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Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
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Brandon DonnellyWhere the rich don't drive -- is density the new luxury?
This data is from 2019, but I imagine that things would look pretty similar today and that it might even be a little more pronounced. The dataset from the above article looked at how many people have cars in a given area (a darker dot = fewer cars) and then plotted this against population density and income per capita.
Here's what that looks like for the regions of New York, Boston, Los Angeles, and Houston (data from 2013 to 2017):
What is fascinating about these charts is that they show two different correlations. In dense and transit-rich cities such as New York and Boston, car usage is most closely linked with population density and not with income. The dark dots form a horizontal line near the top.
However, in the case of Los Angeles and Houston, car usage is instead most closely linked with income and not with population density. The dark dots form a vertical line near the left -- the lowest income per capita.
So what does this tell us?
It tells us that if you design a city to broadly require a car, then you are likely to sort people based on those that can afford a lot of car and those that cannot. On the other hand, if you design a city around transit, then you are likely to instead create a place where both the rich and poor get around in similar ways.
There is also evidence that the latter is being increasingly viewed as more desirable. 2017 was the first year in the US where high-income young people (ages 26 to 33) drove less than low-income young people. Presumably these high-income people had choices, and so I tend to view this as a preference.
As a whole, this is surely a good thing for our cities. But now I think we need to be careful not to allow density and walkability to become the new luxury that only the rich can afford.
This data is from 2019, but I imagine that things would look pretty similar today and that it might even be a little more pronounced. The dataset from the above article looked at how many people have cars in a given area (a darker dot = fewer cars) and then plotted this against population density and income per capita.
Here's what that looks like for the regions of New York, Boston, Los Angeles, and Houston (data from 2013 to 2017):
What is fascinating about these charts is that they show two different correlations. In dense and transit-rich cities such as New York and Boston, car usage is most closely linked with population density and not with income. The dark dots form a horizontal line near the top.
However, in the case of Los Angeles and Houston, car usage is instead most closely linked with income and not with population density. The dark dots form a vertical line near the left -- the lowest income per capita.
So what does this tell us?
It tells us that if you design a city to broadly require a car, then you are likely to sort people based on those that can afford a lot of car and those that cannot. On the other hand, if you design a city around transit, then you are likely to instead create a place where both the rich and poor get around in similar ways.
There is also evidence that the latter is being increasingly viewed as more desirable. 2017 was the first year in the US where high-income young people (ages 26 to 33) drove less than low-income young people. Presumably these high-income people had choices, and so I tend to view this as a preference.
As a whole, this is surely a good thing for our cities. But now I think we need to be careful not to allow density and walkability to become the new luxury that only the rich can afford.
Subscribe to Brandon Donnelly
>4.2K subscribers
Support Brandon Donnelly
Brandon DonnellyWhere the rich don't drive -- is density the new luxury?
Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
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