Lisa Hoff

Need a hit of hopefully news?

Read or listen to this great NPR piece about how Vienna is tackling housing and climate together 👇

@MidwesternPRA: The new Amtrak Borealis beat its projected ridership by 60,000 🔥 Let's keep expanding and improving the Borealis service!!

Build it and they will come! 🛤️

Trump Claims Springsteen Not Born in USA “He’s not half as good a singer as Kid Rock," he added.

Trump Claims Springsteen Not Born in USA
open.substack.com/pub/borowitz...

“Health freedom” advocates now denying millions of the choice to protect themselves from COVID. #MAHA is a dangerous joke.

A prayer for trying to stay off the internet more Almighty God,

A prayer for trying to stay off the internet more
open.substack.com/pub/thecorne...

Here Is Everything That Has Changed Since Congestion Pricing Started in New York Fewer cars. Faster travel. Less honking. And some questions we still can’t answer.

NEW YORK: “Policy changes often take years to show results. Even then, you may have to squint to see them.

And then there’s congestion pricing in New York.

Almost immediately after the tolls went into effect, they began to alter traffic patterns, commuter behavior, transit service, even sounds…”

Webinar: Project Drawdown presents: The Climate Crisis on Our Plates: Rethinking food and farming. ​When we think of climate change, we often think of fossil fuels, electricity, transportation, buildings, and industry. But that’s not the whole story. Some 20–35% of human-generated greenhouse gase...

Food can be a climate change problem. AND it can be a climate change solution! Learn how in next week’s @projectdrawdown.bsky.social Ignite webinar with @globalecoguy.bsky.social @matthewhayek.bsky.social and more! us02web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

m.youtube.com/watch?v=vmDD...

Who says the suburbs are boring? Five walks that showcase Twin Cities suburban architecture. A failed utopia, revered ramblers and the neighborhood that gave Edina its reputation: We mapped architecturally interesting walks around the Twin Cities metro.

Excellent work, @gretakaul.bsky.social! And a wonderful trip through memory lane for those of us who grew up in suburbia in the 20th century.

www.startribune.com/to-do-archit...

Tweet from Pete Hegseth: This morning, I proudly ENDED the “Women, Peace & Security” (WPS) program inside the @DeptofDefense. WPS is yet another woke divisive/social justice/Biden initiative that overburdens our commanders and troops — distracting from our core task: WAR-FIGHTING. WPS is a UNITED NATIONS program pushed by feminists and left-wing activists. Politicians fawn over it; troops HATE it. DoD will hereby executive the minimum of WPS required by statute, and fight to end the program for our next budget. GOOD RIDDANCE WPS!

There's strong evidence that women's participation in security efforts makes countries safer.

That's why leaders in over 100 countries have taken action to further it.

One of them—who signed the U.S. Women, Peace & Security Act into law in 2017—was Donald Trump.

People of all ages and abilities walk, and sit on benches, along the Nanjing Road Pedestrian Mall; a car-free shopping street in the centre of Shanghai lined with trees, benches, planter boxes, and shopfronts.

People of all ages and abilities walk, and sit on benches, along the Nanjing Road Pedestrian Mall; a car-free shopping street in the centre of Shanghai lined with trees, benches, planter boxes, and shopfronts.

People of all ages and abilities walk, and sit on benches, along the Nanjing Road Pedestrian Mall; a car-free shopping street in the centre of Shanghai lined with trees, benches, planter boxes, and shopfronts.

People of all ages and abilities walk, and sit on benches, along the Nanjing Road Pedestrian Mall; a car-free shopping street in the centre of Shanghai lined with trees, benches, planter boxes, and shopfronts.

The Nanjing Road Pedestrian Mall—perhaps the most prominent shopping street in China—is a mirror of Shanghai's evolution into a liveable and prosperous megacity. As recently as 1998, it was a heavily trafficked thoroughfare, until all motor vehicles were removed as part of a redevelopment strategy.🧵

The US Secretary of Transportation is actively campaigning against public transit use at this point.

