PHILADELPHIA NAMED BEST CITY FOR NEW GRADS

How about Philly besting Boston, New York, Chicago, Atlanta, and every other city in America for the honor, "Best City for New Grads." This is according to Apartments.com and CareerBuilder.com, which looked at how many other young'uns there were there, what jobs were out there, and how much it cost to live there. Hey, different strokes for different folks, but it's good to know more youngsters are catching on to what Philly has to offer: great cultural and recreational amenities, no need for car ownership, easy jaunts to nearby big cities, and lots of jobs in attractive fields like pharmaceuticals, financial services, and design. Add tons of history, a great sports vibe, and a surprising number of bars and clubs, and you've got yourself a new grad magnet. Kudos to the City of Brotherly Love!

HOW TO BUILD HOUSES THAT WILL SELL FOR LESS THAN WHAT THEY COST TO BUILD

A nice editorial in today's Inky on our affordable housing need: "Affordable Homes: Welcome Ideas for Housing Fund. It's a topic of personal and professional interest for me, and I am hopeful that policymakers, builders, and affordable housing advocates can come together towards solutions where everyone wins.

As my real estate guru colleague reminds me, the solution to affordable housing in Philadelphia isn't going to come from allowing developers to build more market units if they commit to building affordable units; steep labor costs, high taxes, and onerous regulations make it hard to clear a margin on any development, no matter how many bonus units you're given. Rather, the path to "go" will have to come from things like tax credits/abatements, expedited permitting, and financial/bureaucratic assistance with land assemblage.

Hey, those just happen to be things we should be doing more of in general, affordable housing requirement or no. And why not throw in some additional policy objectives, like making life more affordable for working families via transit-proximate housing (lower transportation costs) and green materials/fixtures (lower utilities costs). Clearly, there's lots to discuss here; let's hope everyone around the table can agree on a way forward that really works for everyone.

CAR FAST

It appears that neither I nor my firm was selected to officially participate in Philly Car Share's Walk Ride Share promotion. Nevertheless, I am thinking about honoring their self-proclaimed Walk Ride Share Month next month - perhaps not with a complete car fast, but a selective one. I won't get any goodies or any glory, like the selected participants will, but I have my reasons, nonetheless.

It occurs to me, for instance, that fasting from driving is a great way to identify with the poorest among us, which is one important reason the Bible gives for fasting regularly (see, for example, Isaiah 58:6-7). Voluntarily forgoing my car may mean long waits for public transportation, or going to my smaller neighborhood grocery store for food, or getting rained on as I get myself and my kids from Point A to Point B. In short, the kinds of annoyances that many of my neighbors have to bear every day of their lives.

I am sure that Philly Car Share's motives in promoting walking, biking, and car sharing are more about environmental sustainability, vibrant urban living, and business for them, all of which I am certainly in favor of encouraging more of. But if I avoid my car next month, it'll also be for the good of my soul and for the opportunity to more closely identify myself with the poorest among me, who my God most closely identified Himself with. And, no goodies or glory notwithstanding, that's good enough for me.

CITIES, A GOOD REAL ESTATE VALUE

It looks like I was saying what NPR said last week, about city locations increasing in attractiveness vis a vis far-flung suburbs: "Home Prices Drop Most in Areas with Long Commute." Hey, different places for different preferences; but it makes sense that the downturn is hitting the burbs harder, since there was probably an undervaluing of being physically proximate to urban amenities (transit, culture, downtown street life), which a more appropriate gas price and heightened awareness of environmental considerations has now corrected for. As for me, give me high-density living any day; and maybe, over time, real estate values in places like where I live will rise as others do the math and say the same thing.

FELSONIANS RULE

I just want to give a shout out to two fellow Fels alum who won state primaries earlier this week. Kenyatta Johnson won his Democratic primary for State Representative in the 186th District. And Lance Rogers won his Republican primary for State Senate in the 17th District. I'm telling you: 'round here, Felsonians rule.

THE GIFT OF PAIN / MAKE ANGELS CHEER

I have been reading the book of Job in my morning times with God, and so in my quest to better understand the book, I came across a series of sermons on the book by John Piper, author of Desiring God. Here's an excerpt from one:

What we have seen so far, then, is that Job's suffering has a twofold explanation: its purpose at the outset was to demonstrate God's value and glory, and its ongoing purpose was to refine Job's righteousness. His suffering is not punishment. It is not a sign of God's anger. Job's pain is not the pain of the executioner's whip but the pain of the surgeon's scalpel. The removal of the disease of pride is the most loving thing God could do, no matter what the cost.

