I was reminded by Philebrity’s commentary on the city’s recycling PSA posters that this week marks the beginning of weekly, single-stream, curbside pick up of recycling.  WHYY’s Bill Hangley did a story that ran on 91FM this morning about recycling that included information about the city’s Christmas tree recycling program:
City officials want 2009 to be [...]

If you are a home alarm owner, the annual registration fee with the City of Philadelphia is going up this year. The fee is now $50- up from $35 in 2008. But why register your alarm in the first place? The biggest incentive, from what I can tell, is that you won’t pay a dime [...]

Greater, Greater Washington’s Cavan Wilk posted a fantastic piece about the possible end of shopping malls that had me wondering what the changing economics of these staples of suburbia could mean for this region.  Wilk’s points to a recent piece in Slate that is among the first from outside of the traditional “urbanist” movement - [...]

Maybe you’ve set out this year to exercise more, lose weight, save money, quit smoking, lead a less stressful life or do something else. While resolutions typically are a personal thing, what should Philadelphia’s resolutions be? Mayor Michael Nutter and City Council probably have their own ideas for Philly in 2009. But what do you [...]

The piece in today’s Inquirer about the Ghost Bike movement brings to mind a lot of items that I’ve been reading on sites like Streetsblog (NY), Greater Greater Washington (DC), Philadelphia Bicycle News (Philly, of course) and elsewhere that attention is called on a regular basis to the difficulties of cyclists and walkers in this [...]

By Tom Ferrick
When it comes to Mayor Michael Nutter and the libraries, the phrase “more trouble that it’s worth” comes to mind.
The Urban Dictionary, a snide and funny web site of American slang, defines the phrase as follows: “high maintenance; requiring excessive investments of effort that may not be exceeded by the return.”
That sounds about [...]

Not blogging today because of the day off.  Perhaps I’ll even go catch a glimpse of the Mummers parade.
Anyway, 2008 was one heckuva year for Philadelphia.  If you were “the city” what would your resolutions for 2009 be?  What do you think the city will look like on January 1, 2010?
Share your thoughts in the [...]

The Daily New’s Dan Geringer put together this helpful guide to what government services and other amenities will be open and functioning tomorrow.  Of course, 3-1-1 will be available because it would be shame to tout something as 24/7/365 and then take the first day off.
If you’re planning on coming to town for that little [...]

(This all may be temporarily moot given the court decision from a couple hours ago but it’s worth discussing anyway.)
I realize that title assumes that privatization is considered to be bad and goes from that position to trying to figure out if it can be good.  That concedes a little to the framing of this [...]

The breaking news is that Judge Idee C. Fox has issued an order stating that Mayor Michael Nutter can NOT go ahead with his planned library closures on or after January 1st without City Council approval.
The Inky has some details but it appears that the Nutter administration will appeal the verdict.
WHYY’s Tom MacDonald reports even if [...]