Aaron M. Renn

All Things Aaron

Don’t Fly Too Close to the Sun

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I was honored to speak at a conference in Milwaukee over the summer called Milwaukee's Future in the Chicago Mega-City. Chicago and Milwaukee are about 90 miles apart on I-94. There's an Amtrak link that makes the journey in about 90 minutes. The two cities have been sprawling such that there's now more or less continuous development along the lakefront between the two cities. Milwaukee has been a challenged city economically and demographically. Chicago has had its own serious problems, but has seen its already muscular core boom in terms of … [Read more...]

Improving Chicago’s Business Climate

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This article is part of the State of Chicago. Chicago is a tale of two cities when it comes to the business climate. If you are a high profile Loop business, things are great. The city will move mountains for you, permits won't be an issue, and a healthy heaping portion of TIF dollars might even be coming your way. If you are a small business or someone without connections, it's a different story. Improving business conditions, especially for small business and especially in the neighborhoods, is critical to the city's economic future. I'll … [Read more...]

Chicago As the Midwest’s Global Gateway

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This article is part of the State of Chicago series. Chicago is a city that has been ignoring its traditional role as capital of the Midwest in order to focus on ambitions to be a global city. But as this series has illustrated, Chicago has not thrived recently with this approach. Much of its economy remains tied to the region and to manufacturing, and with those sectors having struggled, Chicago has likewise struggled. Also, global city Chicago, powerful as it might be, is simply much too small to carry the region on its own. A broader plan … [Read more...]

Film Review: Detropia

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Trailer for Detropia. If the video doesn't display, click here.I was lucky to get to see Detropia, a buzz-laden documentary about Detroit, at the UMass-Boston film series, where Heidi Ewing, one of the film makers, was present for a post-screening discussion. Ewing, incidentally, grew up in suburban Detroit. The title is an interesting word play. It's a portmanteau of ambiguous meaning. It could be a combination of "Detroit" with either "utopia" or "dystopia," though as the bleak civic outlook suggests, the latter is far more appropriate. … [Read more...]

Thoughts on Chicago’s Tech Scene

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This article is part of the State of Chicago. I wasn't planning to write a piece on Chicago tech, but I did a radio interview about it this week and since I never know how much might be used from me in a space constrained medium, I thought I'd lay out something here too. I've said before that I don't think Chicago is well positioned to become some type of dominant tech hub, but should only seek to get its "fair share" of tech. However, as the third largest city in America, Chicago's fair share on tech is still pretty darn big. If you look … [Read more...]

Review: The New Geography of Jobs

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The New Geography of Jobs by Enrico Moretti Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (2012) Starting in the 1980s, the American economy bifurcated. On one side, cities with little human capital and traditional economies started experiencing diminishing returns and stiff competition from abroad. On the other hand, cities rich in human capital and economies based on knowledge-intensive sectors started seeing increasing returns and took full advantage of globalized markets. - Enrico MorettiFor unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have … [Read more...]

Rethinking Brand Chicago

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This post is part of the State of Chicago series. So many Midwest places flail around looking for a brand image or identity. Not Chicago. In fact, the identity and stories of Chicago overflow the page. They are too numerous to be written in a mere blog posting. Yet Chicago has in effect decided to jettison that powerful, historic brand identity in favor of a type of global city genericism. This, I believe, is a mistake. One trend you can't help but notice if you travel is the increasing homogenization of the urban culture and standard … [Read more...]

David Gunn on Amtrak’s $151bn NEC Plan and How He Rebuilt the Harrisburg Line by Stephen Smith

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[ If you didn't read Stephen Smith's two great recent pieces on why US transit costs are so high over at Bloomberg, you should check them out now. See: US Taxpayers Are Gouged on Transit Costs and Labor Rules Snarl US Commuter Trains. He also writes over at Forbes and the great blog Market Urbanism, which takes a free market view of boosting cities. He followed up on these pieces with this one talking about Amtrak. I hope you enjoy - Aaron. ] First order of business: I wrote two articles for Bloomberg View (the opinion counterpart to … [Read more...]

Fixing Chicago: Rahm’s Work in Progress

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This article is part of The State of Chicago. As I continue with my Chicago series, I'll turn now to the matter of how to fix what's wrong with Chicago, hopefully without damaging the things that are already right and going well. This first piece is to highlight what Mayor Rahm Emanuel has already been doing. The timing's risky, as at midnight tonight the teachers' union might go on strike. But I'll take my chances. I voted for Rahm for mayor, for three major reasons: 1. I see him as like his mentor Bill Clinton, namely someone to … [Read more...]

Brief Notes from a Trip to Philadelphia

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I've always said that Philadelphia is the biggest city in America you wouldn't notice disappearing. With six million people, it's the sixth largest metro in America. And while, because of the vagaries of metro area definitions, I think that overstates its rank a bit, without a doubt, Philly is one of America's largest metro areas. A 1.5 million people, Philadelphia is also America's 5th largest municipality. So why doesn't Philly loom larger in the national consciousness? When we think of Philly, mostly we think of stuff that happened a long … [Read more...]