Urban Explained

Urban Explained Deep dives on real estate, economics, and NYC’s future
(for people in a hurry 🏃‍♂️💨)
(1)

05/28/2026

Two buildings going up on Billionaires’ Row. Same street, same size, two very different visions of what the city needs right now.

05/26/2026

I met up with Mayor Mamdani to discuss his highly ambitious housing plan: Block By Block. 200,000 units built BY the city.

This week’s winners and losers in New York City. May 18th - 24th 2026.
05/24/2026

This week’s winners and losers in New York City. May 18th - 24th 2026.

05/20/2026

NYC has 2,873 empty lots sitting in plain sight. All zoned for housing. All surrounded by housing. So why aren’t they being built on? The answer is buried in the city’s own construction code.

05/14/2026

It’s never been more popular to hate on real estate developers.

It’s also never been more clear that most people have no idea how the industry actually works.

NYC fixed its FY 2027 budget on paper, but not the underlying problem: the City spends more than it takes in. This year’...
05/13/2026

NYC fixed its FY 2027 budget on paper, but not the underlying problem: the City spends more than it takes in.

This year’s “balanced” budget leaned on moves that can’t repeat. There’s already a projected $7B gap for FY 2028.

05/12/2026

It’s a tale of two construction industries in New York City: Class A office demand is back and booming while multifamily development has fallen to record lows.

The final two towers at the World Trade Center site make this contrast impossible to ignore.

CitiBike is a public good run as a private business. A citywide monopoly, no performance enforcement, and no real cost t...
05/07/2026

CitiBike is a public good run as a private business.

A citywide monopoly, no performance enforcement, and no real cost transparency. When their costs go up, riders pay every dollar, while they get the best of both worlds.

05/06/2026

Two 0.29-acre playground projects in the same twelve-month window show us just how much of a construction cost premium NYC really has.

04/29/2026

Monitor Point is one of the most affordable mixed-income projects ever proposed on the Brooklyn waterfront. So why are Greenpoint neighbors fighting to stop it? It has little to do with the buildings…

04/27/2026

NYC opens its first full casino tomorrow (April 28th), and it’s expecting to pull in $8 million a day from New Yorkers’ losses, with no competition until 2030.

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