Is the E-bike Tax Credit Dead?

Every day at The Overhead Wire we sort through over 1,500 news items about cities and share the best ones with our email list. At the end of the week, we take some of the most popular stories and share them with Urban Milwaukee readers. They are national (or international) links, sometimes entertaining and sometimes absurd, but hopefully useful.

APA releases 2022 State of Transportation Planning: The American Planning Association has released a 324 page report on the State of Transportation Planning with an introduction by Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg and pieces on equity, public engagement, and new ideas. It’s a lot to digest but I think there’s probably something in there for everyone. (Various Authors | American Planning Association)

Office buildings on verge of midlife crisis: In the 1980s many cities around the country doubled their office space and nearly 1/3rd of today’s office building supply was produced. That means that many of those buildings are getting closer to reaching their 60 year useful life and will need complete renovations. However the slow down in office leasing might require complete reimagining, especially for older buildings that aren’t as attractive for businesses. (Patrick Sisson | Commercial Observer)

E-bike credits still possible: A lot of active transportation advocates are frustrated that electric cars got huge tax credits in the most recent reconciliation bill and e-bike credits were left on the cutting room floor. But the e-bike tax credit that was left out might come back later this year in another tax package. It would cost $4.1 billion to provide $900 in refundable credits. (Andrew Hawkins | The Verge)

Billionaires gonna NIMBY: An article by Jerusalem Demsas discusses the “do as I say not as I do” attitude towards housing construction that the billionaire class hold by sharing a letter venture capitalist Marc Andreessen and his wife Laura wrote that opposed all new multifamily housing in their city of Atherton California, even after Andreessen wrote in 2020 that silicon valley needed more housing. (Jerusalem Demsas | The Atlantic)

The air conditioner’s role in politics, climate change: The air conditioning helped change the political landscape of the United States by allowing more people to move to hot sunbelt cities and the south and allowing congress to work year round in DC. But as the world warms due to climate change, more people will need air conditioning. But the air conditioning is part of the problem as it allows for spread out land use patterns and increases local heat through greater energy use. (Joseph M. Siry | Washington Post)

Quote of the Week

The take-home thing is that the faster you go, the more all bets are off. There’s a speed limit for a reason, and the faster you go, the more things happen that are all bad.

-UCLA emergency room Dr. Mark Morocco in the LA Times discussing the damage crashes do to human bodies after a high speed crash in LA left 6 people dead.

This week on the podcast, we’re joined by architecture journalist Alexandra Lange to talk about her book, Meet Me by the Fountain: An Inside History of the Mall.

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