“Being still and quiet for a few minutes a day gives your mind a break from input. That break creates space in your thinking, which allows you to hear your own voice and get back in tune with your inner compass.” ~ Cory Allen.

Opportunities for moments of #selfcare are as fleeting and precious as they are inherently necessary for all who provide care and support to others.

#Alzheimers #dementia #mentalhealth #caregiving

Edwin Kneedler, a ‘Citizen Lawyer,’ Gets a Standing Ovation at the Supreme Court In a remarkable scene, the justices applauded Edwin S. Kneedler, a government lawyer with a reputation for candor, care and integrity.

Kannon Shanmugam, a veteran Supreme Court lawyer, said it was “one of the most electric moments I’ve ever seen in the courtroom.”
www.nytimes.com/2025/04/28/u...

Timeless

On a train in 2008, when he was Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio.

Pope Francis on a cargobike rickshaw.

#RIPPopeFrancis
@coolbikeart1.bsky.social

Pope Francis - the most urbanist pope yet? Maybe...

Senator Lisa Murkowski Makes Startling Admission as Trump Wages Retribution Campaign Lisa Murkowski, a longtime senator from Alaska and an independent voice in an increasingly tribal party, has been the rare Republican on Capitol Hill willing to criticize President Trump’s actions.

“We are all afraid.”
www.nytimes.com/2025/04/17/u...

Screenshot of a bird sound identification app in use. The screen shows an audio recording at 27.3 seconds, with a green pause button at the center. Above the timer is a spectrogram visualizing the bird sounds as a series of dark and light horizontal and vertical patterns on a gray background. Below the timer, the app provides a list of "Best suggestions" for bird species based on the recording. The top suggestion, highlighted in yellow, is "Common Chiffchaff," with a thumbnail image of a small brownish bird. Other suggestions include "Great Tit" (a black, yellow, and white bird perched on a branch), "Rose-ringed Parakeet" (a green parrot with a red beak), and "European Robin" (a small bird with an orange-red breast). Each entry includes a small arrow for more information.

I've been taking early walks in the park to watch and listen to birds for my sanity, and the Merlin Bird ID app has been indispensable for identifying bird songs.

Merlin was funded by a grant from the NSF, the science funding agency that Trump is trying to destroy.

www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/...

Opinion | It’s Time to Protect America From America’s President Trump’s authoritarian actions are vandalizing the American project.

“Trump prides himself on his ability to free hostages held in foreign prisons, yet he presents himself as helpless when it comes to bringing back Abrego Garcia…”
www.nytimes.com/2025/04/16/o...

So lovely.

Yours as well.

In Minnesota, yes.

If you were wondering, Wikipedia says it was in 1936.

naked contempt for US senators. they are certain they will never be held accountable to anyone or to the public

Bob Dole used to carry a copy of the Constitution in his pocket so he could show people the Tenth Amendment

Judge Sides With The Associated Press In Fight Over Access to Trump A federal judge ordered the White House to restore the outlet’s access to certain White House events and agreed that it had been singled out over its editorial decisions.

www.nytimes.com/2025/04/08/u...

The Trump administration has barred the publication from participating in the press pool, citing the wire service’s refusal to adopt the administration’s renaming of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.

France Introduces ‘SUV Tax’ To Curb Sales Of Heavier Cars French legislators are technically targeting all cars over a certain weight, but in the age of the SUV boom there are no prizes for guessing which body type is really under fire

What can be done about car bloat? Look to France and Norway, which tax new vehicles by weight.

At the local level, the District of Columbia ties registration fees to vehicle weight, and cities like Paris and Montreal require SUV and pickup owners to pay more to park.

The Anti-MAGA Hat Goes Global From Greenland to Canada, the merching of a protest movement.

"Ben-Ghiat believes the merching of the anti-MAGA movement is just beginning."
www.nytimes.com/2025/04/03/s...