Grassroots for a Healthy Harbor

02/04/2026

Small businesses - the heart of communities - face big barriers.

This conversation between Main Street America's Director of Research and the owner of a plant shop in Tacoma, Wash., reveals the unique struggles of today's storefront business owners.

11/21/2025

Street that are safe (and comfortable and enjoyable) for people outside of cars are possible - right here in North America!

When the status quo is producing traffic fatality after traffic fatality, it's time to experiment.

11/20/2025

As they say in "Life After Cars": Cars Ruin Childhood

Or: How we traded kids’ freedom for drivers’ convenience

11/16/2025

https://substack.com/home/post/p-178653717

“Imagine my surprise, nay, my consternation, when without moving from his privacy, Bartleby in a singularly mild, firm voice, replied, ‘I would prefer not to.’”

11/12/2025

" The new American Dream isn’t about square footage — it’s about shared ground."

"Because when homebuyers say they will pay more for walkable living, what they’re really saying is:

- We want our housing to be less about isolation, and more about community.

That, in a sentence, is the new American Dream."

By Mike Hathorne, author of The Great Housing Reversal and the New American Dream A Quiet Revolution Beneath the Market A survey from the National Association of REALTORS® reveals what might be the clearest signal yet that America’s housing values are changing. Nearly 8 in 10 buyers say walkabili...

11/05/2025

Way to vote Gig Harbor!
Thank you to everyone willing to serve and congratulations to Mayor Barber, Patrick Ammann, Emily Stone, Loreto Tessicini, Julie Martin and Reid Ekberg. Five of seven councilmembers decided in this election round, but three of them have served before in appointed positions. Let's try to work together to make our place work for all who live here.

09/29/2025

Last week I spoke with a woman from the Pacific Northwest about her town. She described it as historic, walkable, with a harbor people adore. And yet, despite everyone agreeing that the “old stuff” is the best stuff, every new resident ends up buying in a subdivision.

You know the pattern: new houses get built on the edges, people drive everywhere, parking becomes the obsession, and downtown fills with SUVs. The very qualities that attracted newcomers vanish under the weight of sprawl.

Community members feel like growth is ruining the town, but growth itself isn’t the problem. For centuries, adding people made cities better, more trades, more skills, more resilience. It’s only since the 1950s, when we outlawed normal neighborhood building and handed cities over to mega-developers, that growth turned toxic.

Subdivisions aren’t investments, they’re strip-mining operations. Developers clear the land, throw up cheap houses, and leave. Locals don’t benefit, new residents don’t integrate, and the community loses. Everyone walks away thinking “growth ruins towns,” when really it’s sprawl that ruins towns.

The solution isn’t complicated: build more of what already works. Walkable, mixed neighborhoods. Small lots. Local ownership. Another block of shops. Another cluster of houses near schools. This isn’t lost knowledge, it’s the exact way every good town was built in the first place.

Cities can grow without getting worse. They used to. They can again.

08/21/2025

I was having coffee with a couple of friends on my local Main Street and I was struck by the importance of this block. Whether it’s food, drinks, ice cream, retail, hardware, or banking, this one block does it all. It gives thousands of families a place to walk, gather, bump into neighbors, and actually feel like a community. It is the beating heart of our neighborhood.

But here’s the problem: it wasn’t designed for us. It’s designed for the people driving through. Wide lanes, angled parking, narrow sidewalks, dangerous crosswalks, cars get triple the space humans do. Our neighborhood doesn’t need that. Nobody here needs to drive to this block, yet our safety and quality of life take a back seat so someone from two towns over can shave 40 seconds off their commute.

Want proof this is backwards? One café swapped two parking spots for ten sidewalk tables. The math is brutal: those two spaces might have served 36 customers a day. The tables? Around 180. That’s not activism, that’s economics. People spend money. Parked cars don’t.

This isn’t just about one block. Across the country, we’ve turned neighborhood centers into mini-highways. We pretend cars equal vitality, when in reality, they destroy it. People don’t flock to great streets because of easy parking, they flock because they’re beautiful, lively, and safe.

So here’s the choice, Do we want a community built for residents, kids, and neighbors? Or do we want to sacrifice it so strangers can speed through? One block proves the truth, when you give space to cars, it fills with cars. Give it to people, and it fills with people.

Cars dominate every other corner of our cities and towns. We have to be wiling to carve out a couple of small spaces where residents should be able to enjoy themselves without fearing for their lives. Our streets are in-fact public space. They should reflect the values of the people who live here, not the convenience of those just passing through.

07/29/2025

In Washington State, new state law limiting how much off street parking jurisdictions could require through zoning laws excluded small cities. But lots of cities - of all sizes, including small - removed mandated off street parking from their codes without coercion from a higher level of government and have seen benefits. What worked there - and in nearby Port Townsend, not mentioned in this story - would work for Gig Harbor too.

You won’t see it on cable news, but some of the boldest zoning reforms in North America are happening in places with just a few thousand residents. Here are 6 towns rewriting the rules on parking.