Remember the words of the Lord: Better to suffer the excruciating pain of a gouged out eye than to let any sin remain in your heart. If this does not seem obvious to you—namely, that sanctification is worth any pain on this earth—it is probably because you don't abhor sin and prize holiness the way God does and the way you should. Let us examine ourselves carefully at this point.

Indeed, it seems human nature to question the Almighty and/or oneself "when bad things happen to good people." Is it punishment for bad we've done? Have I somehow merited God's anger? Is God capricious, impotent, or, even worse, just plain mean and heartless?

When God arrives on the scene, 38 chapters into a 42 chapter book, He does not reply to Job or his friends. No, He's the one asking questions, most along the lines of: "Can you do what I do?" Rightly humbled, Job can only answer: "No, I can't. I am not God. You are."

When we experience pain or see our loved ones go through it, it is possible to accept it as a gift from a God who so loves us that He will "operate on us," to use Piper's analogy. We may never get our answers on this side of glory, but we can trust in a God who is thoroughly and profoundly in charge, a God who thoroughly and profoundly loves us.

However circuitous or a tumultuous a road we take to get to that place of comfort and assurance, we can be there, even on this side of glory. And when we have those moments of quiet but steely trust in God, we make angels cheer, or so says Piper:

Picture Satan in heaven surrounded by 10,000 angels awaiting Job's response. Then Job answers, and, unknown to him, 20,000 arms are raised and 10,000 mighty voices shout, "Worthy is the Lord God of Job!" And what does Satan do? He flees from the presence of the praise of God.

What Drives Transportation Advocates and Urban Economists Batty

I sent the Times article to couple of my colleagues, who replied with
their two cents, which I'd like to paraphrase here for public benefit.
One, who works for AASHTO, spoke of the increasing justification for
a straight "vehicle mile traveled" tax, since that's a much more
direct route to dealing with these negative externalities, a gas tax
being a now deteriorating proxy for it. The other, who is a co-worker
of mine, added that another huge subsidy we provide to drivers is free
parking: homeowners can build garages and get the mortgage tax
deduction, while the fact that shopping mall owners pass the cost of
parking on to all users means there's no incentive for any individual
person to reduce their use. Clearly, the fact that driving is vastly
underpriced in terms of direct costs drives both transportation
advocates and urban economists batty. Me too.

GAS IS STILL TOO CHEAP

A nice scoop by Discovering Urbanism on an interesting article in the Grey Lady about the negative externalities associated with driving: "Not so Free Ride." The authors of Freakonomics estimate that we're underpaying by 10 cents per mile, or at 25 MPG, $2.50 a gallon. Since none of what we're currently paying for gas is going for the negative externalities mentioned in this article, AND it's not raising enough money to keep up with our huge infrastructure investment needs (my friend over at AASHTO tells me it's a fearsome gap), it's clear that $3.50 for a gallon of gas isn't too high, it's far too low.

Of course, no one who gets elected for a living will touch raising gas taxes with a ten-foot pole. But maybe those of us who care about the urban poor, about the environment, and about roads and bridges not collapsing in on themselves, should make our opinions known: political suicide or not, the price of gas is wildly wrong, and as a result we are consuming far too much, with dire consequences for our planet, the poorest among us, and our own pocketbooks in the long run.

ROOM TO GROW

It used to be easy to think that metropolitan areas would forever expand outward. Cities were a mess and land was cheap, so who wouldn't trade ten more minutes in the car one way to have a bigger house on a bigger lot, far away from all the ills of urban cores?

Urban renaissances and dear oil have changed the equation for some. Maybe public policy will further correct the imbalance between how much it costs governments and the environment to live in far-flung places and how much those people actually pay in. Maybe more people will voluntarily choose cities, partly out of running the numbers and partly out of lifestyle preferences.

