Mailbag, Part 1!
Where we have come from, a call to action, analytics, and reader reactions!
Where we have come from
Let me start by thanking all of you who have sent me notes, questions, and suggestions, and for just letting me know you enjoyed a particular episode, a theme, or the whole program. I admit, I always feel like I’m throwing it out into the void, wondering if I’ll hear even an echo, so I really do appreciate the feedback! I started The Reflective Urbanist one year ago, on March 14, 2025, and I have faithfully produced one essay and podcast episode per week, excluding the summer and holidays. Each TRU episode begins life as an essay, and at an average of 1,500 words each, and 45 SubStack posts so far, I estimate that I’ve produced about 65,000 words of content in the past year! FYI, a book is between 75,000 and 100,000 words, so that is a lot of production! (and I may make a book out of all this one day—a topic for another time.)
Call to Action: Like, Follow, Subscribe, and recommend to a friend
And now, I’d like to ask you for your help. It has been a year, so if you are enjoying The Reflective Urbanist, please press the Like and Subscribe buttons. More importantly, help me expand my audience. Tell a friend or colleague to check out The Reflective Urbanist and, better yet, send them a link to your favorite episode. Most importantly, tell someone in another city or country. I live in Minneapolis, and it should be no surprise that much of my audience is located in the Twin Cities, but many of my stories come from my time working in the Twin Cities as well as Philadelphia; others are from friends and listeners/readers elsewhere in the US; the theory I reference comes from scholars around the country and the world, and all of the things I talk about are universal to city building in the US and well beyond. So help me grow my audience beyond the Twin Cities!
Analytics
I confess, the stats/analytics stuff is all a bit of a mystery to me, but I can say with some confidence that my audience continues to grow steadily!
SUBSTACK: 356 unique visitors through Substack, TRU Site, 38 subscribers, and 2 paid subscribers (Thanks to Barbara and Haila!) If I can get 1,000 more paid subscribers, I can quit my day job, so please, help me out!
PODCAST: 101 followers, 3,200 streams and follows, averaging 58 per episode. Listeners are mostly in the US, but eight other countries are represented, including Malaysia and Ukraine. The average audience member looks like me – an older, white male, something I hope would like to see change, so please help, ladies and my younger colleagues, by telling your friends!
HIGHEST RANKED EPISODES: One thing that I do understand is the ranking of episodes, so here are the top five episodes (well, seven actually), counting down, starting with:
NUMBER 5: Coming in fifth is episode E01, Who do I have to pay?: Political subcultures in American states and cities. This makes me proud! My very first post, about the different political subcultures in states and cities, and why a developer from Chicago was shocked when I told him that he wouldn’t have to hand any cash to anyone in Minneapolis to get his approvals.
NUMBER 4: In fourth place is E25, Jane Jacobs and Me: The Death and Life of American Cities, Revisited. About a panel discussion I participated in and how I finally finished reading Death and Life of Great American Cities last summer, 45 years after starting it as a freshman in college in the fall of 1980.
NUMBER 3: Number three, E34, My best neighborhood meeting: Hang a lantern on your problem, is about being the neighborhood president and managing a meeting with 100 unhappy neighbors when the third-generation owner of a family business that deals in vice was presenting his proposal for a new strip club, just blocks away from their condominiums. I’m particularly fond of this one because my then-five-year-old son makes a brief appearance in it.
NUMBER 2: Tied for second place are E15, What do we have to do to get those darned private sector developers to build more affordable housing?, and E16, Take 2 - What do we have to do to get those darned private sector developers to build more affordable housing? I think we can safely count these two consecutive episodes as one. They were both about the affordable housing crisis, the housing shortage, and my own opinions on the causes of these problems, some ideas for solutions, and why, if we really want to house everyone in the country, we’ll have to reduce local control over approval processes and agree as citizens that we are willing to pay to fund affordable housing. (I’m not hopeful.)
NUMBER 1: E35, Finding freedom in times of turbulence: Some thoughts on Solitude, Creativity, Attention, and the Cultivation of the Inner Self, was my own reaction to local events in Minneapolis, beginning with the President denigrating our Somali neighbors, and about how to focus and be creative and productive when subsumed by uncertainty and chaos. This one was personal, because I drew on how I have developed my own habits for reading, learning, and practice over the years, so I was glad that it resonated with so many people.
AND BONUS NUMBER 6: I think it is worth mentioning that coming in at number six is the introductory episode, E000, Welcome to The Reflective Urbanist: Origins, eggheads, and "a story, a theory, and a lesson." I probably ought to go back and listen to this one again and see if I’m doing what I said I was going to do when this first aired last March!
