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Conversations about Creating a Culture of Activity: Profiling the people, places, programs, and policies that help to promote a culture of activity within our communities.
Note: This transcript was exported from the video version of this episode, and it has not been copyedited
00:00:00:00 - 00:00:23:15
Jon Jon Wesolowski
I want to start getting into the discussion of if we're having repeat, repeat freak accidents, then it's not a freak accident. It's the design of the system. And let's change that system. And so, what you see here on the screen is an accumulation of crashes over the last five years in downtown Chattanooga. We know where the red spots are.
00:00:23:18 - 00:00:31:13
Jon Jon Wesolowski
What are we doing differently in those spots today? To to lower or to to lighten that color. And the answer is nothing.
00:00:31:15 - 00:00:58:01
John Simmerman
Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Active Towns channel. My name is John Simmerman and that is Jon Jon Wesolowski from Chattanooga, Tennessee. Jon Jon is actually an urbanist. The happy urbanist. And he is running for city council there in Chattanooga. So we are going to be having a conversation about, the origins of how he got engaged with urbanism and trying to make more people oriented places, and what motivated him to run for City Council.
00:00:58:05 - 00:01:05:02
John Simmerman
So let's get right to it with Jon Jon..
00:01:05:04 - 00:01:08:21
John Simmerman
Jon Jon, so wonderful to have you on the Active Towns Channel. Welcome.
00:01:08:23 - 00:01:13:19
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yes. Thank you for having me. Feels exciting to, to be a part of this right now.
00:01:13:21 - 00:01:27:17
John Simmerman
Hey, Jon Jon, you and I have a lot to catch up on. We, had an opportunity to hang out a bit in Cincinnati in May. But let's do this for the audience. Just take a moment to introduce yourself. So, who the heck is Jon Jon?
00:01:27:19 - 00:01:52:16
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Hey, my name is Jon Jon Wesolowski. I go by The Happy Urbanist online. And honestly, I feel like I'm a pretty regular person that has gone very deep down the urbanism rabbit hole. And what I found was the further I went down, the smaller my group appears became, the more esoteric the language became, and I wanted to flip that funnel on its head.
00:01:52:16 - 00:02:20:09
Jon Jon Wesolowski
I wanted to create a larger group of people that I could talk about cities and city design and transit problems. And so I started creating content that was approachable, that wasn't specific to, a certain political group or region and that kind of caught on. And so I've kind of grown a community online and started locally with some, organization and activism to help make cities better places.
00:02:20:11 - 00:02:42:12
John Simmerman
I love it, love it. And here's your logo, the happy urbanist. And that's how we first met is is basically online. I just started following you. You started following active towns and, and, and yes, it was just an absolute delight to be able to connect with you, at the strong towns national gathering. I stayed on and also attended.
00:02:42:12 - 00:02:48:02
John Simmerman
See. And you were. Are you able to attend C in you or did you or are you just there for the Strong Towns national gathering?
00:02:48:05 - 00:03:04:20
Jon Jon Wesolowski
No, I was I was there, I was there for seeing you. But, I, I did like, I did reach, like, a threshold of exhaustion. And so I was like, in my hotel room in between talks. Not as much socialization. I party too hard in strong towns. Yeah, yeah.
00:03:04:22 - 00:03:35:14
John Simmerman
Yeah, it's it's it's a lot, you know, with with the two of them mash together like that. The past two years, in fact, I've got my, my coffee mug from, the year prior there in Charlotte. And, it's a long week, you know, it's some of those, like, sensory overload just because you're like, really, you know, you're talking constantly, you're meeting people, or sometimes you're meeting people that previously you've really only met before, like this.
00:03:35:14 - 00:04:10:11
John Simmerman
You know, us, you know, you know, you know, in a online type of setting or social media type of setting. To me, that's what's really, really special about going to conferences. I've been doing this for, oh, gosh, the better part of 15 years now in the urbanist world. And so I it's gotten to the point where the most, beneficial, the most impactful, the most rewarding parts of these conferences is actually just meeting people and getting together and socializing, the in-between times.
00:04:10:13 - 00:04:28:13
John Simmerman
Occasionally I'll, I'll make sure that I attend a presentation like I did with yours. And that was awesome. Do you do you kind of. Do you notice that, too? Is that, you know, a lot of the impactful stuff is is not only the sessions, but also that time to interact.
00:04:28:15 - 00:04:56:29
Jon Jon Wesolowski
100%. But something I found is you can't always force those interactions. Like, there was a conversation with, with John Anderson in that Chuck Marone and were there for like join that conversation. And it was completely spontaneous. It didn't happen. It wasn't planned. And so where what's interesting is, like, you can't say no, to the in-between times because that's where the magic happens.
00:04:56:29 - 00:05:05:12
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And that's where I got a year off. That was like, man, we had dinner until 10 p.m. and then went to a running group and then, you know, yeah.
00:05:05:12 - 00:05:27:06
John Simmerman
Yeah. That's the that is absolutely so true. So I pulled up your website for the happy Urbanist. You had mentioned that this is really your landing pad for, interacting and giving folks an opportunity to, to interact with other cities. And in fact, you can see the little button there of bring me to your city. Is where you there?
00:05:27:06 - 00:05:45:06
John Simmerman
Because you do get invited to speak in other communities and, and share that message that you were sharing at the Strong Towns national gathering. Why the heck would they do that? Why do they want to bring John John, the happy urbanist to their community?
00:05:45:08 - 00:06:18:25
Jon Jon Wesolowski
I think there's a gulf between professionals that practice urbanism. Decision makers who, hold the keys to things getting done. And then, a third group of people who are most affected by urbanism and what I see myself as is the sort of idea translator in the same vein as, someone like Jane Jacobs, who is not a practicing engineer or even an architect, but someone who takes in qualitative data and tells stories.
00:06:18:27 - 00:06:45:22
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And so, a good portion of what I want to do is help city councilors and city planners not just know that what they're doing is correct, but know how to communicate it to their, you know, to their citizens on how this is helpful, them and why they're making these types of decisions. So, if I do come to your city, like, I want to come and form videos that I'll post to my channel to highlight whatever you're trying to highlight.
00:06:45:24 - 00:07:05:21
Jon Jon Wesolowski
I also do want to come and, you know, speak to, not just professionals in a closed room, but to a larger audience of people who might have questions about what's going on and why is this happening? Or why should we be thinking about reducing lanes on a street in the middle of the downtown or something like that?
00:07:05:24 - 00:07:21:27
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah, I pulled up, the Instagram post here from the Chattanooga Urban Society, explain who the Chattanooga purpose is. That's easy for me to say who the Chattanooga Urban Society actually is.
00:07:21:29 - 00:07:42:26
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. So the of the urban society has a funny origin story where, there is a guardrail taken out on a bridge that left pedestrians who are walking by a vulnerable to a 25ft drop, and it just wasn't getting fixed. It was probably a state route within the city, and there was some work order that put in, and they just put up caution tape to, keep someone from falling.
00:07:42:26 - 00:08:02:20
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And I remember thinking like, the city should have done something, at least for the pedestrians. It could have been would it could have been temporary, but something should have been done. And then I remember thinking, well, I should do something. And at the point I decided to do something about it. I didn't want to get credit for it because I didn't know if I would get in trouble, but I also didn't want the city to get credit for it because they hadn't done anything.
00:08:02:22 - 00:08:23:23
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So I created in my head what was a fake group, with a logo, and I stenciled it on anything that was that was getting put into place. And then I put up a guardrail. And actually, if you go to the Instagram and one of the first posts, you'll see that guardrail that was fixed, and I posted a video about it from anonymous point of view on a, on a channel with zero followers.
00:08:23:23 - 00:08:46:10
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And that first video got 150,000 views in a week. And so I was like, okay, maybe this state group is actually going to become a real group and it since has become that. So we've done all sorts of events. Our main sort of flagship program is we're increasing seating, and benches around the city. And, we build benches for bus stops.
00:08:46:10 - 00:09:07:12
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So that's actually our flagship bench design. And most of them are made from dumpster wood, but all have a very similar look. And, we built upwards of 90 of them throughout the city, doing about 10 to 20 a month at this point. And, that's. Yeah, the urban society, we just received a, at the state of the city.