Thankfully, most cities have room to grow. From an infrastructure standpoint, these are places that were built to serve a lot more than they now have. Just take a look at this extraordinary chart of city populations in 1950 and 2000. St. Louis, Pittsburgh, and Buffalo bled half its population during that time; Baltimore 300,000 less people, Philadelphia well over 500,000 less, and Detroit had 900,000(!) less.

These are all, of course, Rust Belt cities that dwindled as we shifted out of manufacturing. Demographics favors the Sun Belt, as retirees seek warmer climes and Hispanics grow faster than anyone. Among our Top 50 cities by population now are such places as Tucson, Mesa, and Long Beach - all more populous than such big-league cities as Cincinnati, Kansas City, and New Orleans.

Maybe people will continue to equate the American Dream with a picket fence in a quiet subdivision in the burbs. But if the economics of living and moving keep going the way they're going, maybe there's a mass reverse exodus into cities. And if so, I know a lot that have room to grow.

MACHINES CHEAT, PHILADELPHIA WINS

There it was, on the back page of the front section of today's Inky, in big white letters against a red background: "CHINA CHEATS. PHILADELPHIA LOSES." (The "I" in China was dotted with a yellow star, in case you weren't sure we were talking about China here.) It was a full-page ad taken out by the Alliance for American Manufacturing, and it went on to say that Pennsylvania has lost over 200,000 manufacturing jobs to 2000 - because of China. It concluded like this: "We need a President and a Congress who will stand up to China. Until then, China will continue to illegally subsidize their industries, keep the value of their currency low, dump their products in the US and steal our jobs. Don't let them get away with it."

Wow. Where to start? How about the fact that automation is the reason for most of our manufacturing job reductions. Or that the US is also still in the business of subsidizing industries and has a weak dollar. The last time I checked, "dumping their products in the US" was seen as a good thing for consumers who are glad that global competition has meant goods that are better in quality AND lower in price. Speaking of which, if another country's workers can produce goods that are better in quality AND lower in price (Japanese cars in the 1980's, Chinese consumer goods in the 2000's), let's get out of those jobs and into ones that we can do better, instead of acting as if we're entitled to "our" jobs and becoming uncompetitive in them means that someone "stole" them from us.

Mind you, China does have a lot of reform to do: political, economic, environmental, and social. It is good public policy to invest taxpayer dollars in figuring out how to help manufacturing workers and manufacturing towns transition to higher and better functions. And we do need a President and Congress who can get tough, for the sake of US workers and the US economy, as well as for the sake of the global economy and our shared environmental challenges.

But I'm a little tired of the China-bashing. We didn't lose manufacturing jobs because China cheated. We lost them because machines "cheat": they can work 24 hours a day, they don't retire and collect pensions, and they can do certain tasks better and faster than humans. And Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and the US have all "won" as a result of this "cheating" - our standard of living has never been higher, less and less of us work bone-crushingly menial jobs, and most consumer products are extraordinarily affordable.

Let's not scapegoat the Chinese or the machines; both have helped our quality of life. And we've got enough to worry about as it is: we're irreversibly transitioning to a modern, knowledge-based economy, and not enough of our children (or adults, for that matter) are getting the education they need to make their contribution.

GEOTHERMAL IS SO 1990's

A nice piece in today's Inky about the Friends Center's use of geothermal technology to heat and cool its new office complex: "Energy From the Ground Up." While upfront installation is much more costly, lower energy consumption means a payback period of six to eight years. Good for the bottom line, and good for the environment.

Of course, I have to take this opportunity to salute my former boss, Della Clark, for understanding this double payoff over a decade ago. She has been at the helm of The Enterprise Center, my previous employer, since 1992; and shortly after her arrival there, she set about buying and renovating the old American Bandstand studio at 46th and Market Streets in West Philadelphia.

Salesperson and visionary that she is, she decided to go geothermal. Specifically, we drilled 66 wells in our parking lot. At 200 feet deep, the water is 56 degrees year-round. Circulating that through our building gets you a much easier starting point to room temperature than 20 degree or 80 degree air outside. (Plus the symbolism of water coursing through the building was too rich for us to pass up.)

She was able to convince utility companies, energy thinktanks, and the system manufacturer to help cover the cost differential between geothermal and a traditional system, so The Enterprise Center started off at zero and has saved money since Day 1. To this day, some 11+ years after we moved in, I'd put our 35,000 square foot facility against any in the region, in terms of energy efficiency. I'm glad the mainstream media is getting hip to geothermal, and gladder still to have worked for a boss who "got it" over a decade earlier.

