I wrote an essay about how freeways divide our urban fabric (largely inspired by my personal experiences living a couple blocks from the Kennedy)
pencillingout.substack.com/p/life-next-...
At least it seems we'll find out pretty quickly!
This week's @cep-lse.bsky.social Trade and Urban Seminar @jeffrlin.bsky.social "Spreading Out in Expanding Idea Space"
cep.lse.ac.uk/_new/events/...
this is kind of spectacular -- you can't escape your hydrological destiny
In an effort to get to know my new home, I've sought out all kinds of books about Chicago. Here are some notes on my favorite books about this great city, and noteworthy themes across my reading.
pencillingout.substack.com/p/reflection...
#QJE Feb 2026, #10, “The Price of Housing in the United States, 1890–2006,” by Lyons (@ronanlyons), Shertzer (@econhist-allday), Gray (@econhistoryorbust), and Agorastos: doi.org/10.1093/qje/...
Join us Monday at 8:00am in 310 for an #ASSA2026 session on Spatial Sorting and Economic Transformations
Papers on poverty (non-)traps, income sorting, urban exploration & WFH by Bryan Stuart, Yuhei Miyauchi, Gabriel Kreindler, Yichen Su.
Discussants: @chrisseveren.bsky.social, Couture, Rappaport
Join us Saturday at 10:15am for an #ASSA2026 session on Development of American Cities
featuring papers on mortgage markets, slavery, migration & ghost towns by L D'Amico, S Naidu, T Jaworski, M Hoelzlein
Discussants: @econhist-allday.bsky.social, S Heblich, @allie-green.com, @jeffrlin.bsky.social
These are 10 of my favourite #UrbanEconomics & #SpatialEconomics articles published in academic journals in 2025, continuing with a tradition started in 2018 (order is alphabetical by first author, no ranking implied):
Recently accepted by #QJE, “The Price of Housing in the United States, 1890–2006,” by Lyons (@ronanlyons), Shertzer (@econhist-allday), Gray (@econhistoryorbust), and Agorastos: doi.org/10.1093/qje/...
Congrats Oren! 🥳
Hi all, please spread the word and we hope everyone can make good use of this new data drop: cmfdata.org
The full surviving establishment-level Census of Manufactures manuscripts and digitized data from 1850, 1860, 1870, and 1880!
🚨New predoc positions!🚨
Join @alexbartik.bsky.social and me to work on developing LLM tools to analyze zoning regulations and their impacts on housing affordability.
One position starting at the "normal" cycle next year, and another ASAP.
Apply here: apply.interfolio.com/176538
Okay #EconSky, if you do any kind of spatial analysis, it's a good time to be alive
☞ A new, open-access global spatial database combining 73 harmonized datasets on the world population, its distribution in space, and its characteristics, 2015–2023:
doi.org/10.12688/ver...
Hello #econsky, the Nebraska Labor Summit will be held Friday, March 13, 2026. It's a really fun, junior-centric, research conference in labor and related applied micro fields. Martha Bailey and Alex Mas will give the keynotes. Deadline for submissions is Nov. 1! forms.gle/JC5tN5cT1R2i4ZUJA
Check out the call for papers for a Real Estate Economics Special Issue on Commercial Real Estate with guest editor Xudong An! Special-Issue conference sessions will be held at the AREUEA National Meeting in Washington, D.C., in May 2026. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/page/journal...
in new @findingspress.org paper, PhD candidate shirin qiam
(now at Minneapolis Met Council). uses a deep learning model and post processing pipeline that outlines surface parking lots. Tulsa has a lot, Oakland surprisingly little.
findingspress.org/article/1452...
Call for student poster submissions for the AREUEA-ASSA conference, deadline November 1. www.areuea.org/areuea-assa
Call for submissions for AREUEA doctoral dissertation award. Submission deadline October 31. Recent PhDs who defended between July 2024 and June 2025 are eligible. www.areuea.org/hoyt-institu...
Call for submissions for AREUEA doctoral dissertation award. Submission deadline October 31. Recent PhDs who defended between July 2024 and June 2025 are eligible. www.areuea.org/hoyt-institu...
Call for student poster submissions for the AREUEA-ASSA conference, deadline November 1. www.areuea.org/areuea-assa
Thanks to everyone who came to the @urbaneconomics.bsky.social North American Meetings in Montreal and to all those who worked behind the scenes to make it happen. Our next meeting will be in Barcelona, 8-9 May 2026. Call for papers coming soon.
Very exciting! The seminal 1980 documentary "The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces" by William H. "Holly" Whyte has been RESTORED and screening in NYC this week!
I wanted to honor his work and used his words in the companion book and produced this 11 years ago.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=sU2v...
Excited to see the new Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics (Volume 6), edited jointly with Dave Donaldson come out: www.sciencedirect.com/handbook/han.... Fantastic set of chapters on recent advances and pointing the way to exciting further research @treballen.bsky.social @siepr.bsky.social
Check out our conversation on Densely Speaking with Zach about this research from earlier this year. @gregshill.com
open.spotify.com/episode/6HcN...
Neat paper!
Check out our conversation on Densely Speaking with Zach about this research from earlier this year. @gregshill.com
open.spotify.com/episode/6HcN...
🚨NEW RESULTS (w/ Slattery & Nober)
- When gov't engineers retire, highway projects cost more: the engineers pay for themselves 6 times over
- Improving gov’t engineer quality from the 25th to 75th percentile reduces costs by 14%, equal to 3x avg. engineer pay
Paper: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....