00:09:07:12 - 00:09:26:28
Jon Jon Wesolowski
The mayor gave the Chattanooga Urban Society an award. And what I love about this is we are not an organization. We're just a mutual aid group. We're not a 501 C3. You can't donate to us yourself. We'll take it. But you're not going to get to get it as a right off it. I tell people we have more in common with three raccoons and a trench coat than we do with the actual organization.
00:09:27:00 - 00:09:54:12
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And, so what's cool is what you're seeing right now was, an art installation where an artist took our bench. It made it beautiful and then put it under, under the theme of boldly taking up space. That's what the whole gallery was about. And, so, yeah, you'll see a lot of benches being built, but you also see things of like being critical of, some of the decisions our city has made, in regards to the, homeless population or pedestrian safety.
00:09:54:12 - 00:10:03:10
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And so the urban society is, has really been like a local incubator for change. And in the city scape.
00:10:03:13 - 00:10:34:21
John Simmerman
Nice, nice. Yeah. And that's what really impressed me about you and your presentation that you gave with the strong Towns National Gathering is just how organic and, not asking permission to do stuff and and really just kind of taking control. I mean, obviously, you know, maybe that first 311 call or post, you know, I, I'm assuming you guys use 311 in City of Chattanooga to report to things that need to be done.
00:10:34:21 - 00:10:53:29
John Simmerman
You know, it's like, okay, we're going to try to use the system and try to, you know, get the city to respond. Do we need a bench at this bus stop? I mean, come on, this is inhumane that we don't have this or, you know, hey, this guardrail is very, very dangerous. We need a safer situation here for for people.
00:10:54:02 - 00:11:29:25
John Simmerman
And so you you're just not shy about. Okay, that's clearly not working. How can we be more creative about this? How can we use, like, the spirit of tactical urbanism, of just pinpointing and doing something and making it happen? And, and I love the fact that you, you know, use a little bit of, of humor to, to to this as well, and creating a fake society and, and just putting it out there because then it, it like creates this momentum of identification of that.
00:11:29:25 - 00:11:36:12
John Simmerman
Oh wow. This is like a community effort, which is what this is really all about.
00:11:36:14 - 00:11:57:03
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. It was a real if if you build it, they will come type of moment where people who wanted to be a part of it. And here's the thing is you have to create involvement at all levels of ability. Like if I just went out there and said, I need, you know, highly skilled craftsmen to build me beautiful benches that we can then set up around town.
00:11:57:05 - 00:12:14:25
Jon Jon Wesolowski
But instead we created events that was like, hey, we're going to have a, a like a wood prepping event if you can pull nails out of would show up, we're going to have a painting of it. If you can paint, show up, we're going to have a trash picking up event. And the idea is like this idea of including people at all levels.
00:12:14:27 - 00:12:38:08
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yes. Part of it is about the people who sit on that bench and experience the ability to sit while they're waiting for 45 minutes for the bus to show up, but also half of this is about the people who are actually doing the work and how they will be changed whenever they drive by and say, I hope make that bench or that place needs a bench, and my eyes are open to it, in part because I've been working on this bench project.
00:12:38:10 - 00:12:47:16
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So it's really cool that it cuts in both directions, that it's helping people as an end goal, but it's also changing the lives of those that that work together in it as well.
00:12:47:18 - 00:13:09:25
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. I went backwards to December 6th, 2022 to show that original, logo that you put together. And again, here's the, the barrier that you were talking about and the challenge that was there and and. Yeah, I mean, taking control, making it happen, I love it. It's good stuff and yeah, just amazing.
00:13:09:27 - 00:13:40:10
Jon Jon Wesolowski
It's also a lot of fun. And I think at the beginning, we were anonymous, in part because we didn't know if we'd get in trouble. But since being recognized by the mayor in different news outlets, we're pretty sure we're not going to get in trouble for a lot of this stuff. But we still use that anonymity because it's almost like we want people to see themselves in this action of like, no, like any individual project will heavily be anchored by one person who saw the vision for that project and let it.
00:13:40:12 - 00:13:57:04
Jon Jon Wesolowski
But instead of giving them the credit, it's a faceless set of hands that gets the credit and all the videos. And so we want people to be able to imagine like, oh, I could go put out a bench, I could go do this. And I hear that all the time where people are like, how do we open up a chapter of the urban society in our city?
00:13:57:06 - 00:14:06:15
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And we'll send them branding assets. They can create it for themselves. And then we just say Google events, whatever or whatever you can, even if you're set up, creates an award. Go build a badge, see what happens. Yeah.
00:14:06:17 - 00:14:57:02
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. The other thing that I really, appreciated about your presentation there at the Strong Towns National Gathering was that sense of of identifying opportunities to create community, to get people to, like, care about their places. And so the benches were apart, but there were other, you know, sort of strategic things. You know, it reminded me a lot of like, the little Free Libraries that you'll see around a neighborhood, you know, you, you're walking in and it creates this sense of, of sociability, and especially for people who are walking and biking, because if you're outside of a car, you notice this kind of stuff.
00:14:57:08 - 00:14:58:15
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah.
00:14:58:18 - 00:15:15:19
John Simmerman
Talk a little bit about that Zeit Geist, because that's very much a part of of what makes your efforts like really, really special is that that sense of community? I think there was even like a kiosk or something like that. It was like a little free library on steroids or something. In your presentation.
00:15:15:21 - 00:15:38:22
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Oh yeah. Great. Great call. So some of this comes back to an idea I got from Monte Anderson. Who is in your home state goes to Stroud Towns. And we were talking about walkability scores. And he said, you know, the only walkable score I care about. And I was like, what's that? And he goes, if people are actually outside walking, how do people inhabit that space?
00:15:38:27 - 00:16:00:14
Jon Jon Wesolowski
That's the true test of whether space is walkable. And so what I like to think about is what are the reasons for people to be in that area? And for most of our neighborhood, there's no reason to be outside of your home. There really isn't like dog walkers meet each other because their dog forces them outside, people who are directly next door.
00:16:00:14 - 00:16:22:05
Jon Jon Wesolowski
But there isn't that sense of place that exists in most neighborhoods in America. And so, when we're looking at the urban society and what we're doing is we're essentially trying to do some more placemaking. And the free little library you're talking about was actually a, a community fridge. So it was food based, but it was anyone can add food to it.
00:16:22:05 - 00:16:46:08
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Anyone can take from it. But what was great about it is, if you're walking by, you can take a picture, upload that picture to your Instagram story. And that's helping people out. That's letting people know, like, there's this needs to get cleaned or this food is available. And what I found really powerful about that is, it increased chance encounters and interactions and community within that.
00:16:46:10 - 00:16:47:26
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So yeah.
00:16:47:29 - 00:17:07:10
John Simmerman
And we're scrolling through your Instagram now. So this is your Instagram. This is your, happy urbanist, page here. And we saw just a moment ago, right when you were saying placemaking, you know, an example of some of your more recent posts, you know, you know, really kind of calling out, you know, placemaking. We've got a whole mixture of different stuff here.
00:17:07:10 - 00:17:35:20
John Simmerman
And then we start to see, whoa, all the pretty pictures are starting to get, you know, lots of words in here. You're starting to get more activated in, in, you know, content creation and putting stuff out. I mean, it's like this walkable distance isn't necessarily walkable. Because and this is one of the challenges I have, and I don't know if you're, I don't even remember this video.
00:17:35:20 - 00:18:07:13
John Simmerman
So I don't know if you're talking about this or riffing about it, but one of the things that really irks me about, walk, score and proximate city, tools that really hone in on walkable distances and say, oh, this place is incredibly walkable because the distance is the proximity. It's very close. And without taking into consideration true walkability, which is oh, yeah, it may be, it may be close, but you can't get there from here because it's incredibly hospital.
00:18:07:16 - 00:18:28:02
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Actually, that video you were just showing was a perfect example. So that video on TikTok got over 10 million views. And it was a very simple video. I was walking to a neighborhood hall, which was like 15 minutes away. And so the distance was walkable, and I was just naming, what am I coming across as I'm going?
