Joseph Miscimarra 🇺🇸

@jmisci.bsky.social

1066 Followers 284 Following

Energy efficiency industry employee and former ADU resident. Here to stay updated on climate, energy, urbanism, and weather. I post frequently about Chicago!

In Land Use Planning and Wildfire: Development Policies Influence Future Probability of Housing Loss, Alexandra D. Syphard, Avi Bar Massada, Van Butsic, and Jon E. Keeley modeled three different development scenarios in San Diego to investigate how land use planning can influence the future probability of housing loss due to wildfires. Key Takeaways • Infill development produced the most efficient use of land, with the highest housing density; and the homes built were at the lowest fire risk. • Leapfrog development - the construction of housing in isolated, undeveloped areas - consumed the most land to build homes at the lowest density; the resulting homes were at the highest risk of fire. • To mitigate the risk of housing loss from wildfire, policymakers should concentrate growth on infill parcels where the risk is lowest.
How the New Parking Zone Works: From the North Avenue Beach Pedestrian Bridge to Navy Pier, riders must end their trip in an approved location. Map showing grayed out area on lakefront
The project cost the co-op's members almost $5 million, or about $11,000 per unit. It's expected to cut the building's energy use by more than a third and reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by more than 1,000 metric tons each year. "We were kind of lucky," says Corinne Irvin, the co-op board's vice president. The old boilers would have needed replacing eventually; BEPS just accelerated the process. The co-op had also just retired a mortgage, which freed up money and lightened the financial load. The Cairo, however, was not so lucky. The building is saddled with quirky hardware - air conditioning units in each condo that also contain old-fashioned electric heaters.
2030 apportionment estimate from the NDRC IL loses 2 electoral votes, CA loses 3 and NY loses 1 Texas gains 3, other red states like Idaho and Florida also gain
Crain's Chicago Business Illinois ranks second to last in U.S. on building new housing 11 hours ago The Real Deal Illinois Ranks Near Bottom in new Home Builds 2 hours ago
4 story apartment building made of brick
Arch rock - a natural bridge on Mackinac island
Sign in airport terminal saying “Welcome to Illinois, the quantum capital of the world”
3 buildings: one of 3 stories, one of 8 stories, and one that’s even taller
Post from Mitchel L Ikenna Johnson: “facts!!!” Reposted a picture saying “3000+ experts agree: 9/11 really was an inside job”
Navy pier Ferris wheel with moon rising in distance
Big tall ship in front of huge cumulonimbus clouds at golden hour
Pedestrian tunnel almost wholly underwater
People at a beach with the Chicago skyline in the back
Tons of blue bikes stacked next to station
Tidy bikes next to beach
The CTA needs a text-message based hotline to report issues. Today, I heard an announcement on the train platform that if you see something wrong, you should either tell an employee or press the emergency button. These are both bad ideas. And the online chatbot is also useless. Let's say you're on a train, and someone starts yelling at you unprovoked. You don't want to press the emergency button because this might aggravate that person. But you also can't tell any CTA employees because there are none in your train car, and you don't want to get off at the next stop. There needs to be a discreet way to report a bad situation. And it must connect to a human, not a chatbot. (I've reported incidents via chatbot plenty of times and have never seen any help.) The obvious answer is to have a text-message based reporting system. Plenty of cities do this; you can't go 60 seconds on a London tube ride without seeing or hearing the phrase "message 6-101-6 to report something wrong. See it, say it, sorted." Just copy their idea there's no penalty for plagiarism! There are many situations in which I would use this option. Maybe someone is smoking, or I see what could be human trafficking. These aren't necessarily emergencies, and I don't want to stop the train with the emergency button so the conductor can walk back to fix the problem. But there needs to be a quicker response than what is currently offered. I understand that the NITA legislation entails changes to CTA operations. Ideally, this hotline would be implemented alongside the task force's other recommendations. Whoever runs the hotline should have direct communication with conductors, police, transit ambassadors, and emergency services. Please roll out the hotline ASAP, and don't procrastinate with a pilot phase. Thank you for your consideration!