Class in Urban America

We Americans can sometimes find class societies like India odd. Until
we realize that class divisions are alive and well right here in the
land of the free and the home of the brave. And the tension is no
more evident than when it comes to our own kids. Pre-kids, many of us
want to change the world, live among the poor, break down the walls
that divide us. And post-kids, many of us abandon these ideals, hole
up in enclaves with others like us, doing what we can to keep our kids
from having to associate with "those people."

As a parent, I am torn. My kids will probably need more educational
help than the typical kids of Ivy League parents. (Jada is already
significantly behind in her verbal skills, and we've scheduled a
speech therapy session for this summer as a result.) Giving one's
kids a leg up through private schooling seems the most selfless of
acts. Having had the good fortune of a good education, I intend to do
what I can to see that my kids have the same opportunities.

And yet I can't help but think that these decisions are in some way
drenched with a privately held fear that our kids will not "make it,"
and will thus have to live below the class level we have striven to
achieve. If I were to enroll my child in a high-tuition school, would
it be to give them the best education possible; or would it be to
ensure that they would only be with other high-income people who alone
can afford such a tuition?

In an urban place like Philadelphia, these are very real choices.
While many suburbs tend to be fairly homogeneous from a class
standpoint (in fact, that's often why people choose them, and then
often defend that homogeneity to the death, through things like
minimum lot sizes and opposition to new multi-family developments),
cities offer lots of options at all sorts of price points. You can be
among the poor without ever having to actually interact with them, or
(gasp!) having your kids interact with them. Conversely, you can also
sacrifice your kids in a vain attempt to practice radical urban
Christian living, being ashamed of your wealth instead of thanking God
for it and being a good steward of it.

In other words, in an urban place like Philadelphia, there are no easy
answers to the question of class. I do not have to go far each day
before I am tempted to disdain the rich among me who look down on the
poor and make distinct choices to keep their kids from them. Even
more often, I check myself for looking down on the poor among me and
seeking to distance myself from their lives.

Every parental moment seems to confront me. Am I trying desperately
(if secretly) to slot my kids among the "right" crowd? Am I cheating
them from the best I can offer them? Am I teaching them to be OK with
their privileged status and yet treat all people with dignity? Are
they learning skills to advance themselves even as they learn that
sometimes Jesus calls us to "downward mobility"? Some parents know
the answers to these questions, and it is reflected in their choice of
residence. Where I live, all of this is still up for grabs.

It is my hope that as a parent, I can inform my kids of the realities
of class in urban America. I need not be ashamed to be rich, so long
as I invest that wealth in my kids in appropriate ways. I want to
connect them to real and meaningful experiences with people from a
range of socio-economic backgrounds, including the very poor who live
in our neighborhoods and go to our church and attend our schools. And
I want them to know about a God who truly does break down the
distinction between rich and poor; whose crowning representation of
His character was a person in the flesh, who became the poorest and
most servile among us, that we might be seated with Him in glory.

NO WILL TO DO GAS RIGHT

Uh oh. Presidential candidates on both sides of the aisle are talking about how un-American high gas prices are. McCain wants to lower the federal gas tax, insulting Obama in the process. Obama's running ads here in Philly about how he alone can stand up to fat-cat oil companies - raking in record profits while the rest of us have to pay high gas prices - because he doesn't take money from oil companies. (Except that he does.)

How much does the climate have to worsen before we get this right? How many bridges have to collapse, how many suburbs will we let sprawl to the horizon? How long until we admit our addiction to cheap oil, and make the painful but necessary changes to our lifestyles? Apparently, it's going to take at least another four years.

PEAK WATER

National Geographic predicted "The End of Cheap Oil" almost four years ago and introduced me to a concept known as "Peak Oil." Could Wired be the mag that scoops "Peak Water"? Water availability is something I've kept my eye on since college - here's a post from a year and a half ago - and the stakes haven't gotten any smaller. Here's hoping we can mix concern for the poorest among us with capitalist smarts to figure out solutions that best steward this most essential of resources.