00:18:28:04 - 00:19:03:24
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And I did not. This wasn't a heavily planned out video. I was meeting my family at the pool and my wife said, can you just be done with your phone for the night? You know, after work? And I was like, okay, I'll film myself walking in the pool and then I'll be done. And this is exactly what I think, sort of, you know, makes people swallow that blue pill where they realize like, oh, like something that's close by can have sidewalks the entire way and still technically not be walkable for X, Y, and Z reason.
00:19:03:24 - 00:19:25:02
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And that's exactly what the spirit of this video is. I had some images of different spots in my city that were real places, and you see these black and white image under the regular neighborhood. And, and one of them is actually on that street you just saw me walking on, but you could really choose any of those images.
00:19:25:04 - 00:19:43:07
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And what you'll notice is the sidewalk infrastructure hasn't changed between those two time periods. So if you go to the 19th, oh, this is the perfect. This is exactly the one I wanted to do. So. So this is the original neighborhood in Chattanooga. It's a very suburban neighborhood, but it used to be a streetcar suburb, so it had its own little town center.
00:19:43:07 - 00:20:05:12
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Right. And these two images, the sidewalks are the same, and one of them is walkable. And one is why is that? One? You had a reason to be walking in one of them. You had stores and resources and third places and the other one, you see, it's a lot of empty lots. And one of them, it was busy enough that the traffic moved slowly.
00:20:05:14 - 00:20:31:26
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And the other one, you'll see that it's a thoroughfare and cars go at incredibly fast speeds. So one of the things, that I think is really novel, that people open their eyes to is that you can't drop a sidewalk in a walkable block, make like you have to do more than that. And, and what's magic about doing more than that is it doesn't take a lot of I don't think initially it doesn't take a lot of top down planning.
00:20:32:02 - 00:20:55:04
Jon Jon Wesolowski
It takes just removing restrictions, allow things to develop organically. And that's really what what I'm all about here, showing people like this is what our neighborhood used to look like. There. It's so funny. You've traveled, a lot. Last year. I was in Europe for seven and a half months. I always caught myself using the term downtown, and Europeans didn't understand what I was talking about.
00:20:55:07 - 00:21:10:15
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And it's so funny because that's true of American cities pre-war is that we had lots of little downtowns. You have lots of little neighborhoods, centers that rival what a downtown is. And most American cities today.
00:21:10:17 - 00:21:34:28
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah, they would use typically Centrum. To mean the, the city center or the historic core. Some of the cities were, depending on how old they were and whether they had any, Roman origin. There may have been a or like if you visit severe Seville, you know, you've got the old historic wall that, you know, that was around the original city.
00:21:35:01 - 00:21:52:13
John Simmerman
Many of the cities in the Netherlands, had a star pattern of the canals that were part of the fortress. So the city center, the old historic core, I say, I would say downtown all the time. And they were like, what are you talking about? Oh, the city center, the historic core. Oh, that's what you mean.
00:21:52:16 - 00:22:13:05
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And it's funny to see how, Oh, this this is a street I was actually on in that neighborhood. And, what's interesting about this is whenever I show this picture, because, if I don't know if you can quite tell one building is exactly the same on the left hand side, it says, like Tennessee Awning Company. It's been active for the last 50 years.
00:22:13:07 - 00:22:38:13
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Or 75 years, I should say about 50 years since this picture was taken. And, what's interesting is that any neighbor I show agrees that what used to be there was better than what's there now. Mostly just empty parking lots and chain-link fences. But whenever you get to an issue where zoning changes that will make that bottom picture possible come into play, people vote against it.
00:22:38:13 - 00:22:57:25
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And this is my whole M.O. is just helping people understand. If you want neighborhoods like you see in the bottom picture, then you're going to have to make decisions like that might mean narrowing roads or allowing for a mixed use development to be within a block of your house or something like that.
00:22:57:27 - 00:23:18:11
John Simmerman
Yeah. What's interesting to this is one of the first times I've seen like, an example of where we actually see one major, major improvement in the new version versus the old version. What am I talking about?
00:23:18:13 - 00:23:21:08
Jon Jon Wesolowski
You know, I, I may have missed it. What?
00:23:21:10 - 00:23:24:18
John Simmerman
It's the burying of the utility lines.
00:23:24:20 - 00:23:34:08
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Well, actually, you you say that they just moved one street over. They're not as they're not as obnoxious on the street, but they do exist on the next street over.
00:23:34:14 - 00:23:56:07
John Simmerman
Because that's one of the pet peeves I have is that, you know, so often, you know, we've got these overhead utility lines and, you know, they're and what space are they taking up? Well, they're typically taking up pedestrian realm. You know, they're or you know and it's just so frustrating how often times you know, oh we can't get there.
00:23:56:10 - 00:24:06:23
John Simmerman
You know, if you're with somebody who happens to be in a wheelchair because the, you know, the pedestrian realm is impassable if somebody, is, is not able bodied.
00:24:06:26 - 00:24:27:13
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. So actually, that's one of the biggest things that I use when I'm here, I'm presenting to city council, is the amount of people in mobility aids that use the bike lane. Because if you get to a curb that's not cut or a telephone pole that's in the middle, you have to backtrack 300ft to the next access point.
00:24:27:17 - 00:24:34:16
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So why not just right start off, start off in the street to begin with. And that's, incredibly popular. In my city as well.
00:24:34:18 - 00:25:02:26
John Simmerman
Well, in, in, in you bring up a really good point too. And I try to to emphasize this on the Active Towns channel all the time when we look at cities that have incredibly high rates of people riding bikes for utilitarian purposes, getting to their meaningful destinations, those networks, those cities that have been developed, are incredibly comfortable for all ages and abilities, and all ability is part of that phrase.
00:25:02:26 - 00:25:40:09
John Simmerman
All ages and abilities also means that it's the preferred place for somebody in a mobility device, a wheelchair, or other type of mobility device to want to be in it's way smoother, more, more cohesive than it is to be, you know, sharing pedestrian rail. And so that's exactly what you see throughout the Netherlands and in Copenhagen and many other places like that is you see that those that cycle network is in fact, a wheeling network that is, you know, supporting people who are on bikes or on mobility devices, on scooters of various types.
00:25:40:12 - 00:25:55:00
John Simmerman
And, and it's just part of an enhanced level of mobility for them. And, and then you still have to have a very attractive and comfortable pedestrian realm as well. So yeah, just wanted to put that in there.
00:25:55:03 - 00:26:16:25
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And I saw that this summer in Chicago. Obviously Chicago has a long way to go to become, you know, Denmark or anything like that. But in a few places I saw some nice protected bike paths. That's where I saw like, it was truly multimodal. There was lots of different types of wheels. People going through that pathway.
00:26:16:27 - 00:26:43:21
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And then, of course, I saw that a lot. When I was in Belgium last year or so. Belgium, seems to have gotten that right. I think of these as like, as like in the are you familiar with the term indicator species in biology? And so that's something I, I like push with cities all the time is like, these are your indicator species if they're people who are here by choice, then you're doing something right.
00:26:43:23 - 00:27:07:07
Jon Jon Wesolowski
If there are people, if you only see people who are forced to be here, in this format, then something is wrong. And so, seeing someone with the mobility aid in an unsafe bike lane, that's, that's a negative indicator species. But seeing somebody who's out with their family, you're having fun. You're probably going to see them in a great protected pathway.
00:27:07:07 - 00:27:12:21
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And that's a positive indicator species, that you'd be looking for there as far as placemaking goes.
00:27:12:24 - 00:27:35:15
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. And I, and I say that a lot about women and children, you know, women, children and the elderly. If you're seeing lots of women, children and the elderly, you know, on bikes, you know, on their mobility devices, joyfully, getting around to their meaningful destinations, then that's your indicator species that you got the design, right?
00:27:35:18 - 00:28:01:10
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. And that's, one of the things, that we'll get to, I'm running for a local office now. And one of the things is people are like, oh, isn't he the bike lane guy? Because I've kind of been I've been branded as someone who has advocated for pedestrian and cyclist safety. And some people are like, well, you know, we don't have the luxury of riding bikes in this district or riding, you know, like that.
