Doug Trumm
Doug Trumm is the Publication Director at The Urbanist. He joined the exodus to Seattle in 2014, leaving behind his home state of Minnesota. Living on disputed land between Wallingford and Fremont, he is doing his best to improve both neighborhoods. He is a grad student at the Evans School of Public Policy and Governance and a marketing intern at King County Metro. His views are his own and do not represent his employer.
We have an enormous opportunity. Washington state could do something really meaningful to address climate change by passing a ballot initiative pricing carbon. I-1631 has united a broad coalition around a carbon pollution fee that then funds the green economy.
On October 10th, supporters...
Remember how the federal government has a four trillion dollar annual budget, but somehow has only peanuts left over for low-income housing? The US government spends more subsidizing the mansions of the rich via the mortgage interest tax deduction than it spends on low-income housing.
This spring, California toyed with passing SB 827, an ambitious zoning preemption bill authored by State Senator Scott Wiener that would have allowed five-story apartment buildings within walking distance of high-frequency mass transit stops. Many Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) stations and a good number of LA...
Mayor Jenny Durkan delivered her first budget address today at Fire Station 10. While the mayor had broadcast her desire to trim department budgets by 2% to 5%, ultimately her budget proposal increased the City's budget to $5.9 billion, with police and transportation spending leading the way.
While housing advocates have been calling for social housing on the City-owned Mercer Mega Block site and other publicly-held land, the Durkan administration is planning to auction the choice parcel off to highest bidder. In fact, the City's Request for Proposals (RFP) brags about just how juicy...
2015 was a different time. People were optimistic and filled with ambition, especially the transit advocates. We were not at a "value engineering" scaling back phase. On the contrary, activists were charging ahead and among other things campaigned to add a NE 130th Street Link station to...
Stone Way and the surrounding Fremont and Wallingford blocks continue to be a focal point of new construction. In 2015, I predicted this neighborhood, which some have dubbed "Frelingford", was developing a retail district to rival Fremont's 36th Street and Wallingford's 45th Street corridor. That trend has...
The Urbanist has been banging the drum for following through on long-laid plans to build the Center City Connector to connect Seattle's two orphan streetcar lines. The wheels were well in motion--$75 million in federal grants are secured to fund it--yet politicians vacillate and Very Serious People...
