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Simon Maarfield

@simonmaarfield.bsky.social
121 followers 47 following 254 posts

Eisenbahner, transport planner, rail fan, environmentalist

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Reposted by Simon Maarfield
Robert Reich @rbreich.bsky.social · 22h
CEO-to-worker pay ratio in 1965: 20-1 CEO-to-worker pay ratio in 1990: 75-1 CEO-to-worker pay ratio today: 325-to-1 Trickle-down economics was always a sham. Nothing has ever trickled down.
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Peter Neumann @peterneumann.bsky.social · 11h
Statt vier Monate jetzt bis Dezember 2027: Die Strecke über #Rathenow und #Stendal ist unterbrochen. Pendler brauchen teils doppelt so lange. Eltern schaffen die Kita nicht mehr, Kliniken bangen um Personal. Ein Besuch im #Havelland. www.berliner-zeitung.de/article/was-...
berliner-zeitung.de
Was 14 Monate Bahnsperrung für Berlin-Pendler bedeuten: „So kann man eine Region kaputtmachen“
Statt vier Monate jetzt bis Dezember 2027: Die Strecke über Rathenow und Stendal ist unterbrochen. Pendler brauchen teils doppelt so lange. Eltern schaffen die Kita nicht mehr, Kliniken bangen um Pers...
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Simon Maarfield @simonmaarfield.bsky.social · 9h
Nail hit firmly on head as you would expect. Thank you, @georgemonbiot.bsky.social
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Grant Ennis @grantennis.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
“Great Britain can internalize the negative externalities of driving by expanding congestion charging, increasing the cost of parking to match its true societal cost, and by going down @gregshill.com ‘s checklist to eliminate the many laws that force society to subsidise driving.”
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Railway Gazette International @railwaygazette.com · 02/10/2026
Leo Mobility Management orders ‘configurable’ coaches from Magyar Vagon www.railwaygazette.com/coach/2026/1…
railwaygazette.com
Leo Mobility Management orders ‘configurable’ coaches from Magyar Vagon
INNOTRANS: Leasing company Leo Mobility Management has selected Hungarian rolling stock manufacturer Magyar Vagon Vasúti Kft to supply 200 Neo modular passenger coaches that can be configured to meet operator requirements. Leo Mobility Management has been established by Leoš Novotný, founder of Leo Express, backed by Czech investment company Creditas Group. It aims to provide…
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Prof. Ian Walker @ianwalker.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Autonomous vehicles offer to entrench, for another generation, the idea that the any other use of urban streets must come second to the rapid movement of metal boxes
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Vor-Ort-Anleiter 🇺🇦📯 @vorortanleiter.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Neu ab 1.11.: 2 tägliche Zugpaare Baku🇦🇿 - Tbilisi 🇬🇪, künftig gibt es nebem dem Nachtzug auch ein Zugpaar tagsüber. Leider mWn nach wie vor nicht von Leuten mit 🇪🇺-Pass benutzbar.
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The Man in Seat 61 @seatsixtyone.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Oh dear. Time to stick with €2 for any choice of seat at Trenitalia?
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Jon Worth @jonworth.eu · 01/10/2026
Ah Sachsen 🇩🇪 - that’s been unable to electrify Dresden - Görlitz - Zgorzelec 🇵🇱 for >20 years is starting an EU funded Interreg project about international #CrossBorderRail public transport www.medienservice.sachsen.de/medien… I suppose they know what to NOT do!
medienservice.sachsen.de
Grenzüberschreitende Infrastruktur besser gemeinsam umsetzen
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Brent Toderian @brenttoderian.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
READ: If you haven’t seen this yet, please take a look. Motonormativity ("car brain") is a bias that stops people from making rational judgements about driving. This study co-authored by @ianwalker.bsky.social looks at where this bias comes from & how it works. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Screetshot of study title “Why Do Cars Get A Free Ride?” #CarBrain #Motonormativity
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George Monbiot @georgemonbiot.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
You can see the genocide from space. Yet still it is widely denied.