00:28:01:12 - 00:28:23:28
Jon Jon Wesolowski
That's something that people that wear Lycra and carbon fiber bikes, that's what they do on the other side of town. We don't have the luxury of doing that. And that's one of the myths I'm trying to dispel, is like, the upper the economic mobility of our district could be contingent on people safely getting access to opportunities they otherwise wouldn't safely have access to.
00:28:24:00 - 00:28:46:05
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And, it's normal to see a white 30 year old man riding in and out of traffic on a bicycle. But when it's so safe that a child that you can bring your children along on the bike ride, that's when you realize, okay, this is not just safe for children, it's safe for economic access. It's safe for delightful evenings with your friends.
00:28:46:07 - 00:29:02:27
Jon Jon Wesolowski
It's safer, you know, I don't know, boosting the local economy, increasing community. The those things are, are all part of making a great multimodal pathway and connecting, like, neighborhoods and nodes throughout the city.
00:29:02:29 - 00:29:27:07
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. And I love that concept of thinking of this as a multi-modal pathway versus a bike lane. A bike lane kind of conjures up an image, in the general population of, oh, yeah, why are we doing that? Why are we, you know, going bending over backwards to create infrastructure for that dude in Lycra. Nothing against dudes in Lycra.
00:29:27:07 - 00:29:48:08
John Simmerman
I'm a dude. Sometimes I wear lycra. You know, I've got my racing bike as well. Yes, but to to to your point, you know, those people are actually those people. Me. You know, I'm comfortable just riding on the on the shoulder of, you know, over the country road. In fact, it's it's absolutely delightful to be able to do that.
00:29:48:10 - 00:30:21:04
John Simmerman
And I'm comfortable riding in traffic, too, but that's not what we're building. Mobility multi user mobility infrastructure for. We're building safe and inviting all ages and abilities cycle networks so that we can do just like we said earlier, make it truly safe and inviting for all ages and abilities to be able to use that. And so it really kind of shifts that conjuring of what the stereotypical person we're talking about when we're saying we're building, this infrastructure for.
00:30:21:07 - 00:30:52:07
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And I think it goes even beyond that. So in, in Chattanooga, there is a heavily pedestrianized area, called Frazier Avenue. And the longest pedestrian bridge, in the US dumps people from downtown into the North Shore, right on Frazier Avenue in Chattanooga. And there's little shops there. It's fun to walk there. But it's a 4 to 5 lane strode that cuts through there, and it's incredibly dangerous.
00:30:52:10 - 00:31:16:18
Jon Jon Wesolowski
This one building that got hit last year has been hit eight times since the year 2000. Last year there were 37 vehicle incidents on this, like 4 to 5 blocks of road from the street side parking. And we even got federal grants eight years ago to make it right. And the businesses were against right sizing it and adding bike facilities, and that kept it from happening.
00:31:16:18 - 00:31:41:22
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And then last year, there was an incredible tragedy where entire family was hit and two out of the three family members died, including a small child. And that was a wake up call and that that road is now getting treatment. But even after it was decided that that road would be right size, the businesses came out against bike lanes and bike facilities and and if you drill down and ask them why, they were saying, well, the cyclists are annoying, they're always on the sidewalks.
00:31:41:22 - 00:32:04:13
Jon Jon Wesolowski
They're like, well, why are they on the sidewalks? Why why do you think people on the Segway and electric skateboards are running into your patrons on the sidewalks? There's no safe way for them. And they're sort of counterproposal was to have a cycling path through the park behind the building. So so the cyclists needed to get somewhere they they can bypass the area.
00:32:04:15 - 00:32:27:09
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And I realize they don't see cyclists as shoppers. They don't see cyclists as people with wallets. And so that's where we had to start this campaign that like, you don't get paid by cars driving by, but by wallets coming through the door and someone on a bike, who's more likely to notice your shop because they're moving at a slower speed and is more likely to stop because it's not a hassle to park.
00:32:27:12 - 00:32:53:24
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Are way better shoppers than someone who's trying to go home from work taking the fastest way possible. And and that was a huge paradigm shift. And you all honestly, the studies were on our side and we could show those studies all day. But it took analogies, anecdotes, illustrations, stories to show cyclists are shoppers like cyclists. I can help run your business and you want them coming by your front door.
00:32:53:24 - 00:32:57:15
Jon Jon Wesolowski
You don't want some path around the back. So,
00:32:57:17 - 00:33:34:11
John Simmerman
Well, if I can jump in and just say this, it's like part of the challenge that we have in trying to, to help businesses, business owners, see, this is, is for us to even change our language and not even call them cyclists. I mean, what we're really talking about is people. We're trying to create a people oriented place so that people, people, people who might be walking, people who might be riding a bike, people who might be in a wheelchair mobility device can get to your business and interact with your business.
00:33:34:17 - 00:34:15:27
John Simmerman
The second thing is, is that there's often times and you know this and maybe you're about to talk about this is that there's this misperception that all 100% of my customers come by car. And and that's just an erroneous perspective, because you don't really know how people are coming. That may be the case if you're a completely in a completely car dependent location, but if you're in a location that is, you know, quote unquote Main Street USA, where, you know, 100 and some odd years ago before the automobile took over, you know, this was a place that was thriving because it was an attractor for people getting there.
00:34:16:00 - 00:34:32:16
John Simmerman
And, you know, and we've allowed the automobile to take over, then you, you know, you have an opportunity to to really kind of lean into the fact that, as you mentioned, it's wall, it's walking through the door, not cars driving past.
00:34:32:18 - 00:34:55:06
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And that's something we also tried to bring up was that if you look at the street itself, Frazier Avenue, the south side of the street is full of shops and those shops are thriving. Rent is high right across the street. The shops are, a little bit more dead, a little bit slower and, and a lot more vacancies on the north side of the street.
00:34:55:06 - 00:35:13:26
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And it's because the street is unsafe to cross on, and the pedestrians are coming from downtown and to and from the park, and to the point where there's even a parking garage on the other side of the street. So there's 300 parking spaces on the north side. But what you see instead are people crossing mid-block to get to the south side of the street, because that's where the buildings are.
00:35:13:26 - 00:35:40:16
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And 30 people are, and that side of the street is brought alive by individuals and people. So, it it is it is interesting. We'll see how it all plays out. But what's so powerful about this moment is that we are going to do this street correctly. And after five blocks, the street turns into a state route, and it's going to be much more likely that the state route will add bike facilities to match the urban fabric that we've created.
00:35:40:19 - 00:36:01:04
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And I think that's one of the reasons why I'm so passionate about the idea of getting involved locally is that, we're creating roadmaps for how other cities can influence, you know, their state Department of Transportation, who has huge say, especially in southern cities, and how your urban fabric is laid out fantastic.
00:36:01:08 - 00:36:19:21
John Simmerman
Okay. So yes, you have made the decision to to run for city council. This is your landing page for, your, campaign, talks a little bit. Talk us through a little bit about, when the election is and what really prompted you to want to throw your hat in the ring for this?
00:36:19:23 - 00:36:47:07
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah, there's a recent Atlantic article podcast, by Jerusalem, us. Who who said something that I'm having a hard time accepting. So one very wonderful writer and, really on top of, topics that have to do with cities and urbanism, but essentially what they're calling for almost seems like a retreat from local politics. They're saying we've wanted to engage in local politics because it feels the most democratic.
00:36:47:07 - 00:37:13:27
Jon Jon Wesolowski
It feels like you have the most influence. There. But because those elections aren't highly, attended, perhaps the most Democratic thing is to move to the state and the federal level. And so there's there's sort of like prescribing this retreat from local politics. Let's fix zoning on the state level. That, to me feels like the privilege of a more progressive or like, forward thinking state, like new Jersey.
00:37:13:29 - 00:37:44:21
Jon Jon Wesolowski
But that isn't going to be something that happens anytime soon. And Tennessee, where I live. And here, the local control is going to be where it most likely happens. So my decision to run for local politics was really based on two things. If it can be done, I want to see if we can do it and if we can do that as an example to cities in the American South to say, you don't have to wait till you're a, you know, left coast, blue city.
