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Brent Finnegan

@brentfinnegan.bsky.social
154 followers 127 following 157 posts

Posts about the intersection of transportation, climate, housing, and land use. From Harrisonburg, Virginia ("The Friendly City") currently living in Utrecht, NL. brentfinnegan.substack.com

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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
"Replace workers with foreign workers and boys should play in girls sports." - Karl Marx
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Oh The Urbanity! @ohtheurbanity.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Limiting housing construction in walkable central neighbourhoods means pushing more people out to live in car-oriented suburbs.
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David Zipper @davidzipper.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Translation: Georgians who use a car little or not at all will subsidize heavy drivers even more than they already are.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
I love doing quick grocery runs with my e-bike & vintage Shenandoah's Pride milk crate combo.
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Fietser @americanfietser.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
This is a remarkably lazy argument. Subsidizing cheap gas just guarantees continued car dependency. The true financial anchor dragging down the working class is living in a society where expensive private vehicle ownership is a mandatory tax just to exist.
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Fietser @americanfietser.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
When there's a housing crisis that has gone on for decades, but the tech oligarchs control your entire government with their influence.
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Paris Marx @parismarx.com · 25/09/2026
An individual in Canada used ChatGPT for eight months to plan one of the country’s worst mass shootings. Yet, if you listen to politicians and media, the real threat of AI is a fantastical scenario where it might wipe out humans in ten years. They need to stop getting fooled by tech deceivers.
disconnect.blog
The media has the AI threat all wrong
Generative AI is harming people today. We don’t need to waste time fantasizing about science fictional scenarios.
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Yonah Freemark @yonahfreemark.com · 24/09/2026
Americans may not be able to afford to buy a home, but at least they also can’t afford gas or groceries
nytimes.com
Mortgage Rates Hit 7% as Iran War Fallout Crushes a Weak Housing Market (Gift Article)
The average rate on a 30-year mortgage in the United States jumped to 7.03 percent, putting pressure on housing affordability.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
People will read a headline like this and jump immediately to wanting to ban the wrong vehicle.
Local news headline: E-bike rider hurt after being hit by a car near Springville Tuesday night Seymour Skinner: It's the e-bikes that are the problem.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Plenty of e-bikes (new and used) going for about $1,700.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
But will it get more media attention and online comments than a story about the Broad Street Bullies?
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
I don't think I could just let that slide. "Hold on, stop the call. WTF was that?"
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Fietser @americanfietser.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
We took traffic laws explicitly designed to manage the deadly physics of multi-ton motor vehicles and applied them directly to bicycles. When your only regulatory tool is a hammer, every vehicle looks like a nail. In cities, bicycles simply shouldn't be governed like cars. It's lazy policy.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
It's easy to see how pathetic this is. What is worse IMO is how common it has become for non-billionaire regular people who also outsource their creative thinking to LLMs.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
After living in Utrecht for a year without a car, I would describe my high-cortisol experiences commuting by bike in the US as abusive. It's the difference between living peacefully in a house, vs. when the loud, angry drunk comes home. It's unnecessary and unacceptable.
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Brent Toderian @brenttoderian.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
“Dutch people cycle an average of 2.6km each per day. If this pattern was replicated worldwide, annual carbon emissions would drop by 686 million tonnes. This mammoth figure exceeds the entire carbon footprint of most countries, including the UK, Canada, Saudi Arabia and Australia.” @euronews.com
euronews.com
Cycling like the Dutch would slash the world’s carbon footprint
If everybody cycled like the Dutch, we could offset the UK or Australia’s entire carbon footprint.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Only 4% of adults who ride bikes in the Netherlands wear a helmet. Helmets protect the skulls of riders who fall off their bikes. A styrofoam hat is no match for a 4,000 pound metal vehicle moving at 45+ MPH. The difference between the US and NL is whose safety and convenience is prioritized.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
The last time Harrisonburg, Virginia had passenger rail service was in 1948. Blue Ridge Rail is forming a new coalition seeking to bring it back in the 21st century. brentfinnegan.substack.com/p/what-would...
brentfinnegan.substack.com
What would it take to bring passenger rail service back to Harrisonburg?
Blue Ridge Rail is seeking 500 local residents to submit public comments in favor of including Harrisonburg on the DRPT Statewide Rail Plan by September 21.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
Riding an e-bike is cheating, but driving a car instead is fine.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
Practically every local news headline about an "e-bike crash" fails to contextualize whether the person on the bike crashed into something or someone, or were hit by a car. The majority are the latter. Cars kill people. www.yahoo.com/news/us/arti...
yahoo.com
Cars And Trucks Still Kill E-Bike Riders The Most, Says The Actual Data
Nearly 55% of e-bike-related deaths were caused by crashes involving cars and trucks. By contrast, only 6% involved pedestrians.
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Yonah Freemark @yonahfreemark.com · 25/08/2026
Turns out when you add bus lanes you can massively improve transit quality and speed! [Live footage from Seattle! For reference: seattletransitblog.com/2025/07/12/r...
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
Drivers can ignore speed limit laws but they can't ignore the laws of physics.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
This is so common that it hasn't even been a month since the last #CarIntoBuilding in Harrisonburg. www.whsv.com/2026/08/24/c...
whsv.com
Car crashes into Harrisonburg home, causing nearby evacuations
South High Street in Harrisonburg is shut down between Grace Street and Maryland Avenue on Monday afternoon after a car crashed into a home, according to city officials.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
