I really love this law, but I do LOL at Healey taking public credit for the Baker administration's work.

I do think there's further to go, in that this law is best coupled with additional investment in the bus and commuter rail system. Many towns have access to the MBTA, but it's not really usable access.

The unoccupied real estate thing is a really odd problem. You'd think with how valuable real estate is property wouldn't sit vacant, but when you start looking around for them, they're everywhere. There are three SFHs that have been empty long-term within a block of me. Two of them belong to elderly people in nursing homes without family and are just waiting for them to die. They've been vacant for years. The third had owners pass away and the kids are fighting over the list price for months.

Are you surprised that elderly people on fixed incomes don't want the taxes on their home to go up?

Ah yes, because the issue with Boston's nightlife is that it's not white, corporate, and expensive enough. What an uninspired choice.

Also Bloomingdale's across the street at the Chesnut Hill mall

I hate to tell you, but MA has a severe shortage of inpatient facilities and the cost can be prohibitive for families even if you can find a bed. A friend's son needed inpatient treatment and had a history of violence but only could access outpatient because of lack of beds. It's apparent that many people on this thread have little knowledge of how broken MA's mental health system is.

I'm comfortable with using the word sympathy. It's what I feel for everyone involved. Reading about PPD psychosis, including first-hand accounts from survivors, knowing that she actively sought treatment. It's far more common than I ever knew and far less researched and talked about than it should be because medical misogyny is real. And 5% of mothers with postpartum psychosis kill themselves or their child. We know how dangerous this condition is. But because it's poorly researched, little is known about what is actually effective treatment. Electro shock therapy is a commonly recommended despite seriously side effects like memory loss.

This is a major issue with our judicial/incarceration system. This isn't a unique story; I remember reading about the mentally ill unhoused man who pushed someone into thw train; he'd been in and out of treatment for years. Your brain can be broken. And unlike other health issues, when our medical system failures to treat you effectively - even if you beg for treatment - you are a criminal and the consequences for your community are unrecoverable. We need massive investment in mental health care and treatment facilities. I'm angry that every public official isn't demanding it.

It's really embarrassing that West Roxbury and Roslindale are about to be even more grossly underserved by public transit and Wu is saying nothing publicly (despite it being her own neighborhood) because white people.

Can't be electrified may not be the right term... there's a shared track issue where it essentially can't run any faster than 60 minutes no matter what so the goal of electrification is moot for the Needham line and in fact will only become worse as other lines run more frequently. Others have explained it on here better than I can. Essentially the MBTA's only plan for better serving the line is to sunset it; extending the OL from Forest Hills through West Roxbury and extending the D line from Newton through Needham. The OL extension would be expensive but fairly doable; the Green line would be a nightmare and is highly unlikely anytime soon. Needham would rather limited service than no service for some long period of time... they know the legislature allocating huge funds to serve one millionaire town is slim in this climate. And they have the power to cock block West Rox/Roslindale.

Essentially the most likely and least expensive 10 - 15 year solution (which would also serve the greatest number of workers, particularly lower income workers) is expanded rapid bus service through West Roxbury to Roslindale Village and extending the OL one stop to RV. I'm actually surprised elected officials haven't yet begun loudly clamoring for it.

An OL stop at Roslindale Village is a viable option within that timeline (or much earlier), but any other expansion seems highly unlikely even though the alternative is screwing over thousands of commuters.

Except the Needham line, which is one of the densest and most traveled but can't be electrified.

Most those suburbs are still close to an hour commute from Enfield but the COL difference is huge. You can get a large 3 bed 2 bath home with a big yard in a really good school district for $600k. Good luck finding that within an hour drive of Boston.

This is an outlier example though of a high-end second home community. In my town, which admittedly is less desirable, home values peaked 6+ months ago. At this point, they're at most 10 - 15% over 2018 prices. That's still a lot but it's at pace with overall inflation. And we very clearly haven't hit the bottom yet, as anything that isn't in pristine condition is sitting with multiple price drops.