00:37:44:26 - 00:38:15:17
Jon Jon Wesolowski
In fact, there are many reasons within a conservative vernacular for increasing property rights. As hard as it is to to advocate, to increase affordable housing and things like that. So one is to be that example two is to realize the power of community and experimentation and cities that feel underfunded. And here's what I mean by that is every city councilor is fighting for a small piece of pie when it comes to the budget, and I think I should do that as a city council.
00:38:15:17 - 00:38:40:03
Jon Jon Wesolowski
I should fight for the resources for my district. But it's underutilized to see city council members activating their community towards more tactical actions. And, so, one example of this is in my community, I'm not a city councilor yet, but I'm just doing this as a private citizen, as I've applied for a grant to make a safe pathway to school and my neighborhood.
00:38:40:05 - 00:39:10:27
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And, I've gotten friends who've worked for the city to draw and make compliant plans. We're looking at local, foundations to match that grant. But when we win the grant, there is no pathway for the city to get this done. We're going to have to do it ourselves with the permission of the city. But if we're able to pull this off and create a sort of paper pathway for others to follow, essentially what we've unlocked is the ability to have official tactical urbanism in a city that hasn't really done that before.
00:39:11:04 - 00:39:21:11
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And so, that's the second thing I'm really running on, is the ability to empower the community to shape itself, regardless of what funding it does or doesn't get right.
00:39:21:18 - 00:39:45:24
John Simmerman
And if I click on your your priorities, here we are on that. We've got infrastructure neighborhoods and communities and housing are your three big buckets that you have. And you know, priorities. It's time for deeds, not words. I mean, that's a big part of your entire zeitgeist in terms of the types of things that you have been doing.
00:39:45:27 - 00:40:08:25
John Simmerman
It is yeah, it's it's not just time to talk about it. And it's also not time to necessarily just ask permission about it. Let's, let's, let's do some stuff. You just said it there again is is that tactical. You know, let's have that spirit of let's get it out there. Let's trial this. Let's move quickly on some of these, you know, installations and, and interventions.
00:40:08:27 - 00:40:33:04
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And the closing speaker for Strong Towns this year was a city planner named Bachar Patel, who I now like consider a friend. And baka, when she was talking about what they did in Jersey city to achieve Vision Zero, it was action. It was use what you have. The only green paint we have is used for tennis courts where we're going to use it.
00:40:33:06 - 00:41:10:12
Jon Jon Wesolowski
We've made bike lanes safe enough that anyone can ride on them, but not everyone's riding on them. What can we do? Well, we're going to add a ponytail to the cyclist symbol so that people can see this isn't just for for for the guys in Lycra. Yeah, the ongoing joke of us and so, what I find so inspiring about that is that a city has shown that there is more than just two narratives when it comes to safety and infrastructure right now, the, the, the narrative is this anything that happens is a tragedy as a result of, a freak accident.
00:41:10:18 - 00:41:25:14
Jon Jon Wesolowski
What can we do? Or human error? What can we do? Like if this person was wearing bright clothing, this wouldn't have happened. If this person wasn't drinking. This wouldn't have happened. So there's a human error, and then there's a freak accident. This is a 1 in 1,000,000 thing.
00:41:25:17 - 00:41:30:25
John Simmerman
Yeah, it was just. It was one of those things. It was this, like, you know, who knew? Yeah.
00:41:30:28 - 00:41:53:22
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And. And this is where I want to start getting into the discussion of if we're having repair repeat freak accidents, then it's not a freak accident. It's the design of the system. And let's change that system. And so, what you see here on the screen is an accumulation of crashes over the last five years in downtown Chattanooga.
00:41:53:27 - 00:42:11:05
Jon Jon Wesolowski
We know where the red spots are. What are we doing differently in those spots today to, to lower or to to lighten that color? And the answer is nothing. So, the answer is people need to stop speeding in those areas, or people need to pay attention to those areas or not look at their phone in those areas.
00:42:11:07 - 00:42:19:29
Jon Jon Wesolowski
But we know where they are. We can target them. And that's really what I want to be about, is taking this sort of action and the next right foot forward.
00:42:20:02 - 00:42:46:20
John Simmerman
It's also changing the conversation that's happening right. It's like we've we basically have 70 to 80 years of having the narrative shaped by what you were just talking about is blaming the victim or blaming the not behind the wheel. It's that human error perspective. The human error orientation versus the built environment orientation of this is the way that we've built this.
00:42:46:20 - 00:43:20:08
John Simmerman
We looked at, you know, several examples of of you know, streetscapes. And you described, you know, the of the road going through. I mean, we have built a system that is delivering expected results. This is not an accident. This is an expected result. And so that's an incredibly important thing to, to realize and to embrace, I think and, and it's hard for people to understand that these hotspots, this is not just where, you know, the into inattentive people congregate.
00:43:20:10 - 00:43:38:24
John Simmerman
This is this is this is because of the design of the infrastructure that's there. And we can change that. And in a city, the thing that absolutely destroys vitality and vibrancy and safety and inviting and welcoming environments is motor vehicle speed.
00:43:38:26 - 00:44:02:26
Jon Jon Wesolowski
You know, and it's so interesting that you, you, you bring that up because your experience, overseas probably affirms this and that other city planners recognize us and, and one of the things I I've, I've tried to tell people because like, again, I'm in the American South, I'm not using the same language that someone would use in the Barrie area.
00:44:02:29 - 00:44:19:11
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So a, you know, someone's going to sit here and talk about why you need to be able to get to work. And then and they make it about like a personal rights issue. And I'm like, look, there are two rights that play your right to speed through. My neighborhood is usurping my right for my kids to play safely in my street.
00:44:19:14 - 00:44:43:07
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And so what we need to come to is, is this idea that it's not just about one set of rights that are being infringed upon when we reduce lanes downtown or something like that, but instead it's a conversation about what is this neighborhood actually for? What are we supposed to be doing here? And, and when you frame the conversation like that, I think you actually get a different dialog than just three lanes.
00:44:43:07 - 00:45:04:05
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Good. Five lanes bad. You know, you start framing it around like, what are we supposed to be doing in this location? And does the street design bring about that benefit? Those benefits, and something you said earlier because you talked about the indicator species of the old, the young having a good time, that's also been really helpful for me.
00:45:04:05 - 00:45:31:22
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Whenever someone gets hit and the narrative is they were looking at their phone or they're drunk or something like that, what I like to say is, okay, a drunk individual is simulating the awareness of a child. And so what I tell people is what we need in public spaces are streets so safe kids can play in them. And when we have that, it'll also be safe for the phone zombie that's not paying attention.
00:45:31:25 - 00:45:57:13
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Or, you know, the person that is over imbibed on a on a Saturday evening and what I tell people is like, we should look at the most vulnerable people, for whatever reason, as a simulation, for the people we care about the most. And I think personally, both lives are equally worthy, but safe streets and safe children, and playing them, rings differently for for certain group of people.
00:45:57:16 - 00:46:28:06
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. I this image that you, shared this pair of images here. I'll have you describe it for the listening only audience as well. But one of the words that you just use there that, you know, people will oftentimes, you know, bring up or the narratives they'll bring up is don't infringe upon my freedoms, you know, to be able to drive live, you know, anywhere I want to go as fast as I want to go, you know, you're you're you're you're infringing on my, my rights to be able to do so.
00:46:28:08 - 00:46:54:14
John Simmerman
And I like to to reframe that and say, well, actually, what we're talking about here is trying to, create freedom of movement. We're talking, you know, being able to to live in a place that's kind of like on the left hand side of this, this image here, looks like if we if we get the design right and it's truly a safe and inviting environment within reasonable distances, it looks like 2000ft here is is the distance that we're looking at.
00:46:54:17 - 00:47:11:07
John Simmerman
That to me is is like the the ultimate in freedom because you have hopefully that option of mobility choice. But that may not be the framing that you have for this particular set of images. Take it away. What are we looking at here, and why did you want to share this with the audience?
00:47:11:10 - 00:47:34:21
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah, I got this image from Victor Dover who gave me permission to share it, use it on social, and it's one of my favorite images. So it shows 2000ft of road, and a similarly wide road. So when you look at this and you look at the direct resources, both of these images are using the same amount of resources, 2000ft of asphalt for what is, I think, a 32ft wide road.
