Minneapolis

Did your city implement a road diet this year that really knocks your socks off? Is there a street near you with a new light rail line, or a protected bikeway, or fresh red transit lanes and bus bulbs? How about a stoop-to-stoop rebuild that created more space for people to enjoy the sidewalks?

UPDATED 11/28/14 at 8:48 a.m.: The Pioneer Press is reporting that late Wednesday police changed the status of the driver from "victim" to "suspect." 

If you build it, they will bike. That's the upshot of a new study from researchers at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, examining the effect of bike infrastructure.

Bill Lindeke at Network blog Twin City Sidewalks says he grew up in a rather bucolic setting. Even so, he wasn’t able to escape the constant whir of speeding cars. The old farmhouse on a half-acre lot where he grew up is just three-quarters of a mile from Interstate 35E. And in that way, he was like almost everyone else in the Twin Cities, he points out:

Every city has places where the buildings present a blank face to the sidewalk. A dark, recessed arcade deadening the pedestrian environment or a soulless concrete wall fronting a windswept plaza.

Forgive us for the unacceptable two-week gap between podcast episodes but this one is totally worth the wait. Feast on our in-depth exploration of three transit lines (in order of fantasy to reality): Las Vegas, Minneapolis, and Salt Lake City.

They call it "intra-regional job piracy" -- when one town uses tax breaks to lure employers from neighboring towns.

Finally, there is a light rail line connecting the Twin Cities. The Green Line, running 11 miles from Union Depot in downtown St. Paul to Target Field in downtown Minneapolis, cost $957 million and took decades to build. The process of choosing stations was contentious but eventually incorporated the proposals of low-income communities that wanted them, and the line is already being held up as a model. It's not the fastest way between the two downtowns, but it might be the best way. Jeff and I discuss.

This week's mayoral elections yielded good news for transit and safe streets in both Houston and Minneapolis. In Boston, meanwhile, the results are less straightforward.