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NationCymru @nation.cymru · 01/10/2026
Senedd Members have rejected a Reform motion calling for the Welsh Government to scrap default 20mph speed limits
nation.cymru
Senedd Members reject Reform bid to scrap 20mph speed limits
Ella Groves – ICNN Senedd Reporter Senedd Members have rejected a Reform motion calling for the Welsh Government to scrap default 20mph speed limits. The proposal was defeated by 51 votes to 37 follow...
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European Rail Timetable @europeanrailtt.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
OUIGO is adding a 4th Brussels–Paris round trip from December 13, running Fri–Sun. The slower, cheaper trains may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but there’s clearly a market for them — and GoVolta is about to join in too. shorturl.at/H6OdS
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Jo Kibble (Political Animal) @politicanimal.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Andrew Gilligan: rabid on Muslims, terrible on buses, annoyingly and generally consistently good on active travel. (‘Best person I ever worked with at City Hall on this stuff’, according to the pro-cycling Labour council leader I used to work for)
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Oliver Moore @oliver-moore.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
All those Toronto drivers who shouted about bike lanes' [non-existent] effect on emergency vehicles will no doubt throw their support behind congestion pricing. Right?
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The Man in Seat 61 @seatsixtyone.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
No wonder the infamous Renfe.com needs the upgrade! “The current system is based on almost 400 interconnected applications, many of them programmed in obsolete languages and having been in service for between 20 and 30 years”
renfe.com
Renfe | Train tickets AVE, Avlo Low Cost (with No Booking Fees)
Buy cheap train tickets AVE, Avlo high speed Low Cost ✓ Timetables, Fares and Discounts ✅ No Booking Fees! ▷ ( Renfe.com )
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Doug Gordon @brooklynspoke.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Very very good. This is life after cars.
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Brent Toderian @brenttoderian.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
A #WarOnWalking. A war on biking. A war on public transit. A war on any transportation choice other than driving. A war on better cities. But a war on cars? Hardly. Cars still get most of the space, rights, budget, prioritization, etc. And any effort to add more choice is immediately attacked.
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Meredith Glaser @cyclingprofessor.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
BREAKING 📣 For several days, a peaceful protest took place in the morning, after a young child was killed by a car driver. The child was riding his bike to school, the father with him. The grieving community came together with hundreds of people, cyclist or not, creating a 3km long human bike lane.
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Paul Bernal @paulbernal.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Personally, I’d rather have healthy kids than mollycoddled millionaires
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Sam @samd.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
gotta say there’s something almost poetic about Trump incentivizing less fuel efficient vehicles as the Iran war keeps pushing up the price of gas
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Michelle @michelle-colleen.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Impressive turnout at #criticalmass #bikeTO to show our opposition to Doug Ford's plan to rip out bike lanes & endanger our lives. Bike lanes save lives! Doug Ford is a corrupt animal. Shame on him! #cycling #visionzero #toronto #ONpoli #TOpoli
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Peter Neumann @peterneumann.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
„Die geplanten Ersatzverkehre für die Zeit von Oktober 2026 bis Dezember 2027 sind völlig inakzeptabel.“ #Bahn #Berlin #Hannover #DB www.berliner-zeitung.de/article/sper...
berliner-zeitung.de
Sperrung Berlin–Hannover: Pro Bahn warnt vor „katastrophalen Verhältnissen“
Ab 2. Oktober wird die Strecke nach Stendal und Wolfsburg mehr als 14 Monate gesperrt. Manche Berufstätige sind dann sechs Stunden pro Tag unterwegs.
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Jon Worth @jonworth.eu · 25/09/2026
FINALLY we have the right version of the Kemijärvi 🇫🇮 - Lagos 🇵🇹 #LongestTrainEU film up on Youtube! 😀 Watch me battle my way past cancellations, delays, and have good luck at Badajoz 🇪🇸 The record is: 125 hours, 31 mins Who wants to have a go at doing it faster? 🤔 www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAJd...
youtube.com
125 Hours - Longest Train Journey in the EU: From the Arctic to the Atlantic
YouTube video by Simply Railway
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Dr Charlie Gardner @charliejgardner.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
This year has been brutal, and like most people you probably want to do more about climate change. But what, and how? Great news – I’ve written just the book for you! It’s called What One Person Can Do and it’s a clear and simple how-to guide, a roadmap to help you make influential changes...