00:47:34:24 - 00:47:58:12
Jon Jon Wesolowski
In one image you see a downtown, I believe it's, in Virginia with lots of buildings close together. You see some green there. So you got to imagine there's a parking there. There's a church that is sort of the terminating this this, so the street ends at that church. And then on the other image you have what is 6 or 7 structures with lots of yard and between maybe a couple houses, but some businesses.
00:47:58:15 - 00:48:18:05
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And this really is telling a couple of stories. So one, the story you were just telling, if you were to ask about the freedom of choice and you walk out of any of those buildings, which one gives you more access to more things? It's the one where the mixed use, dense, densely brought together places.
00:48:18:08 - 00:48:28:11
John Simmerman
Granted, this is gentle density to let's, let's, you know, for those people who they hear the word density and they're just. Yeah. Oh, my God, this is terrible. You're talking about a three storey building.
00:48:28:11 - 00:48:49:24
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. Yeah. This is gentle. Yeah. And yeah. And obviously there's tree canopy along the street that is you know so so that's the first thing is like which one. So the first, the first question is which one gives you more choices whenever you walk out the door. The second question I ask people is which one do you think developed as a result of choices versus restrictions?
00:48:50:02 - 00:49:17:23
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So on the right hand side you see a lot of yards and big parking lots. That's the that's the result of policy of saying you have to have so many setbacks. You can have maximum lot coverage. You can't use this type of building in this area. And that's what I did. And then the third question, and I think this is the most important one, is I asked which one of these generates tax revenue that can afford that 2000ft² of asphalt.
00:49:17:25 - 00:49:38:02
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And the the exact right answer to that is the left one, the one with the gentle density. And so, any time you talk about this, you got to talk about urban three and the work they do. The image that's pulled up right now is a simulation of that. So I asked the question, who pays? Chattanooga built Chattanooga's bills?
00:49:38:04 - 00:50:01:14
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And when you visualize the data, you see that downtown disproportionately subsidizes the suburbs. And we've essentially outlawed the type of development that brings in that type of revenue. And so what I, what I like to make with those three points is the individual on the street is the gentle, dense with the of the neighborhood with gentle density.
00:50:01:14 - 00:50:24:19
Jon Jon Wesolowski
They have more choice and more options. Therefore they have more freedom. The owners of the land of, of that area have more freedom and rights of what they can do with their land, and as a result, they inherit more, more services and more wealth as a result of the, the economic engine that those two that those two street or that that one street shows over the other.
00:50:24:19 - 00:50:25:06
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So yeah.
00:50:25:12 - 00:50:48:16
John Simmerman
I think that's, that's a really good thing to, to, you know, emphasize and to give additional context to that, you had mentioned the image on the right here, the spread out development pattern. You mentioned the cost of the road, you know, of that 2000ft of road. We also have to think of all the other infrastructure that's there underneath the road.
00:50:48:16 - 00:51:34:19
John Simmerman
You've got the bury the sewer lines and all of that. And so part of what really brings home how powerful this revenue, tax revenue per acre analysis that, urban three has done new duplicated here by a data that you were able to get publicly is just that point is that the further out that we spread ourselves out, there's no way for us to actually tax those far out places, those landowners, enough to be able to bring in enough money to cover the long term obligation of that infrastructure.
00:51:34:22 - 00:51:55:22
John Simmerman
When those water pipes go bad, when the sewer lines go bad, when the road needs to be repaved, you know, we're getting new water mains and sewer pipes in our neighborhood here, which was platted in the 1930s. And so, you know, a lot of that infrastructure, you know, is getting, you know, pretty darn close to 100 years old.
00:51:55:26 - 00:52:28:25
John Simmerman
It's crumbling. It needs to be replaced. And so we're going through that painful exercise of doing that. It's a heck of a lot easier to be able to afford as a city. This is really good for a, potential city council member to understand is that, yeah, if we are in, if we have more places that are in the green here that are bringing in more tax revenue per acre, we can actually have a better chance of being able to afford that ongoing obligation and maintenance.
00:52:29:02 - 00:52:59:11
John Simmerman
It also brings in the fact that being able to develop more closely to the development pattern of the left side of this, where we do have that gentle density versus the right side, where everything is sort of sprawling and spread out, the more likely that the city coffers are going to have the money in the future, assuming the city does a good job of like putting that money aside to be able to to pay for, you know, that future obligation.
00:52:59:13 - 00:53:05:28
John Simmerman
There's a whole nother thing that that Chuck talks about where cities aren't doing that, but that's another discussion.
00:53:06:00 - 00:53:29:24
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And that's the thing. What you said reminded me of two anecdotes. The first one I think I got from Hayden Clark in The Transit Guy, and he brought up that, Nashville is 13 times the size of Barcelona and land and like, footprint, but a smaller size population. You can't afford that sewer lines 13 times, power lines, things of that nature.
00:53:29:27 - 00:53:44:13
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And Chattanooga is lucky for every one person that moves out of Chattanooga. Three are moving in. If anyone can afford, to thrive as a city, it should be a growing city like Chattanooga. Yeah.
00:53:44:14 - 00:53:45:23
John Simmerman
And Austin too. Yeah.
00:53:45:28 - 00:54:07:15
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. And our problem is we have 2500 lane miles of road, and on a good year, we will pave 60 to 70 miles. And if you do the math that comes out to like 32 years, we need some of these roads, the last 40 years, we need these roads to last. And I talked to an engineer and I said, how long are these roads designed to last?
00:54:07:15 - 00:54:28:26
Jon Jon Wesolowski
These like 25 years is stretching it. 15 to 20 years is normal for some of these roads. And so it's just like even as a city that that is punctuated with growth. If the growth pattern is working backwards, then scaling up makes things worse, not better. So so if the growth pattern is causing debt, then increasing that pattern makes the problem worse.
00:54:28:26 - 00:54:29:21
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And that's something that.
00:54:29:28 - 00:54:53:22
John Simmerman
So give a little bit of a context to the setting there in Chattanooga. I've never visited Chattanooga. I need to get there. I need to spend some time on the ground with you. I have been to Memphis, though, and so I understand the the situation in Memphis. Memphis, just like Austin, grew exponentially back in the day and sprawled out to massive, massive levels.
00:54:53:27 - 00:55:16:22
John Simmerman
And then, of course, had the the city center in the core, go through really, really getting hollowed out and having difficult times. That sense has started to change in the medical district is one of the areas, the neighborhoods that are coming around and there's lots of, lots of wonderful folks like Roshan Austin there in South Memphis, who's doing some great stuff there.
00:55:16:24 - 00:55:23:27
John Simmerman
But what's the what's the situation there in Chattanooga? Are you guys relatively compact or did you all sprawl out as well?
00:55:23:29 - 00:55:33:16
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. So, Chattanooga in 1969 was, named by Walter Cronkite. The dirtiest city in America. Okay, we we have a.
00:55:33:17 - 00:55:35:19
John Simmerman
Scam during that context.
00:55:35:21 - 00:55:59:13
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah, well, we're an industrial city, okay? That was in a valley. And so it like what I heard from someone I actually use, one of the original members of of seeing you. And he was telling me when he lived in Chattanooga in the 60s that most days you couldn't see the mountain, the mountain being Lookout Mountain.
00:55:59:16 - 00:56:03:16
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Now, Lookout Mountain, is right downtown.
00:56:03:17 - 00:56:04:07
John Simmerman
Like, is it like.
00:56:04:07 - 00:56:26:14
Jon Jon Wesolowski
The foot of it scoops into downtown? So you're sitting here thinking like you can't see that mountain most days. And so it was a dirty, polluted city that has turned itself around first and foremost in the 90s by focusing on its downtown area, making a world class sort of area. So Chattanooga has branded itself as a beautiful place, both in natural resources and in its like downtown core.
00:56:26:15 - 00:56:47:24
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And that's true. Like if people that visit Chattanooga tend to have a positive view of it. But what's happened is there's developed to Chattanooga's the one you visit and the one you live in, the one you visit has a pedestrian bridge that spans the river. And, actually, what's really interesting about this map is you see the city outline, and then you see that little donut in the middle.