SAVE THE WORLD AND SAVE A BUCK ON SEPTA

It has apparently been around for a few months, but I've just stumbled upon SEPTA's commuter calculator, which allows you to enter your miles driven and other variables to determine how much money and CO2 emissions you'd save by using transit instead. I punched in a commute for a hypothetical worker in Rosemont who could ride the R5 instead of driving 10 miles one way in his 25 MPG car. Results: almost $300 saved per month, plus over 350 pounds of CO2 emissions! Not factored in: money saved buying less aspirin to deal with the headache of rush hour on the Schuylkill Expressway ten times a week. Here's hoping more commuters do the math and figure out the smart way to go, for the sake of their pocketbooks and the planet.

EIGHT KINDS OF STREETS

No sooner had I warned of an auto-centric world than I was directed to this delightful article in the Times about the eight kinds of streets New York City is trying to implement to improve circulation and elevate the pedestrian. I loved this quote by a local urban design academic: “It is absolutely critical that the people on foot are at the top of the hierarchy. The alpha mode is the shoe.”

I also liked his sentiment about serendipity in the city: “Cities are generators of accidents. And to the degree that they are happy accidents, that’s the indicator of a good city." When you're whizzing by in a car, the only accident you can have is a bad one, involving damage to your fender or even bodily harm. But at the foot level, an urban "accident" can mean chancing upon a jam session, a long-lost friend, or a beautiful tree. So if it takes eight kinds of streets to make less of the first kind of accident and more of the second kinds, so be it.

Walking in a Autocentric World

God gave me two working legs, and whenever I can, I try to use them.
This puts me at odds at times in an increasingly autocentric world.
Two years ago, when our family car pooped out, I rode the regional
rail into the burbs, walking three-quarters of a mile from the station
to the auto dealer, and getting strange looks from cars whizzing by.
People speak in hushed tones when Amy and I go for a walk around my
parents' neighborhood in suburban San Jose: are they poor, deranged,
and/or dangerous?

Where our kids go to day care is four blocks from my office, so I walk
them there and then walk to work, reversing my commute on the way
home. Our day care does not allow strollers to be stored on site, so
I walk an empty stroller four blocks between there and my office.
Admittedly, it is a strange site: a man in a suit pushing an empty
stroller down a busy street. (What percentage of working parents do
you think walk their kids to day care and then walk their stroller to
work: 1 out of 1000? 1 out of 10,000?)

Still, I'm a little tired of the razzing. In addition to quizzical
looks, I've gotten smirks, bad jokes, and mocking. One clever young
lad managed to call me a girl and the n-word all in one
compactly-worded insult.

I take it all in stride (literally!). Still, it saddens me that
walking around like I do should seem such a source of teasing. We've
been walking for a long time and driving cars for just a sliver of
that time, yet we've made ourselves quite an autocentric world.

THE PRICE IS STILL WRONG

I had the pleasure of attending Temple University's third annual Social Entrepreneurship Conference this morning. What a refreshing experience, to hear from thought leaders in the for-profit, non-profit, and investment communities, and to see so many students and professionals in attendance to hear from them. I am heartened that we are moving closer to a world in which the intersection between financial profit and social good is the best place to be, and not an arena where the tree-huggers and capitalists feel they have to slug it out.

As an economist, I appreciated peoples' concerns about what we label "externalities." The classic negative externality is pollution: the producers of pollution aren't bearing enough of the cost to society of the pollution, and as a result, absent government intervention, we would tend to produce more than a socially efficient level of pollution. If you will, the "price" of pollution is far too low, and as a result, we are "consuming" too much of it.

Green innovation has flourished in this recent era of rising energy prices. One panelist salvages grease from our sewers and converts it to diesel, which saves our municipal infrastructure and provides a green alternative to gas. Another panelist spoke of how carpet manufacturers his firm was investing in figured out how to reduce polyurethane content in the backing, resulting in lower prices and higher margins. A third spoke of how the convenience and affordability of Philly Car Share has led many users to choose to live in high-density, transit-oriented neighborhoods. All of these innovations are good for the environment and good for society, and none would have come into being if higher energy prices hadn't made them make sense from a business standpoint.

So here's the trillion dollar question for our presidential candidates: has supply and demand absolved us of using public policy to account for these negative externalities? One panelist noted that despite the rise in some energy prices, the price is still wrong: electricity, for example, is still being sold in this state for less than what it costs to produce it.