VDOT is spending $336+ million to add one lane in each direction for six miles of I-81 through #Harrisonburg. A jackknifed truck that blocks 2 lanes will also block 3 lanes. "One more lane" is DOT's answer for every traffic issue, but it doesn't fix the problem of monomodal transportation systems.
Tractor trailer flipped on its side, blocking lanes on I-81 in Rockingham County. July 29, 2026.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
E-bikes don't only reduce carbon emissions, they save money.
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Fietser @americanfietser.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
A leading killer of children in the US is cars and particularly SUVs.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Another bollard appreciation post from my walk in Utrecht this morning. This is a concrete jumboblok protecting a red and white traffic bollard in front of a no car traffic sign (bikes and scooters are allowed). Bollards are beautiful.
Photo of a large stone bollard in front of a red & white striped bollard on a curved curb in a residential neighborhood in Utrecht, the Netherlands
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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 23/08/2026
"Low-emission zones," where car traffic is restricted, save lives -- especially the lives of children. The empirical evidence is unambiguous. But every attempt to create a new one is met by hysterical opposition filled with lies, because our societies are collectively poisoned by car-brain.
theguardian.com
London’s low emission zone is working – so why are cities around the world so cautious about clean air?
Similar initiatives have been launched from Barcelona to Bogotá, but they have misinformation, political pressure and vested interests stacked against them
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Cycling purists who call e-bikes "cheating" are ignorant at best.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Traffic safety in the US is an international embarrassment.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
The experience of living in a city that does what other citie councils say is impossible is both a privilege and an inspiration. #utrecht
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Fietser @americanfietser.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
If city leaders were serious about protecting people's lives, they would install solid infrastructure that puts the burden of consequence on the car and its driver, rather than the people and property outside of it.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 16/08/2026
Flex posts save car paint. Bollards save human lives. That's the difference.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
The US is so full of suburban strip malls, urbanist reform can feel hopeless at times. Mixed-use adaptations like this show that there is a pathway for beginning to transform car-centric American cities into more livable places. It's a step in the right direction.
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Cathy Tuttle @cathytuttle.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Climate Reality Melting asphalt, twisting tracks, cracking concrete. The planet's roads & rails were engineered for a climate that no longer exists. Dear governments, factor that into your externalities as we continue to grab for & blow through fossil fuels. EVs won't save us. But bicycles might.
nytimes.com
As Europe Gets Hotter, Its Transportation Systems Struggle to Cope (Gift Article)
The continent’s railways and roads “were engineered for a climate that no longer exists,” one expert said.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Hopeful message from @coachbalto.bsky.social: We don't need a perfect plan, we need people doing what they can where they are to build communities that work for children.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
#eBikeSummer is real. And not only in cities that offer e-bike rebates. This is the nationwide search trend over the past 5 years.
Google Trend graph of 5 years of search trends in the US for electric bikes and ebikes shows a significant surge in the spring and summer of 2026.
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The War on Cars @thewaroncars.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
"The law also unfairly affects people with medical issues who buy low-speed e-bikes with a throttle instead of a pedal-assist for use as transportation, Connor said. 'There are disabled people losing jobs or who can’t get to school because of this dumb bill,' she said."
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
"Urban planners in American cities discovered that the most efficient way to accommodate cars was to demolish all the things that weren't cars."
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John Lloyd @boyonabike62.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
No bike lane ever “forced” any driver to stop driving, but lack of bike lanes has often forced cyclists to stop biking (or prevented them from starting).
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
The only thing NIMBYs and urbanists can agree on is that cars occupy too much space. The motonormative solution is to preserve "free" parking at the expense of housing. The urbanist approach internalizes the externalities of cars by right-pricing curbed parking, freeing up more space for housing.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
For every victim-blaming comment from car drivers who hate bikes (of any kind) on the road, and for every self-righteous cyclist who calls e-bikes "cheating," there are people having eye-opening experiences like this. E-bikes have the potential to transform our towns & cities for the better.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
Local news has been reporting on how deadly cars are for more than 100 years. Let's keep blaming individual drivers instead of the car manufacturers and road designs and hoping for different results. One more "drive safe" campaign oughta do the trick!
Headlines from the November 30, 1931 edition of the Daily News-Record in Harrisonburg, Virginia displays three separate headlines about local residents killed by automobiles.
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Gravel Influencer @gravelinfluencer.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
"E-bikes are out of control!" a big account on here says. No, you're talking about kids on e-motos, not someone on a pedal assist e-bike that maxes out at 20 mph.
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David Zipper @davidzipper.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
E-bikes don't go 46 MPH. Ads like this should be illegal. usa.streetsblog.org/2026/08/05/s...
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Miser @misernyc.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
The recent hysteria over bike and ebike regulation is infuriating, dumb, and counter-productive.
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Brent Finnegan @brentfinnegan.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
Imagine if the response to a child drowning was to make swimming illegal, rather than collectively insuring that kids have safe places to swim.
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Tony Jordan @tonyjordan.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
Absolutely horrifying, but is it really scarier than when you can’t find a free parking space right by your destination? Who can say, really?
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