00:56:47:24 - 00:57:10:01
Jon Jon Wesolowski
It looks like a, it's that's the city of Red Bank. So Chattanooga started sprawling so much that a town in cooperated. And Chattanooga just kept spreading and went all the way around. There's three communities that Chattanooga has subsumed that, a red bank is a whole city. There's one called Ridge Side that's literally a neighborhood. And then one called Eastridge.
00:57:10:01 - 00:57:11:24
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And so what happened, which.
00:57:11:28 - 00:57:14:27
John Simmerman
Is but by the way, Austin did that as well.
00:57:14:29 - 00:57:15:18
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Oh, it's so cool.
00:57:15:21 - 00:57:56:25
John Simmerman
It was it was. And again, a lot of, a lot of cities do this. It's that process of, you know, going out and continuing to annex in more and more, less land, especially when that land has, has already been allowed to develop in sometimes unincorporated areas, sometimes historic villages. But the development, you know, pattern like started exploding and they might be in the area of like the utility and police and fire, service district, but because that's not officially part of the city, the city doesn't get any of those taxes.
00:57:56:25 - 00:58:19:07
John Simmerman
And so cities are oftentimes very incentivized to try to annex and more land. Okay. That kind of helps with your tax rolls today. But again, you're taking on the obligation of an additional, most likely sprawled out, infrastructure. Again, all those roads, all those sewer pipes, all that water, all the utilities.
00:58:19:07 - 00:58:44:02
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah, exactly. And it creates greenfield development, which Chattanooga has a lot of brownfield because of that and that cheap quick injection of cash, you see a lot of developers that come in and make deals that say, hey, we'll build the roads, we'll build the infrastructure. You just adopted a city infrastructure once we're done and that works. But then it's the growth Ponzi scheme where 20 years from now, now we can't afford to to maintain what we have.
00:58:44:06 - 00:59:04:15
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So Chattanooga is in this really interesting moment. We're a world class city in so many ways. We have the fastest internet on the planet. It's a public utility. You as a private citizen could get 60 gigs of internet to your house. And it's attracting tech companies. We host a lot of festivals and events, but we're at a decision.
00:59:04:15 - 00:59:24:29
Jon Jon Wesolowski
We're at a point where we're going to decide whether or not we're going to be a programed based city that is primarily geared towards outsiders and hospitality. Or are we going to become a wonderful place to live for citizens? And as you and I know, the best places to visit are places that have gotten that second thing right, they've just made a wonderful places to live.
00:59:25:02 - 00:59:45:26
Jon Jon Wesolowski
I don't like going, I'm going gonna speak from my experience in Belgium. You know, I love cities that feel lived in and feel like real cities. Whereas, like, you can go to Brugge, which is a wonderful city, but in some ways, the tourist, local level is so high that it feels like Disneyworld. It doesn't feel like a real place.
00:59:45:29 - 01:00:00:25
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And I think that's a lesson that Chattanooga has to learn, is that we can continue to focus on the small part of downtown to attract festivals and events and people, or we can make it a wonderful place to live and trust that people love visiting wonderful places.
01:00:00:27 - 01:00:37:23
John Simmerman
Yeah, I gotta pull this graphic back up because I had mentioned earlier, I sort of spoke disparagingly to density and oftentimes the the knee jerk reaction that that residents have, the NIMBYs have to, to basically saying no to any increased density is that they feel like it's going to be this sudden intensification of, oh my gosh, right next to my single family home, which was built in the 1930s, is going to be a, you know, 30 storey tower.
01:00:37:25 - 01:01:15:04
John Simmerman
And it's just going to be is going to destroy my, you know, sense of character to the neighborhood, but also just kind of, you know, feel like I'm, you know, being dwarfed by this massive, massive tower. What what's really, really interesting is there's a place and a time, you know, for those residential towers and that situation for us in Austin, that's very much in our downtown area where we have a vibrant, situation where we do have residential towers that have now been built, which is a complete turnaround for the city.
01:01:15:04 - 01:01:47:12
John Simmerman
20 years ago, nobody was living in downtown except for the the neighborhoods, you know, within walking, biking distance from their, which I happened to be in. I happen to be a very, very comfortable five minute bike ride from the downtown, area of Austin, Texas. But now we have a plethora of towers that are there to matching with the towers of the business district and the music district and all of the other, you know, things that are happening which are cool and hip and fun in the downtown area.
01:01:47:15 - 01:02:09:10
John Simmerman
That's not what we're talking about here. So the incremental intensification and what I like to call gentle density and missing middle housing, is what we're so lacking in, in our, you know, in our environments here in North America. Walk us through this, this particular slide and why you wanted to share this with the audience.
01:02:09:13 - 01:02:30:16
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. So for those listening, there's this on the left hand side. It says incremental intensification. And it shows houses. And then it shows the houses getting a little bit bigger and then buildings filling in the empty space. And then you see some like short towers and houses mixed together. And then the sudden intensification shows houses and then giant apartment blocks.
01:02:30:19 - 01:03:04:04
Jon Jon Wesolowski
The reason I show this is I like asking people what they're worried about their neighborhood becoming, and a lot of times it's soulless person personality lists, buildings that seem to pop up, in growing cities and towns across America. And then I want to ask the up a question is, why do you think those pop up? And it's almost always going to be a very not necessarily untrue, but a very simple answer of like greedy developers or business owners that want to maximize their profit.
01:03:04:06 - 01:03:24:24
Jon Jon Wesolowski
But then I want to ask a follow up question and say, okay, why are they doing that now? And why didn't someone do something smaller earlier? And that question is where people kind of get stopped. And the answer is, if you don't like big, ugly buildings, we actually need to loosen restrictions because what happens is the restrictions build up a need that's so great.
01:03:24:24 - 01:03:46:22
Jon Jon Wesolowski
When the dam breaks, you have these big buildings. I think Austin is a perfect example. People talk about Austin and Minneapolis. Far from being affordable places, they're a lot more affordable than if they didn't build the way they've been building in the last few years. But also that Austin is probably an example of there being an intense need.
01:03:46:25 - 01:03:52:27
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And there was an, a sort of pathway for incremental development for the decades up until that need.
01:03:52:29 - 01:04:19:18
John Simmerman
That's very that's very well said. Because really, what we have seen here in Austin on the ground until some recent changes by city council to allow a little bit more of the incremental intensification that we see on the left, what we were pretty much the only thing we were getting was that sudden intensification, which just spurs even more resistance from, you know, from the not in my backyard group, because they don't want that.
01:04:19:18 - 01:04:50:08
John Simmerman
They didn't want the feeling like they were going to suddenly their neighborhood was going to suddenly go from single family housing to we're going to have a whole bunch of five over ones, you know, right next door. And so what's happened recently is, you know, some some moves by city council to actually make it a little bit more feasible and legal to be able to do those two middle steps that we have in this particular, incremental intensification diagram.
01:04:50:10 - 01:05:20:18
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And let me give you a personal example of this across. I'm in an old historic neighborhood, and across the street from my house was a parking lot when I moved in and there was a zoning hearing, it was going to get turned into apartments, and everyone in my neighborhood was against it except for me. Now, what got built is a little ugly and not preferable to most people, but, Peter, Peter Katz, who was one of the founding members of Kgnu, was in town and he came to a front yard, hang at my house, and he pointed something out.
01:05:20:18 - 01:05:41:11
Jon Jon Wesolowski
I didn't notice. He said, look at all the houses that are built 50, 100 years ago. They're all set back a similar amount from the street, but there was no there was no zoning that told them to do that. They're all elevated a certain amount from the street, he said. That means if you're walking around your house without your shirt on, you actually still retain some privacy, so you'll keep your blinds open.
01:05:41:14 - 01:06:00:01
Jon Jon Wesolowski
He goes, let's look at the bottom floor of those apartments. The windows are so low that whoever inhabits, that will probably close the blinds one day to get privacy and never open them again. And the effect of that is, there's less eyes on the street, there's less of a gray area between the public and private space.
01:06:00:01 - 01:06:24:01
Jon Jon Wesolowski
There's less of a welcoming and inviting in of community and noticing what's happening on the street and going and joining that, whether it be good or you're trying to stop something bad and something he pointed out I hadn't thought of, is that the height restrictions of that apartment force, that developer to say, well, if I can only do 35ft, the only way to get three floors worth of apartments in here is to cram, you know, as low as I can and as high as I can.