It may seem politically suicidal, but a carbon tax would help get the price right. A carbon tax helps fix the wrong signal that the current price is telling the market, and leads to a more efficient supply/demand equilibrium. You can even do a dollar-for-dollar swap between energy taxes and income taxes, so that the working poor, who would be hit the hardest by higher prices on their groceries and utilities, are no worse off as we transition towards a more environmentally sensible mix of taxes.

Fortunately, these and other ideas are being seriously discussed at the national level. And fortunately, the intersection between financial profit and social good is growing: according to the keynote speaker, we're talking about 30,000 socially responsible firms, 60 million values-driven consumers, and $2.7 trillion in professional managed money in socially responsible funds.

Still, there's a reluctance in DC to make tough decisions about environmental policy. Too many businesses and investors make a false dichotomy between maximizing financial profit and maximizing social good. Too many times, it's not a false dichotomy at all, but a very real one, where good-hearted people have to make tough choices between honoring their responsibility to maximize shareholder value and doing what's best for other stakeholders like their employees or their communities.

I believe it was uber-VC John Doerr, who is bullish on green investments, who noted that while the Internet was about revolutionizing the way we do business, environmental technologies will be about fundamental things that we humans tend to need for survival, like air and water. And if you believe in Maslow's hierarchy of needs, you have to think that the potential market and payoff will therefore dwarf anything the business world has ever seen. Here's hoping our elected officials get this, and for our sake and our children's sake, enact courageous policies that help get the price right so that good business is more synonymous with good environmental stewardship.

WORRY FOR CHINA, NOT ABOUT IT

A nice piece by The Economist on China's ravenous appetite for natural resources. The US and Europe are leery of what this means in terms of China's growing influence in, say, Africa, but I'm with The Economist in thinking this to reflect our paternalistic view of Africa, that that's our continent to "save," and that our "aid for progress on human rights" approach is necessarily better than China's "let's do business, no questions asked" approach.

For one, for Africa it's not "no questions asked" when it comes to China, or perhaps more accurately, it's not often any different from US/Europe's relationship with Africa. Consider also that many people are sour on the effect of aid and benchmarks in reforming Africa; meanwhile, China's investment in Congo, to use but example, is ten times the amount of aid from the West, and has transformed the landscape of much of this dirt-poor country.

What is appropriate to worry about is not China as a threat but China as a nation on the brink. The ravenous developing nation can import all the raw materials it wants to, but it can't import clean air and clean water. And parts of the country are in peril as a result. Who knows what environmental catastrophe lurks, or what the effect will be on a generation of babies who grow up under the smoky haze of much of China's urbanized areas.

So instead of some jingoistic fear-mongering or paternalistic tsk-tsking, maybe the US and Europe should just concentrate on how to engage China in the important global environmental issues of the day. After all, when it comes to resource consumption, we may all need to go on a diet, but some hungry eaters may need more help than others.

GOOD ENVIRONMENT MEANS GOOD BUSINESS

He might have lost the battle on congestion pricing, but Bloomy is still fighting the war for business practices that are good for profits and good for the planet. While he longer actively runs a for-profit business, he's still at the helm of an entity that will swell to 9 million in population by 2030, with all the attendant worries about education, infrastructure, and commerce. And this November, we'll be electing a man or woman who'll have policy influence over decisions that affect 300 million people and more. Easier said than done, but for the sake of the planet, doesn't that mean that greenies and capitalists and politicos have to work together, and not try to out-shout one another?

THE CANDIDATES ON URBAN ISSUES

My new blog friend over at Discovering Urbanism has a nice post about the candidates on urban issues.

* On energy, I'm with him on the efficiency of a carbon tax in sorting out who pays and how much gets consumed.

* On transportation, he rightly points out something I'd heard from a colleague of mine who used to work at Amtrak, which is that McCain has been an ardent opponent of Amtrak, much to my chagrin, since McCain is by far my preferred candidate of the three left.

* On housing, he's correct about how the mortgage interest deduction (in concert with massive subsidies of the interstate highway system) is a chief contributor to decentralization by making it cheaper to live farther apart.