Allergies and dry winter air are a fairly obvious challenge to this since they can mimic mild COVID symptoms. It can be difficult to know what to do when you're just feeling a bit off.

I agree with you. But I don't expect parents trying to put food on the table to solve an issue that is fundamentally a societal and political problem. All workers deserve generous guaranteed paid leave. Our government has continually let us all down by favoring corporate overlords. You're getting mad at the wrong people.

And if you think children are a choice that just requires sacrifices you a) don't understand the realities of life for truly low income people and b) are probably burnt out and in need of a new profession.

It's uncomfortable to see a teacher be so judgmental when you don't know their family situation. There are plenty of parents who don't get paid sick leave at all, get minimal sick leave that they use up quickly due to sick kids, or are threatened by their bosses when they use it. There may not be much of an option.

OP, just jumping in to say that there are tons of less challenging/scary but still beautiful winter hikes in NH outside of the White Mountains. I do the Wapack trail every winter and you definitely need gear - quality coat; snow pants, boots; micro spikes; etc. But it's a perfectly doable hike sven for someone who is not a serious hiker and still has some cool views.

Yeah I don't know why folks are ignoring this. The housing complainers that CEOs worry about are 30-50 year olds with families who want to live in a suburban neighborhood with a yard and decent schools. A major problem is that there's no commuter rail that's truly convenient to Kendall. Housing prices on the line that runs through Porter are outrageously expensive basically until you get to Acton and beyond, and at that point the CR itself is expensive. You can maybe walk 20 - 30 min from North Station but that's tough and cold as fuck.

There's no obvious solution. These companies don't want to be downtown or in a random suburb. They want to be in Cambridge with everybody else. A feasible option might be for these companies to band together and essentially create their own public transit system. Run a bus several times a day from several park and ride type locations in suburban areas. But it's still a miserable commute when they could just move to Austin or another Southern city where workers can get a larger, more updated house and a 30 min commute for the same money.

And this is why we need to think about housing as a regional issue, not a city issue.

For those having trouble with the app, look to see if your neighborhood or town has a free or buy nothing Facebook group.

The downside is that as these have become more popular, it's become harder and harder to claim anything remotely decent. My neighborhood group is flooded with comments by the same 10 SAHMs within five minutes of a new posting. Half the time people are just addicted to free, and you see them give away the stuff them claimed a month ago again because they didn't actually need it. And so many people flake out on picking up that now people have bizarre demands when giving away.

Trash day honestly seems like a better bet if your commute or daily dog walk takes you through a nice neighborhood.

In terms of IMPs, if only a potential new building is laid out in this plan it's unlikely to happen in the next 10 years. There will almost certainly be a long period of displacement for the school.

The Warren renovation is really the only sensible thing.

Such weird priorities. Knocking down the COM building (when BU has one of the top 3 COM schools in the country) and replacing with a research facility, with no mention of where COM classes will go.

Warren was in need of a major overhaul 16 years ago so I can only imagine how shitty it is at this point. And I'm all for them building additional dorms to bring more students on campus. But the proliferation of luxury dorms that essentially segregate students with and without money is really ugly. And BU would have an easier time housing all students on campus (and provide a better education overall) if they just reduced the undergrad student head count from the completely insane 18k. What a mess.

BU wants all staff working on campus at least 3 days a week, but the campus sucks to commute to from pretty much all directions and they've made it impossible to get parking. Not sure about other areas of staffing, but I know one major administrative dept that is having serious trouble recruiting because no one wants the commute.

Fuck staties. Not convinced we want them interacting with anyone. Especially since the law is so situational. I'm often on 90 and all 3 lanes are completely stopped because of an accident or construction or whatever. I don't begrudge all lanes becoming travel lanes in those circumstances. And I frequently see aggressive drivers in the left pressuring someone to move back to the middle before its really safe to do so. You need a larger gap than you realize to safely merge into a slower lane. That's how accidents happen. Fear of getting a ticket from some asshole with a quota will only exacerbate that.