The plumbers union has expressed only minor opposition to banning the use of lead piping from city mains to the structures. The installation of such piping, for all practical purposes, would continue to be done by licensed union plumbers. But the unions are expected to use all their political muscle to block any measure allowing plastic plumbing in homes or apartments up to four floors. Unions argue that plastic is dangerous because of high levels of toxicity in fires. Privately, plumbers fear the use of plastic materials will stimulate do-it-yourself plumbing by homeowners or cut down the time involved in a job and, consequently, the income of union plumbers.
In return, Chicago plumbers enthusiastically promoted the industry - as was seen in an article written for the industry's Lead magazine at the time. "I am happy to say that the lead industry [.] has cooperated fully with the plumber to strengthen and improve plumbing ordinances all over the country," John J Calnan, a Chicago plumber, wrote in a piece for Lead magazine in 1934. Within a few years, Lead magazine published an article commending Chicago city officials for allowing only lead service lines in the city's code. The support for lead lines was cemented in the 1950s, as the plumbers union became particularly powerful in the city, according to reporting by Chicago broadcaster WBEZ. The union's leader, Stephen Bailey, marshaled hundreds of thousands of labor votes to help elect his boyhood friend, Mayor Richard J Daley, who remained in office until the mid-1970S.
In 1986, Harold Washington, Chicago's first black mayor, tried to buck the union. He proposed taking the lead requirement out of the code, after hearing from the health department that 1,644 children in the city were suffering from high levels of lead in their blood. By then every other major city in the nation had banned lead pipes and Ballanco's engineering organization was urging Chicago to adopt a model city code that excluded lead as well. But the plumbers' union stood its ground and opposed the measure, and thus it failed to win approval from the city's aldermen. "Lead [pipes] have proven over a long time to do the job they were designed to do," Jim McCarthy, the union's business manager, told the Chicago Tribune at the time. "I'm hard-pressed to understand why people are talking about lead poisoning. We've had lead pipe in the water system here for 100 years."
Article: 100 Students in a School Meant for 1,000: Inside Chicago's Refusal to Deal With Its Nearly Empty Schools by Mila Koumpilova, Chalkbeat, and Jennifer Smith Richards, ProPublica Co-published with Chalkbeat June 13, 2025, 5:00 am
Many big homes in the suburbs. They all look the same and there are few natural areas or trees
Chicago Tribune Editorial: Illinois' population is growing again. But we're losing our children. 2 weeks ago Chicago Magazine Fighting the Losing Population Battle Feb 23, 2026 Governing Illinois Is Nation's Biggest Loser of Younger Population
Double sided protected bike lane with many people biking
Map from Jeremy Glover showing south Lakeview neighbors current zoning, with many existing multifamily homes in areas where they’re nonconforming with zoning
TikTok text: “This is not what housing justice looks like. Thisis what racist gentrification looks like and we need to downzone more land to guarantee affordable housing in future development.”
Lots of people in line under morning sun through the trees
ComEd PTS Summer Hours Alert 7/3, you earned $3 by reducing peak electricity and grid strain. Thanks! Txt STOP to stop ALL ComEd txts.
An Apollo photograph showing an astronaut on the moon with the the American flag
Chicago skyline behind beach volleyball courts. There is a ferocious thunderstorm lit by the golden hour sun to the left.
gerriwhitley: summer nights lit by fireflies bioluminescence is so incredible, I just stand in awe of nature and watch these tiny creatures create light to find each other. I've had this idea in my head for several years, I wanted to capture a bunch of fireflies with the city skyline. I finally found the right spot, I was at Montrose in the natural area the night before I captured these and saw the fireflies. When I got home, I planned this shot and returned the next night. this represents about 2 hours of shooting, creating over 1700 images blended to create this composite view. Countless mosquito bites and weeks of editing, I captured the photos on July 2nd and have been steadily working on this since then.