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Railway Gazette International @railwaygazette.com · 24/09/2026
DB says it welcomes competition but prefers collaboration on international routes www.railwaygazette.com/high-speed/2…
railwaygazette.com
DB says it welcomes competition but prefers collaboration on international routes
EUROPE: ‘To state clearly: we generally welcome competition under fair and transparent conditions’, Dr Michael Peterson, Deutsche Bahn board member for Long-Distance Passenger Transport said at InnoTrans 2026.  ‘When that is the case, the offering for rail passengers can indeed be improved.’  But in DB’s view, ‘an efficient cross-border long-distance traffic is currently best delivered…
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European Rail Timetable @europeanrailtt.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
🚄 Frecciarossa to München! DB and Trenitalia have confirmed further details of planned direct Frecciarossa services from München to Milano and Roma from summer 2027, with two train pairs and journey times of around 6½ and 8½ hours. shorturl.at/0lwTY
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Simon Maarfield @simonmaarfield.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
"The collapse of natural systems around the world would lead to conflict, migration and food shortages" - who'd have thought it, eh?
theguardian.com
UK shares findings of damning climate crisis national security report suppressed under Starmer
El Niño poses critical threat to nations’ defences, says Ed Miliband in presentation to global foreign ministers
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Leo Hickman @leohickman.carbonbrief.org · 23/09/2026
'Miliband will appoint a new special representative for climate security, as well as a new ministerial taskforce on “the national security and resilience risks of a changing climate and nature loss”, with military and security experts as well as climate scientists.'
theguardian.com
UK shares findings of damning climate crisis national security report suppressed under Starmer
El Niño poses critical threat to nations’ defences, says Ed Miliband in presentation to global foreign ministers
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Hackney Cyclist @hackneycyclist.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Eerste van der Helststraat, Amsterdam, in 1982 and today. A street once dominated by parked cars to a car free place for people, with children playing, greenery and cafés making use of reclaimed outdoor space. This is what’s possible when we choose to redesign our streets for life, not storage.
Split-screen comparison of Eerste van der Helststraat in Amsterdam in 1982 and today. The historical black-and-white photo shows the street with parked cars on both sides of the street, a cyclist and pedestrians. The modern colour photo shows the same street transformed into a car-free public space, with trees, plants, outdoor seating, pedestrians and children playing hopscotch.
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George Monbiot @georgemonbiot.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
A macho culture of performative selfishness might start on the roads, through racing, rolling coal, ever bigger SUVs ... But it doesn't end there. If we want to live in a decent country which values human life, we need to change this culture. My column. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
Driving that’s too fast, too dangerous and utterly lawless: why do we tolerate this petro-masculinity? | George Monbiot
In towns and in the countryside, I see 4x4s and pick up trucks driven without care or consicence. It’s a Magafication of transport, says Guardian columnist George Monbiot
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Simon Maarfield @simonmaarfield.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Scarcely reported by the main broadcasters in the UK and Germany 🤔🥺
theguardian.com
‘Jaw-dropping’ El Niño bursts through temperature record months before peak
‘Godzilla-level’ phenomenon is supercharging the climate crisis and will have a huge impact on communities across the world
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Simon Maarfield @simonmaarfield.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
This looks fantastic. Assuming the road space for it was reallocated from car to bus, I wonder if there was resistance to its construction? If so, from whom?
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The War on Cars @thewaroncars.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
"The councillor said it came as national studies showed the amount of hedgehogs had declined by between 30 and 75 per cent across the UK in the last two decades."
yorkpress.co.uk
Hedgehog signs put up in York village in spite of 'bewildering' opposition
A councillor has defied opposition to the installation of signs warning drivers about hedgehogs on a York village's roads by putting them up…
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Madeleine Bonsma-Fisher, PhD @mbonsma.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
In a massive dataset of over 10,000 cities around the world, the strongest association with distance travelled by cycling was not climate, topography, or even infrastructure - it was *gasoline prices* doi.org/10.1073/pnas...
Figure 3 from "Global health and climate benefits from walking and cycling infrastructure" by Adam Millard-Balla, Monisha Reginalda, Yasmina Yusufa, and Christopher Bian. The figure shows factors associated with distance travelled by cycling and walking, arranged in order of effect size. For cycling, the largest effects are gasoline prices, GDP per capita, rail service, steep terrain (negative effect), minimum temperature (negative effect), population density, and bicycle lanes. For walking, the largest effects are population density, gasoline prices, bicycle lanes, and maximum temp (negative effect).

