My name is Stephen Smith. I graduated Spring 2010 from Georgetown undergrad, with an entirely unrelated and highly regrettable major that might have made a little more sense if I actually wanted to become an international trade lawyer, but which alas seems good for little else.
Here’s a complete list of my posts.
UPDATE:
Stephen is currently editor at New York Yimby, and still does most of the tweeting for Market Urbanism.
Stephen had previously written on urbanism at Forbes.com. Articles Profile; Reason Magazine, and Next City
You can reach Stephen below:
Market Urbanism
Liberalizing cities | From the bottom up
Why do elevators cost so much more in America? Stephen Smith's new work breaks down the differences and points to vital reforms.
Posted: July 8, 2024, 2:28 pm
I spoke to George Haikalis (trust me, he’s a lot smarter than his HTML looks), a regional planner and former NYCTA official, about the high cost of New York City transit. He had a message to the press and academia: Part of the problem is that we don’t really have a very strong independent technical press, […]
Posted: October 24, 2012, 1:09 am
First order of business: I wrote two articles for Bloomberg View (the opinion counterpart to Bloomberg News) on the high cost of US transit – one on private-sector gouging, and one on public-sector gouging. Secondly, I’ve been talking to former Amtrak president David Gunn a lot recently – at first for the labor piece I just linked […]
Posted: September 1, 2012, 5:33 am
Server glitch wiped the last few articles, so here’s a repose of the Barcelona one. Also, comments should be working now, should you deign to leave one… Somehow I managed to visit Barcelona a few years ago and not learn about the history of the city’s Eixample (x pronounced sh in Catalan), or extension/widening (ensanche […]
Posted: August 9, 2012, 4:58 am
A few things. First of all, the New York Times in 1992 on the postmodern skyline blight that is the Sony Building (then still the AT&T Building): This proposal marks the latest instance in which landlords have tried to recreate ill-conceived or little-used arcades and plazas, which generated lucrative bonuses for builders but not much […]
Posted: July 23, 2012, 9:12 am
The rehabilitation of the postwar glazed white brick apartment building continues apace, with the condoization of 530 Park Ave., a 1941 (okay, almost postwar) 19-story white brick building. I happen to like New York’s postwar white brick buildings, and am even warming up to the red brick variants – I’ve always consider anonymous white brick […]
Posted: July 21, 2012, 8:07 am
If you’ve been following me on Twitter, you’ll know that I spent this afternoon on the phone with folks in California, looking into the recent SNCF-CHSRA bombshell. To summarize: SNCF, the highly experienced French national high-speed rail operator, apparently had a plan for California’s HSR network, but was turned off by the highly politicized routing. […]
Posted: July 11, 2012, 12:20 am
So this weekend we learned that condos are bizarre and pretty much guaranteed to cause problems in the longrun, when maintenance bills skyrocket, the buildings are out of date, and the land beneath them appreciates, but you can’t redevelop the property because all the owners will never agree. You guys posted some great comments, but […]
Posted: July 3, 2012, 3:16 am