News items for February 5, 2024

The former U.S. post office site on the edge of downtown Portland is empty. But why? Photo: Michael Andersen/Sightline.

• 1. King County’s climate plan needs ‘serious course correction’ on transportation

  The county’s own report measuring progress from the 2020 Strategic Climate Action Plan points toward a need to rapidly start making progress in the area of transportation or risk missing climate targets laid out in the plan.

  The Urbanist Climate Action

• 2. Heat and wildfire smoke are even more harmful together

  The research highlights the public health dangers of distinct climate threats that can have a compound effect when they occur simultaneously.

  The New York Times Public Health, Wildfires

• 3. Will a ‘wilderness’ designation help this vital ecosystem?

  Conservationists agree that Oregon’s Owyhee Canyonlands are an ecologically important area, but how to protect them isn’t as simple.

  The Revelator Conservation

• 4. WA drinking water, hydropower at risk as the snowpack shrinks

  The system of waterways and reservoirs isn’t designed to capture the rain that’s falling where snow should be this winter.

  The Seattle Times Water

• 5. How transportation funding is used to manipulate cities

  The agencies that hand out funding also prioritize arterial highways over local, multimodal transportation.

  Strong Towns Transportation

• 6. Upzoning shouldn’t be given for free, says economist

  Three ways the public could receive a bigger share of the benefits that come from upzoning.

  The Tyee Zoning

• 7. Reviving the Samish Tribe’s kelp

  Researchers are documenting the decline of once-plentiful kelp beds in an effort to reverse the trend.

  High Country News Indigenous Science

• 8. WA aims to use public lands for housing

  The question of how to produce more affordable housing is a tricky one as the cost to build and purchase a home remains high in Western Washington. But under a new plan announced by the state Department of Natural Resources — a plan that also might be taken elsewhere across the state — the agency is putting its land to work.

  The Olympian Housing, Public Lands

• 9. Why a natural gas storage climate ‘disaster’ could happen again

  A year after a major methane leak from underground gas storage, a new study identifies potentially thousands of similarly risky wells across the United States.

  Energy News Network Gas

• 10. Video: Elk hunting on a changing Colville Reservation

  Salmon Chief Darnell Sam goes bow-hunting and shares how his cultural relationship with first foods and environmental stewardship are intertwined.

  Crosscut Indigenous Land

More News from February 5, 2024

• A day in the life at a homeless camp

  The residents of a camp in Clarkston, WA, shed light on the challenges of finding solid ground.

  Northwest Public Broadcasting Homelessness

• The little-known election urbanists should vote in right now

  King Conservation District Supervisor Brittney Bush Bollay explains what their organization does and what’s at stake in this February election.

  The Urbanist Elections