Welcome back to our weekly behind-the-scenes glimpse at what’s getting our team talking. Tell us what you’ve been reading at [email protected] and we just might feature it here.
Curbing cars
Back in 2022, RTBC Contributing Editor Peter Yeung reported on Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo’s war on cars. According to a study at the time, the proportion of journeys by car in Paris had dropped about 45 percent since 1990. Now, as Mayor Hidalgo prepares to leave office, the numbers for pedestrians and cyclists are even more impressive — although, as the Economist reports in a story shared by Peter this week, the motorists are not pleased about it.
Peter says:
With over 1,500 km of cycle lanes, Paris now boasts a bigger network than Amsterdam. More daily trips are now made by bike than by car.
A homebuilding moonshot
You probably haven’t heard of Operation Breakthrough, a 1970s effort by the U.S. government to build millions of modular and prefabricated homes. As Bloomberg Citylab reports in a story shared by Executive Editor Will Doig, what may have been the most ambitious federal housing program in the country’s history has been mostly forgotten. Now, an exhibit at the National Public Housing Museum in Chicago is featuring the program and its prototypes — which, Citylab notes, could hold lessons for the future.
Will says:
I love lost-to-history projects, like this audacious attempt in the ’70s to create tons and tons of affordable housing using NASA-style R&D. These kinds of inspirational long-shot efforts feel rarer these days.