Listener/Reader Reactions
I had a short note from a Reflective Urbanist in New Jersey after Episode 09 – Definitely don’t publish it: Why you shouldn’t talk in elevators and other public spaces. This episode begins with a scene from the movie RoboCop, where poor Bob Morton gets in trouble for trash-talking the boss in the executive washroom when, unbeknownst to Bob, the boss is in one of the toilet stalls. The boss exacts revenge, causing Bob’s house to blow up, with Bob inside. My correspondent said,
“Yeah, we learned that the hard way. Now our rule is that we never say anything until we are off the property/site of the interview.”
I have done a handful of episodes on the consultant selection process, interviews, and how they go right, wrong, or sideways, all in the spirit of helping us all do better when we are trying to win the big job or pick the best team, regardless of which side of the table you are sitting on. Two Reflective Urbanists contacted me after Episode #24, The Architect Sketch: Cognitive biases in the consultant selection process, to tell me their interview stories, both with happy endings.
An East Coast architect who specializes in senior living facilities texted to let me know he had just interviewed for a big job: The expansion of a retirement community. The place also happened to be the home of the managing partner of the firm he had worked for out of college. He met with a group of residents and said,
“I mostly talked about the people that lived there and nothing about architecture. Then I said that one of their fellow residents, who was in the room, gave me my first job in architecture. Of course, I knew everyone loved that guy. Yeah, we won the job.”
And a Twin Cities architect was eager to tell me about an interview he and his partner recently had with a small non-profit organization. They talked about whether to do a slideshow or bring other consultants along, deciding in the end that only the two of them would go, and they would just talk to the client group—no subconsultants, slideshows, or other materials. When the day of the interview arrived, it was hot and humid,
“So I decided to skip the sports coats and wear casual clothing. After all, at this age and stage, I may was well just be ourselves. My partner and I had a big conversation with the client about the problems they were trying to solve, and there was very little discussion of design or architecture, and lots of listening. We made a connection with them, and we won the job.”
I happen to know a board member of that nonprofit who was present for the interview, who confirmed this story, recalling that,
“The architect brought nothing other than his cell phone, which he placed face down on the table. On the back side was a Post-It note that had just three things written on it, numbered 1, 2, 3.”
Neither the architect nor that board member could recall what those three things were, but apparently, it didn’t matter.
NUMBER THREE: E29, 22 Kinds of Lightbulbs?!: Bridging the Capital-Operating Divide. The story was about a new police station that won architectural design awards but had 22 different kinds of lightbulbs, which was a nightmare for the cops who actually had to change them, if they could even find replacements. I committed three episodes last fall to what I like to call the “Capital-Operating Divide”—the mismatch in expectations that occurs when designers do not understand who will be operating the building day-to-day, including staffing, capabilities, and budget. I never know whether this kind of thing is going to land with anyone (and I often never find out), so I was delighted to hear from a former neighbor, who had this to say:
“Peter: I just listened to your ‘22 lightbulbs’ episode. After 13 years of working in medical construction, I think you’re the only architect on the planet who understands that.”
Thank you!
Last, but not least, E42, Mansplaining: Why men should listen more and talk less, generated some positive feedback (as in, “thanks for writing about this important topic”), and, sadly, numerous stories demonstrating that we still have a long way to go. One Reflective Urbanist – a woman I know who has worked in real estate development for over twenty years wrote in with two relevant stories, one personal and one professional. First, the personal:
“Peter: Don’t think the mansplaining issue isn’t timely - just this morning, my husband got a 3rd call from the electrician who I had initially reached out to, toured our home with, and called to ask questions about the quote. He wanted to know if we wanted to move forward with the project. When the electrician was first at our home, my husband explicitly directed him to contact me about the project, and also stated after their first call that I was actually the one making the decision. I’m not sure that the electrician is going to get the project.”
The professional one is worse:
“I was in the meeting with my business partner and a potential investor where my partner’s lack of lipstick was the feedback we got when we asked about our proforma. The investor pointed to me and said, “like her, she has a good lip gloss on, maybe you could borrow some from her.”
All I could do was apologize for the behavior of my fellow men, and, now, to caution those men, and particularly that electrician: If you are too incapable of evolving, but you hope to stay in business, you should at least try to understand who is making the hiring decision and writing the checks, and tailor your behavior appropriately. After all, it may be a woman. As I said at the end of that episode, Men, we have got to do better.
A couple of things before we go.
Most importantly, again, help me out. Please press the subscribe and like buttons – I understand that algorithms like it when we do that. Big bonus – send a link to your favorite episode to someone you know, and better yet, someone somewhere else in the US!