links for 2011-07-28

I enjoyed the article about Portland/Brooklyn. Having lived in Portland my whole life (26 years), I’ve noticed a huge shift in the priorities of the overall community. The city seems more interested in making sure that the young, bike-riding, white “hipsters” are satisfied while ignoring every other demographic, like people of color, people with children and, yes, people who need to drive cars because let’s face it, not everyone is able to ride a bike everywhere, especially if they’ve got kids or tools to tow around. Oh, and the poor are often ignored, and not the “voluntarily poor,” people who choose to be poor for political reasons, but people who are forced into poverty by circumstance and have little to no options.