TODERIAN UrbanWORKS Inc. (TUW)

Okay #LdnOnt - you declared a climate emergency what are you actually doing?

Again I am dying not to drive. I don’t want to drive. If you make spaces for all it gets people like me off the roads and less traffic for the people that want to drive.

Iconic cartoon showing a single driver in a wide car taking up most of the street space. With many people crammed into the bus, bike and pedestrian space left over. Someone later added a voice box with the driver saying “Damn those bike paths and bus lanes taking all the space!”

This iconic Fabian Todorovic cartoon is still one of the best I’ve seen at illustrating the remarkable amount of space we surrender to cars, leaving little space left for everyone and everything else. The text added later makes the bonus point that many drivers still manage to complain about it.

All too familiar indeed.

Following Brent is so damned enlightening & depressing.

New Zealand local & central politicians I reckon are world champions at wasting public money in the face of all the evidence we know how to save & prevent.

Mayors are super interesting and potentially very impactful. I have a lot of faith in change coming from cities with wise, forward thinking mayors.

Go ahead toward a people-centred urbanism 💫
Thank you to our friend & crack @brenttoderian.bsky.social for this great Starter Pack 👌
Please share ⚡️

Also better absorbing heavy rainfall that could cause floods - among other benefits...

Also worth noting that we know the solutions for these problems, and we have a large amount of extremely strong evidence proving that they are very solvable issues, but we choose to let corporate interests and the super rich keep us from living better lives

Yes!
It must follow this mobility prioritization ⤵️

👟 > 🚲 > 🚌 > 🚚 > 🚗

In Barcelona rn and it is the best designed city I’ve ever been to by a mile

THIS IS IMPRESSIVE!

Paris is getting a whole new Metro network. And it’s huge | CNN The Grand Paris Express will add four lines, 68 stations and 200 kilometers of track to the French capital’s 120-year-old Metro system, providing vital suburban links – just not quite in time for the ...

Perhaps the smartest #ClimateAction investment in cities is in public transit. While others make excuses, Paris is building a WHOLE NEW METRO NETWORK CONNECTING SUBURBS.

“…the Grand Paris Express, a new 200km system with 4 new lines & 68 new stations.”

#ActionStartsHere
@mayors4climate.bsky.social

Click and Clack of Car Talk fame were Car Guys who very much understood that cars were but one piece of the transportation puzzle!

Famous cartoon of a Climate Summit with the presentation of all the benefits of climate action, and someone asking “what if it’s a big hoax and we create a better world for nothing?”

For decades, sustainable & responsible cities haven’t just been possible — they’ve been common sense, logical, ridiculously obvious! And yet we’ve failed to act. A better future through better cities is STILL possible with real leadership at every level. #ActionStartsHere @mayors4climate.bsky.social

Busy Paris street filled with people on bikes in safe protected bike infrastructure. #Paris

Complete, multi-modal street with public transit/transport, trams/streetcars, wide pedestrian sidewalks, and bike lanes.

Skytrain light rail transit in Metro Vancouver

Bus-only BRT lanes in Ontario

Smart cities are transforming transportation, reducing emissions and public costs while adding more choice and improving quality of life. COMMON SENSE!

Smart infrastructure for public transit, walking & biking is a GREAT INVESTMENT. Fund it accordingly. #ActionStartsHere @mayors4climate.bsky.social

Imagine if we directed the same relentless energy toward building better cities that we currently waste on making excuses for why we can't.

Image 1 is of Kevin from Home Alone film walking in front of a work van being driven. Image two is a child in front of a large pick up truck.

Home Alone could've had a very different ending if it was made more recently.

Shot of front cover

Shot of back cover

Despite the best efforts of unhinged conspiracy theorists who badly want us to be scared of having more things to walk to near-by, my friend @carlosmorenofr.bsky.social’s very important book “The 15-Minute City,” and the simple concept of proximity, are thankfully here to stay. #UrbanismBookClub 5/

The question, as I always understood it, was intended rhetorically...our comfortable assumption was that we would have done *something*. Well, as you say. Here we are.

Too many cities have loudly declared that they don’t know what the word “emergency” means. #ClimateEmergency

Young families typically leave cities for the suburbs. Here’s how to keep them downtown. Urbanist Brent Toderian explains how Vancouver held onto its families.

Way back in 2018 I did a walking tour of Vancouver with @brenttoderian.bsky.social and he explained how that city overcame this problem. You need family-sized units & also, crucially, *good urban schools*.

Cities made a bet on millennials — but forgot one key thing Can cities learn to love kids again?

“When families leave, cities lose far more than tax revenue; they lose their highest earners, biggest spenders, and the next generation of workers. Because Gen Z is a smaller generation… they aren’t going to fill the gap left by millennial families.”

Montreal has an aggressive public transit plan & the province, a huge generator of hydro electric, has an EV adoption rate twice the Canadian average.

I predict a revival of the city state. Great cities are eternal.

Mark Twain said "Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example," and to that point I think the boots-on-the-ground legislative delegation trip to Germany last year was a crucial component in getting NITA's #RevenuesAndReform across the finish line eleven-ish months later.

Paris street transformed from a space for cars to a green place for people

Large Paris public place trading car space for urban nature

Cities like Paris are showing that urban greening thru street & place transformation is just COMMON SENSE, for cooling cities that are getting hotter due to the #ClimateCrisis, and for reducing emissions, cleaning the air, and improving quality-of-life!

#ActionStartsHere @mayors4climate.bsky.social

Canadian Cities Guru Teams Up with Paris Mayor for Groundbreaking New Exhibition Canadian urbanist Brent Toderian teamed up with Paris and, in particular, Mayor Anne Hidalgo on a new exhibition, From Paris to Belém.

“Sometimes I think we do ourselves a disservice by calling such options ‘bold,’ when frankly they’re often just really pragmatic common sense given the real challenges that cities face. The truth is, we tend to think of them as ‘bold’ because not enough cities are doing them, even tho they should.”

What's crazy is not that long ago you would have considered Montreal a city in decline

Picture of book cover

Tonight’s #UrbanismBookClub book tackles better city-making from the communications, branding, & public relations spheres. “Dark PR: How Corporate Disinformation Undermines Our Health & Environment” by my friend @grantennis.bsky.social is a HUGELY important book today. Every urbanist should read it.