01:06:24:03 - 01:06:43:04
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And so what I would like to point out to people, now that Peter had pointed that out, is to look at it and say, hey, you know, part of what makes this ugly is it's proportion is it's window placement. And a lot of that was decided not just by the economics of how can I get the cheapest building in here, but what will the city allow me to put in here?
01:06:43:11 - 01:07:10:28
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And then I can contrast that with another apartment building just down the street. It's a courtyard apartment. It looks like it belongs in Chicago. It's beautiful. And then I show them this is illegal to build. In our neighborhood right now, mostly because of parking requirements. But the buildings that we love, we've made a legal. And the buildings that we we've hate are just the, the one of the reasons they are buildings that we hate is the hoops they've had to jump through to come into existence.
01:07:11:00 - 01:07:31:22
John Simmerman
Yeah. I went back to our, comparison here, between, you know, the two different, context with the 2000ft, the Victor Dover, comparison side by side photos and the reason why I wanted to come back here is the other thing that we hear, you know, from the people who are resisting, gently densify their neighborhood is.
01:07:31:22 - 01:08:08:05
John Simmerman
They're just that they're so fearful that it will be traffic Armageddon. And, you know, it's all the increased traffic, the increased car traffic. I don't want any more neighbors. I don't want any more people here because I'm, you know, I'm feeling like it's going to be a nightmare from a traffic, perspective. And you can understand that response if the only thing that you're ever used to is the scenario on the right, which of course is the, the, the, you know, less dense developed pattern where every trip is a car trip.
01:08:08:07 - 01:08:30:10
John Simmerman
So you kind of understand you're just a little bit of empathy there for where they're coming from, because the only thing they know is drive everywhere for everything. Versus the reality is, is if you do have what's on the left here, you've got a whole lot more choice and freedom from a mobility perspective, your journey might be a walk, it might be a bike ride.
01:08:30:12 - 01:08:33:09
John Simmerman
It doesn't have to always be a car ride.
01:08:33:11 - 01:08:52:27
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And that's something whenever someone brings that up is like the parking, the traffic. It'll be a nightmare if we do this. One thing that I'm not, I don't want to shy away from is to be delusional, because there is going to be growing pains if we allow for for buildings to show up in a car only society, there will be traffic jams.
01:08:52:27 - 01:09:11:22
Jon Jon Wesolowski
There already are traffic jams. But what I like to ask people. So first, in my neighborhood, when I was talking to my community about these new apartments going in, as I said, look, when people say traffic, they usually mean two things congestion or safety issues. What are you most worried about right now? And it's safety. It's people running through stop signs.
01:09:11:22 - 01:09:44:23
Jon Jon Wesolowski
And then so I tell them when we have more people using the street to get home, there will be more congestion, which will slow down the cars dramatically. So when there are little wins like that where you can communicate, we prefer the congestion type of traffic to a speedy type of traffic. And then my next question is also a follow up that just says, if traffic is bad and there's a grocery store within walking distance and there's one within three miles of driving, the choice to go to that walking distance grocery store didn't just say, you time.
01:09:44:25 - 01:10:06:01
Jon Jon Wesolowski
It also, was something loving you scared your neighbor of when you go against a six mile round trip in your car, you're reducing traffic by six miles for someone else. And, that so that's the that's how I kind of deal with the congestion problem is like, help them imagine a world in which they don't have to take a car trip.
01:10:06:03 - 01:10:19:09
Jon Jon Wesolowski
But the first question is, we would almost all, we would almost all prefer slow moving cars on our streets to fast moving ones. And sometimes traffic can actually help that. Yeah.
01:10:19:16 - 01:10:41:23
John Simmerman
Yeah, absolutely. All right. Hey, we are out of time. So I'm going to give your, social media, channels a plug here. This is you, the happy urbanist over on threads. And, we know that you are also out on TikTok. So, folks, if you are TikTokers, be sure to pop on over. What's your handle over there?
01:10:41:25 - 01:10:49:20
Jon Jon Wesolowski
So yeah, it's, John John dot mp4. So, but if you, if you search the happier minutes on TikTok, I'll come up.
01:10:49:23 - 01:11:10:28
John Simmerman
And then you're also again here on Instagram. So be sure to, pop on over there, folks, and, see John John on Instagram. He's got, some other really cool stuff out there. Again, great content creator. What's your what's your process workflow like in trying to get to content out? Is that a constant thing that you're trying to kick out?
01:11:11:00 - 01:11:43:08
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. Great question. I'm usually getting out 2 to 3 pieces of content. A week. And usually it really I might be chewing on something for weeks before it comes out. It might be something I film spur in the moment, but my main process is taking ideas that are already out there and then coming up with anecdotes, analogies and smaller words in which to communicate them so that the average person can, articulate what they feel when they're when they step into, a city.
01:11:43:10 - 01:11:53:08
John Simmerman
Fantastic. And again, we're at your landing page here, your splash pad. For your city council run. I did we talk about when the election is it's it's.
01:11:53:08 - 01:12:18:23
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Not, it's not it's not until March. So it's an off season election. We're nonpartizan in Chattanooga. And one of the unique things about our city that I really like, is nonpartisan races. But it's also off election years. So typically there's a low turnout. And this is what I want to do is I want to change how Chattanooga and I engage with democracy, and I want to get more people participating rather than less.
01:12:18:26 - 01:12:28:17
John Simmerman
And you mentioned that it's that it's off year, as well. Is it, by district or at large?
01:12:28:19 - 01:12:51:02
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Great question. So it's by district. Okay. However, all districts are voted on at once. And so we have nine city councilors. There is a likelihood that seven of them could change because three are retiring or stepping down and a few are making retirements. So, it is it is interesting that we've made herself vulnerable to some pretty drastic change.
01:12:51:06 - 01:12:53:22
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Yeah. In a given year. Yeah.
01:12:53:24 - 01:13:14:06
John Simmerman
And again, here is your The Happy Urbanist Dot city website. So if you would like to have John and, you know, come speak to your community, this is how you reach out to him and book him as well. John. John, this has been an absolute joy and pleasure. Thank you so much for joining me on the Active Towns podcast.
01:13:14:08 - 01:13:23:09
Jon Jon Wesolowski
Awesome. Thank you so much, John. I have so much, to learn from you and your ability to just crank out content. And, it feels great to always be able to connect with you.
01:13:23:12 - 01:13:28:03
John Simmerman
We will definitely, share notes, swap notes when you want to get into the YouTube world.
01:13:28:05 - 01:13:32:00
Jon Jon Wesolowski
For sure. That's that's my next great hurdle. Yeah.
01:13:32:03 - 01:13:37:03
John Simmerman
Fantastic. Again, thank you so very much. And we'll see you, out and about.
01:13:37:06 - 01:13:38:08
Jon Jon Wesolowski
All right. Talk to you soon.
01:13:38:11 - 01:13:53:11
John Simmerman
He thank you all so much for tuning in. I hope you enjoyed this episode with John John. And if you did, please give it a thumbs up. Leave a comment down below and share it with a friend. And if you haven't done so already, be honored to have you subscribed to the channel. Just click on that subscription button down below and ring that notification bell.
01:13:53:17 - 01:14:12:28
John Simmerman
And if you're enjoying this content I'm creating here on the active Tens channel, please consider supporting my efforts. It's easy to do. Just head on over to Active Towns. Georgie. Click on the support tab and there's several different options, including becoming a Patreon supporter. Patreon members do get early and ad free access to all my video content.
01:14:13:00 - 01:14:41:24
John Simmerman
And hey, every little bit helps and is very much appreciated. So until next time, this is John signing off by wishing you much activity, health and happiness. Cheers and again sending a huge thank you out to all my Active Towns Ambassadors supporting the channel on Patreon. Buy me a coffee YouTube. Super! Thanks! As well as making contributions to the nonprofit and purchasing things from the Active Towns store, every little bit adds up and it's much appreciated.
01:14:41:27 - 01:14:43:04
John Simmerman
Thank you all so much!