Fig. 3 Caption: Factors influencing active travel. Each coefficient represents the impact of a one-SD change in each variable on the share of kilometers traveled by cycling (A) and walking (B). For each city-level variable such as density, the model estimates a separate coefficient for each country. The shaded area shows the distribution of country-level coefficients; for density, for example, the effect on walking ranges from about zero to ~0.11, excluding one outlier. For country-level variables such as gasoline prices, there is only a single coefficient. Variables are ordered by the size of their absolute effect in the median country—density and gasoline prices have the greatest impact on walking and gasoline prices and income (GDP per capita) on cycling. The minimum temperature variable shows the marginal effect of both the linear and squared terms.One might expect climate to have a major impact on active travel, and many studies highlight the impact of weather on daily and seasonal travel decisions (9, 25). However, in our model, there is a negligible association between precipitation and the mode shares of walking and cycling. Hotter temperatures decrease walking but have no effect on travel by bicycle. Colder temperatures only reduce walking and cycling in colder climates (SI Appendix for further Discussion). At the national level, gasoline price has the largest association with the share of travel by active modes. A one-SD increase in the price per liter (equivalent to US $0.40) is associated with a ~1.0 percentage point increase in walking and a ~0.5 percentage point increase in cycling—notable given that the mode share of cycling across the entire dataset is just ~0.9%. These findings echo a large volume of research that shows how vehicle travel declines in line with rising fuel prices (26). Gasoline prices also have an indirect effect in promoting denser, mixed-use development (27).
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The War on Cars @thewaroncars.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
The driver’s behavior before and after the crash is sociopathic. But also, no car operated on public roads should be able to go 100 mph, much less 142 mph.
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vlado @mejs.eurosky.social · 20/09/2026
If Serbia actually wanted to do something for the people of Zvornik, they would lay a few hundred extra meters of track and rebuild a station approximately where the old "Zvornik Grad" station used to be. BiH residents of Zvornik could then access it by foot via the King Alexander Bridge
stations marked up on a map
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Simon Maarfield @simonmaarfield.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Does anyone know when the track works on the R3 Latour de Carol / Puigcerdà - Vic - Barcelona #Rodalies rail line will finish? I see these are currently an excuse to reduce service at upper end of the line to a measly 2.5 train pairs per day. #CrossBorderRail @seatsixtyone.bsky.social @jonworth.eu
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tweety fish oh wow like a chimera or something spoooky @sifu.tweety.fish · 19/09/2026
eliminate EV subsidies, ban cheap overseas EVs, ban EV component import, deport people bringing battery technology to the US, pay billions to kill clean energy projects, end fuel economy standards, and then do THIS is such an elaborate prank on the American people you almost have to respect it
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Urban Truth Collective @urbantruth.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
The WAR ON WALKING has taken many forms around the world. It’s often as simple as how we signal who space is and isn’t for. Once our eyes are opened to all the ways we’ve prioritized cars over people, we can’t unsee it. Frustrating photo contributed by @stadsplanering.bsky.social. #WarOnWalking
Background photo from North Macedonia, where “sidewalks are mostly used to park cars” as explained by photo contributor Carl-Henrik Barnekow. Text says “Don’t buy the lie that there’s a war on cars. They’ve been waging a war on walking for a century.” Via the Urban Truth Collective. #WarOnCars #UrbanTruth
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Peter Neumann @peterneumann.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Zur Wahl in #Berlin meine Abrechnung mit der Verkehrspolitik - und den Berlinern. „Keine neue Tramstrecke, kaum neue Radwege, keine neuen Straßen – seit 2023 ist fast nichts passiert. Schuld daran ist aber nicht nur der Senat.“ Link im Kommentar.
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Campaign for Better Transport @bettertransport.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
The climate emergency needs better transport. We are campaigning for low-carbon public transport, shared transport, walking, wheeling and cycling to be boosted and improved. Find out how you can help by making a donation to our work. Thank you. mailchi.mp/bettertransp...
mailchi.mp
The climate emergency needs better transport - can you help?