Long exposure photo of many fireflies in front of chicago skyline
Chicago housing market defies national downdrafts as prices hit another high ＜ Share This house on Wille Street in Mount Prospect sold for a little more than $863,000 in May. It was listed with an @properties Christie's International Real Estate agent. (@properties Christie's International Real Estate) g2) By Dennis Rodkin June 30, 2026, 11:50 AM CDT For the third month in a row, home prices in Chicago reached record highs in May, while the broader national market has seen prices barely lifting above year-ago levels. It's the latest chapter in a now long-running story of the Chicago-area housing market doing its own thing. That's rarely been more clear than it is in this month's roundup of housing market data, which shows Chicago tightening where other major cities are getting looser (inventory) and rising where many of them are falling (prices.) Home prices soar here but flatten nationwide In Chicago, the median price of homes sold in May was up 7.7% from the same time last year, according to data released June 25 by Illinois Realtors.
A blue coffee shop has the text COLECTIVO and COFFEE written above front door. There is a bicyclist with a child riding by
The same flyers in previous post but on top of each other on tree
NO TO OVER-ZONING AT 1040 W. BELMONT (Giordano's) STOP HIGH BUILDINGS IN OUR NEIGHBORHOOD Protect Our Lakeview Community Character & Property Values Dear Neighbors on Kenmore and Seminary Streets, A major zoning change has been requested for 1040 W. Belmont Ave. (currently the single-story Giordano's Pizzeria), and it directly impacts our blocks. Local developers are seeking a permanent up-zoning from B3-2 to B3-5. This change is requested specifically to bypass our neighborhood's standard 50-foot height limit so they can construct a massive 5-story, 64-to-76-foot tall concrete and brick block extending right out toward our doorsteps. Why We Must Stop This Up-Zoning: • Extremes in Height & Scale: The developer claims this massive footprint fits the neighborhood because "other 5-floor buildings exist." This is misleading. Belmont is overwhelmingly characterized by 3 and 4 floor buildings. Placing a towering 64+ foot structure here shatters the historic architectural scale of our immediate blocks (a typical 3-4 floor building reaches 40ft. on average). Examples of construction heights within zoning limits in our neighborhood: 3250 Clark: 44ft, 1039 Belmont 50ft, 1138 Belmont 51ft, 1218 Belmont 44ft • Severe Density Impact: The proposal comes into our immediate space with 28 residential units packed into a mid-block property. While transit-oriented development and affordable housing are noble goals on paper, exploiting those attributes to maximize developer profit with an out-sized, dense complex goes too far. • Detrimental to Property Values: Erecting a massive, towering wall of concrete right outside our residential homes will permanently block natural light, increase alley congestion (via the proposed 6 parking spaces and intensive delivery/trash traffic), and ultimately degrade the property values and quality of life for everyone
Chicago River with a water taxi and people strolling
DanRose773 Move out of lake view then dawg 1 like Eden This problem exists all over the city sooo 26 likes
Partially finished casino building on the riverfront. Almost all of the glass panels are in place
Many people at a beach and an obstacle course on the water
Map by Steven Vance Where apartments are allowed in Chicago The plurality of Chicago's land is zoned to allow only single-detached houses
Chicago leads the nation in apartment rent growth amid tight supply Limited new supply and rising demand are setting the pace in the Windy City Graph from 2025 showing Chicago with higher rent growth than every other major American city
ON THIS DAY 101 YEARS AGO POLITICAL BRICK Arthur Evans, in his story of political brick. brick in Chicago, said that archi- Hollow tile makes a cooler tects estimate that if builders house in summer and a warmer could use tile instead of brick there would be a saving of $500 house in winter. in the average two story house In the winter that saves on and from 5 to 7 percent on a the coal bill. It is estimated that it saves from two to three tons skyscraper. Tile cannot be used in construction walls in Chicago of coal in an eight room house. because the brickmakers have Brick making is virtually a been politically good enough to monopoly in Chicago, and with keep it from being used. They tile out brick is in good. Some- have had a grip on city regula- times a builder gets a special tions for over twenty years. permit for tile, but the ordinary In the suburbs and towns just uilder is handed over to the brickmaker. outside Chicago tile is used, and the Chicago builder can see his Occasionally the council neighbors getting the advantage looks into the matter. It is doing so now. Mayor Dever says he of it, but he cannot build that way insists upon the removal of the because the ordinances will not permit him. restrictions against tile. William It is not a fire precaution. Tile Schlake, the Supreme Brick, has is just as non-conductive as been doing very well so far, but brick. It is not for any reasons of he may have to take off his coat safety in construction, either for and meet a little competition the dwellers in the house or their with another building material. neighbors. The answer to tile is Tribune editorial board, June 12, 1925
Rendering of people in plaza and only one car
Picture of Alexi Giannoulias with Caleb Williams, Rome Odunze, and Pete Crow Armstrong Captioned: Had dinner with these really outstanding young men last night. Our City is lucky to have each of them!
