 & 488
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Find out about our newsletter and archive on YouTube!
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Buy books on our Bookshop.org Affiliate site! 
And get our Cars are Cholesterol shirt at Tee-Public!
And everything else at http://theoverheadwire.com

This week on the Talking Headways podcast we're joined by Jake Berman to talk about his book, The Lost Subways of North America: A Cartographic Guide to the Past, Present, and What Might Have Been. We discuss transit histories through the lens of racial dynamics, monopolies, ballot measures, and overlooked cities.
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Find out about our newsletter and archive on YouTube!
Follow us on Bluesky, Threads, Instagram, YouTube, Flickr, Substack ... @theoverheadwire
Follow us on Mastadon [email protected]
Support the show on Patreon
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Buy books on our Bookshop.org Affiliate site! 
And get our Cars are Cholesterol shirt at Tee-Public!
And everything else at http://theoverheadwire.com

We're back for a new year of Mondays at The Overhead Wire!  This week we're chatting about faster transit, cable cars in the Paris region, congestion pricing and more!
Below you'll find links to the items we discuss during the show...
Closing labor force gap - Los Angeles Times
Congestion pricing air pollution - Phys.org
Congestion pricing benefits - NYT
Leaving DART is hard - D Magazine
Paris cable car - Metro
Speed matters - Italian (urban) letters
Quiet sells - Wall Street Journal
Road salt remains - WHYY
California speeding penalties - Los Angeles Times
Pusing green can backfire - Grist
Misinformation - Volts
Bonus Items
Carmakers and operators liable in China - Cleantechnica
Euro cities clamp down on big cars - AS
Eileen Higgins wins Miami Mayorship - Talking Headways episode
LA Streamlining - Los Angeles Times
Oldes social housing - Deutsche Welle
Dutch answer to water - Inside Climate News
Atlanta's housing progress - Rough Draft Atlanta
Where the prarie remains - Noema
Kotek calls for new transport bill - Bike Portland
Houston residents spend on transport - Houston Public Media
Santa Fe links minimum wage to cost of housing - KRWG
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Follow us on Bluesky, Threads, Instagram, YouTube, Flickr, Substack ... @theoverheadwire
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And everything else at http://theoverheadwire.com

This week we're back at the Mpact Transit + Community Conference in Portland Oregon at the Mpact Innovators Poster Sessions.  We talk with young professionals about the transportation implementation and policy work they've been doing in the field including designing new transportation hubs, rethinking parking, and improving bus service.
This week we're at the 2025 Mpact Transit + Community Conference in Portland Oregon and we're chatting with young professionals about their work that they presented at the Mpact Innovators poster session. The Innovators is an all-volunteer national networking group that organizes events and networking at the conference each year. Each of the interviews is about five minutes and we have a link to the posters in the show notes in case you want to follow along with the visuals.  I will note that the poster sessions occurred during one of the evening gatherings so you may hear a bit of background noise.  But there are some pretty cool ideas in here so hopefully you all stick around to check all 8 of them out.
Cameron Thompson - Sisters East Portal Transportation Hub
Veronica Mandasari - Reimagining Mill Avenue: What Tempe can Learn from Portland's Walkable Street Design
Emily D'Antonio - TriMet Better Bus: Improving Reliability at Greeley and Going
Eric Gasper - Bridgeless to Better Burnside
Daniel Lambert - Pathways Transit Assistance Team (PTAT):  A Trauma-Informed Alternative to Object-Oriented Security on Transit Systems
Ryan Martyn - Wasted Space: Using Parking Lots to Improve Neighborhood Completeness
Jules Plotts - Employer-Centered Accessibility Model to Non-Dayshift Work
Maddy Belden - Development & Datasets
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Buy books on our Bookshop.org Affiliate site! 
And get our Cars are Cholesterol shirt at Tee-Public!
And everything else at http://theoverheadwire.com