Let me reiterate an idea of local interest, which intersects all three of these topics, which is the concept of providing developers with generous density bonuses to construct housing units near transit stops if they sell a percentage of those units at an affordable price. This would seem to be a sensible policy on a number of fronts:

* It properly incentivizes developers to build affordable units, which otherwise won't get built, especially in a down market.

* It fills in some of the inexplicable holes in our built environment near transit stops.

* It provides double affordability to families in need, who not only get a good price on a house but can more easily do without a car and related expenses.

* It costs the City nothing in public dollars.

There's more to this subject, but this level of description will suffice for now. To be sure, what folks decide at the polls in November, and what the man or woman in the Oval Office decides for the next four years, will most certainly affect the viability of these and other local plans; as will the state of the currently shaky real estate market. Regardless, though, I have to think that stacking residences at a variety of price points near transit stops is a sensible, win-win sort of way to go.

FLORIDA BULLISH ON PHILLY

Make that at least two of us who are bullish on Philly, although Richard Florida is about a million times smarter and more influential than I, so him saying so means more: Why Phila. Economic Future Looks So Bright."

The last point, about Philly's housing affordability vis a vis Boston, New York, and Washington, begs the question: why? If we're such an attractive place to be, why isn't it reflected in our house prices?

In some neighborhoods, that upward adjustment is taking place: even factoring in a recent downward correction, we could probably sell our house for almost four times what we paid for it eight years ago. (Although I still think we’re undervalued: would you pay the current market price for my current house, or the same price for a house half the size in a crummy part of California or Massachusetts?)

But there are still some bargains to be had, when you think of all that Philly has going for it, from an employment, recreation, and infrastructure standpoint. And, as I’ve mentioned many times in this space, the dearer gas becomes, the more denser, transit-oriented cities like Philadelphia gain in competitiveness. (Put it this way: when you factor in how little we spend on transportation, the fairer comparison from a cost of living standpoint is my house at its current market price and a house a third of the size in a really crummy part of California or Massachusetts.) So while it’s obvious to me, it’s still good to hear people like Richard Florida agree.

ANDY CROUCH TO SPEAK AT WOODLAND CHURCH LATER THIS MONTH

I'm not as well read up on "Christ and culture" guru Andy Crouch as I'd like to be, remembering his insights from his days editing the now-defunct Re: Generation Quarterly. But I know that a lot of folks in the blogosphere are big fans. If you're interested in hearing him speak and are in the Philadelphia area, he'll be at our church for a special "Evening Learning Community" gathering on April 20th. Hope to see you there!

Making Dad Sad

As I coming down the stairs this weekend, I saw Jada looming ominously
over Aaron. We made eye contact and then I turned the corner; and
then whipped back into view to see what she was going to do to her
little brother once I was out of sight. Sure enough, she raised her
hand and struck him across the face. I swooped in angrily and pointed
her to the corner, where she would be spending some "time out" before
apologizing to Aaron.

When I relayed the story to Amy, she frowned and said, "That makes me
sad." The thought of her kids fighting saddened her. I made some
comment about how that's what brothers and sisters naturally do, and
we just need to be sure to instruct our kids that it's not OK.

Afterwards, though, it occurred to me that God is more like Amy than
me, in terms of His reaction to His kids being in conflict. To be
sure, He is mindful to instruct us when we sin against one another,
through either physical, verbal, or other blows. But there is also a
sense of grieving that I am sure He feels, like Amy did, when His kids
fight.

Ultimately, that sadness is not out of insecurity or impotence; and
ultimately, our sin is not just against one another but also against
Him, and there is a very real and justifiable element of anger and
vengeance in God's response to such behavior. And yet, my
understanding of the God of the Bible is that there is some parental
sadness in there, too, a sadness that Amy first tapped into when told
of our kids' fighting, and one I have a better understanding of myself
being a parent.

And Little Children Shall Lead Us

Our church has been through a heavy season of late; and at times
members have confessed that at times, even the Sunday morning service
has lacked pep. It would be deliciously appropriate if what causes
the clouds to finally break are the littlest among us. Our minister
of music has instituted what I believe to be a wonderful routine, in
that at the end of every service, she encourages the kids to come
forward and grab musical instruments as we sing our last song. The
sight of hordes of bubbly kids bopping away is enough to bring a smile
to even the most hardened sort.