rendering of central square in foundry park development with kids playing and buildings surrounding it
A wooden porch/staircase behind a beige brick 4 story building in Chicago. There are plenty of trees around the building and flowers on the staircase
Many people eating outside at a city bar next to bikes under a tree lined street with cute brick apartment buildings
Graphic: Two months ago: ILLINOIS MAYORS VISIT VATICAN, POPE LEO TELLS THEM TO HELP POOR PEOPLE & IMMIGRANTS Last week: ILLINOIS MAYORS DEFY POPE They coordinated attacks against a proposed bill that would ease barriers for churches to build affordable housing for neighbors in need. These shameless bureaucrats (and their lobbyists, the illinois Municipal League) betrayed Pope Leo. STAND UP FOR ILLINOIS' POPE: Tell your village leaders to end their affiliation with the Illinois Municipal League. Tell your IL state rep/senator to support these bills that expand housing options for neighbors in need: SB 635 SB 330 HB 5198 The BUILD Plan
Moon rising over Lake Michigan at sunset
WHAT THE IMI (linois Municipal League) WANTS -McMansions ONLY -permits, fees, long reviews -ocal BUREAUCRAtS control property, not owners -overreaching MANDATES (parking, lot size, etc.) -MICROMANAGEMENT WHAT THE "BUILD" PACKAGE WOULD LEGALIZE -property owners control land, not local BUREAUCRATS -LESS TRAFFIC Clips) * Briar FREEDOM from micromanagement -more property rights for faith communities -WALKABLE NEIGHBORHOODS VISIT BUILDforlL.org TO SUPPORT PROPERTY RIGHTS!
WHAT THE IML (linois Munipal League) WANTS -MCMansions ONLY -permits, fees, long reviews -local BUREAUCRATS control property, not owners -overreaching MANDATES parking, lot size, ctc.) -MICROMANAGEMENT WHAT THE "BUILD" PACKAGE WOULD LEGALIZE -property owners control land, not local BUREAUCRATS -LESS TRAFFIC FiREEDOm rom micromanagement -more property rights tor faith communities -WALKABLE NEIGHBORHOODS VISIT BUILDorIL. org TO SUPPORT PROPERTY RIGHTS!
People playing spikeball in a park under a pink and orange sunset
Choose pedal assist level When a station only has ebikes, you can lower your pedal assist to ride for the price of a classic ride. • Light boost when you pedal Free for 45 minutes, then $0.19/min Full boost when you pedal Free to unlock, then $0.19/min Save this preference for future rides
Old postcard of the “Belmont harbor yacht basin” There are boats and buildings in the background
Pretty street with variety of housing styles and greenery
Tweet from @gavinnewsom “Confederate states are rushing through rigged maps to erase Black districts off the map.” If this doesn't make you angry, it should.”