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Peter Neumann @peterneumann.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
„Weniger, langsamer, unpünktlicher: Das ist die Bilanz der #CDU in Sachen Busverkehr“, so die verkehrspolitische Sprecherin der Grünen. Allerdings gab es auch schon Negativtrends, als noch die Grünen die Verkehrssenatorinnen stellten. #BVG #Berlin www.berliner-zeitung.de/article/mit-...
berliner-zeitung.de
Mit Tempo 12,7 durch Berlin: Das ist die langsamste Buslinie der BVG
Auf 21 BVG-Linien schafften die Busse im Schnitt nicht mal 15 Kilometer pro Stunde. Neue Senatszahlen zeigen: Der Busverkehr wird seit Jahren langsamer.
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Prof. Ian Walker @ianwalker.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Good article by @georgemonbiot.bsky.social on widespread acceptance - including by the police - of antisocial driving. Lovely to see a link to our recent motonormativity paper in here too www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
Driving that’s too fast, too dangerous and utterly lawless: why do we tolerate this petro-masculinity? | George Monbiot
In towns and in the countryside, I see 4x4s and pick up trucks driven without care or consicence. It’s a Magafication of transport, says Guardian columnist George Monbiot
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Paul Boldrin @paulboldrin.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
On the subject of pathetically lenient punishments I did a thread the other day on pedestrians who've been killed in the last couple of weeks and came across this almost unbelievable sentence for killing someone in a hit and run while drunk and uninsured:
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George Monbiot @georgemonbiot.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
For years I've been told that aviation emissions are negligible, so don't worry your little head about them. But I've kept pointing out that there are - and will be - no good technical solutions, and they'll keep growing. Now we know just how big the problem is. www.carbonbrief.org/ccc-heathrow...
carbonbrief.org
CCC: Heathrow expansion could push flights to ‘80% of UK emissions by 2050’ - Carbon Brief
Aviation is on track to be responsible for 80% of the UK’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by 2050, according to the Climate Change Committee (CCC).
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Kevin Anderson @kevinclimate.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
The CCC @thecccuk.bsky.social offers Heathrow a thumbs up, conditional on the massive deployment of “snake oil” technologies (SAF & GGR). Report by Tyndall researchers, building on UK Govt commitments, science & maths, reaches a very different conclusion. See: climateuncensored.com/heathrow-exp...
climateuncensored.com
Heathrow Expansion: The Physics Does Not Negotiate - Climate Uncensored
Below is the foreword I wrote for my Tyndall colleagues’ detailed and rigorous report examining whether further expansion of Heathrow can be reconciled with
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David Zipper @davidzipper.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Yet again, traffic engineers are gobsmacked that a road closure didn't create crippling gridlock: "You’d never know that a massive highway project, ominously dubbed 'carmageddon,' was underway seven miles away...cars [were] speeding across the Interstate Bridge at their usual clip."
opb.org
Vancouver traffic largely unaffected by start of I-5 Rose Quarter project
Washington transportation officials warn commute time could increase in the coming days.
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Peter Neumann @peterneumann.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
„Ich sehe keine Partei, die mit Visionen, Energie und Emphase auftritt. Ich sehe eher einen duckmäuserischen Weichspülgang. Selbst bei Parteien mit kräftiger Farbe… sehe ich nichts Visionäres für diese Stadt.“ @bundberlin.bsky.social @ccitiesorg.bsky.social www.berliner-zeitung.de/article/berl...
berliner-zeitung.de
„Berlin leidet unter Anti-Verkehrspolitik“: Die Abrechnung vor der Wahl
Tram-Aus in Friedrichshain, Luftschlösser wie die U7 zum BER, neue BVG-Ticketpläne: Fahrgastlobbyist Linow sieht vor der Wahl in Berlin bei keiner Partei eine Vision.
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Andrew Simms @andrewsimms.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
It’s not normal in a health & climate crisis to actively promote highly polluting products that make things worse. Congrats to Bristol - the latest city to end ads for things like fossil fuels, flights and SUVs. @badvertising.bsky.social @adfreecities.bsky.social www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
bbc.co.uk
Bristol becomes first city to ban fast fashion adverts
New rules prohibits the promotion of flights, cars and travel agents on council-owned billboards.
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