And upon further reflection, the blessing is even deeper. Here is
worship as it was meant to be: joyful, light, and honoring to God.
Maybe one Sunday you'll find all of us bopping around, taking our cues
from the littlest among us, the first to remember what it looks like
to truly worship God.

TRANSIT ACCESS AND PROPERTY VALUES

When states raise their own money for mass transit, the usual sources are gas tax, sales tax, and income tax. I like that Richard Daley, Mayor of Chicago, has encouraged the use of property taxes to pay for badly needed infrastructure investment: "Mass Transit Systems Have a Hard Time Paying the Bills." Transit access, after all, can and does have a positive effect on property values, creating a virtuous cycle in which property taxes pay for transit enhancements, which lead to property value increases, which generate more funds for future enhancements.

No matter what the financial price of gas is, it is increasingly accepted that the total cost of driving is becoming dearer and dearer. Here's hoping politicians and citizens warm to transit and to density as a way of adjusting to that reality, and are OK with tax increases that enhance property values and that help make that adjustment to more and better transit possible.

Whartonites Up to Some Good

99 nights out of 100, I'm home for dinner with the family. But when a
colleague and former co-worker of mine said he was assembling a group
of Wharton alum involved in various public interests, I couldn't
resist the networking opportunity.

So I got the kids home from day care and then headed right back out
the door to this dinner. And it was definitely worth the time away.
What an extraordinary group of men and women, all self-proclaimed
social do-gooders. There were non-profit executives, heads of
foundations, and neighborhood activists. Everywhere you turned, there
was a good conversation to be had, a lesson to be learned, and a sense
of camaraderie from our shared alma mater and our current desire to
integrate that business perspective with broad public interests.

And the food was pretty darn good, too. But the company was delicious.

LESS GAS

Talk about putting your wealth where your words are: Al Gore is funding a multi-million dollar advocacy campaign called We Can Solve It, calling for the US to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions: "Gore Launches a Campaign to Cut U.S. Greenhouse Gas." Given that the topic is a global one and not just an American one, it will be key to get other countries, notably fast-developing China and India, on board. Although it is likely that aggressive and thoughtful action by the world's most powerful nation is what it will take to get this thing really cooking on a planet-wide scale. And by the way, wherever you stand on Gore's various political positions, kudos to him for being so engaged and so influential after his White House years.

GET THE PRICE OF DRIVING RIGHT

Bloomy's getting closer to making it more expensive to drive in the heart of Manhattan: "Congestion Pricing Passes NY City Council, Now Goes to Albany." All that money will be plowed into mass transit, which is the more efficient and environmentally friendly way to deal with all the density. Cars, on the other hand, clog up precious road and parking space, and belch out noise and pollution; so it makes sense to change the economics so that they pay more for the right to do those things.

Of course, one "enlightened" opponent on City Council was quoted as saying, "What's next, we're going to charge a user fee to come into Central Park because it's crowded?" It's an important statement. We economists classify parks as public goods, because they cost nothing to provide them to one more person, and because you can't exclude people from using them.

But parks aren't free to operate; someone has to pay for the landscaping and the garbage collection and the maintenance. There's no profit motivation to bear these costs if there's no revenue to be had, so parks end up being paid for by cities, who decide that it's worth it to levy broad taxes to make parks available to all residents and visitors. (Of course, there are parts of parks that can and do have user fees, like skating rinks or rollerblade rentals; and, not surprisingly, sometimes those services are outsourced to a for-profit entity.)

Is driving a public good? Roads are a form of a public good - they cost nothing to provide to one more person, and, except for toll roads, you can't exclude people from using them. That's why governments pay to build and maintain roads, and levy taxes to raise the money they need to do that.

But much more so than parks, driving imposes on others something that we economists call negative externalities: bad things that affect others that are not directly paid for by the user. Pollution is the classic negative externality: we all suffer when factories belch out dirty emissions, and (until recently) those same factories paid nothing in penalties and therefore had no incentive to reduce those emissions.

Driving imposes an additional negative externality of traffic congestion: we all suffer because we are all on the road together. This is of particular consequence in car-choked areas like Manhattan. So that's two negative externalities - pollution and congestion. And congestion pricing gets the price right so that a better equilibrium of volume of driving results - better for mobility, better for infrastructure, and better for the environment. Let's hope those legislators in Albany get this.