Despite intending to choose a voting day that’s best for voters, timing could still be easier—but legislators can fix that.

The post The History of Washington’s Wandering Election Day appeared first on Sightline Institute.

Takeaways First-time candidate for Seattle City Council Alexis Mercedes Rinck just got more votes in her 2024 race than the city’s mayor, Bruce Harrell, when he won in 2021. In fact, she got more votes than any elected official in all elections that Seattle city government has ever recorded.  But it’s not because she’s particularly popular. ... Read more

The post A Magic Boost for Low-Turnout City Elections appeared first on Sightline Institute.

Takeaways The claim comes again and again like clockwork: That allowing homes to exist can be hazardous to a politician’s career.  Even at the annual picnic of her own neighborhood association, surrounded by pasta salad and barbeque, Jessica Bateman couldn’t escape the threat.  It was summer 2019. In her first term as a city councilor in Olympia, ... Read more

The post In Race after Race, People Keep Electing Pro-Housing Politicians appeared first on Sightline Institute.

An egg is an amazing thing, culinarily speaking: delicious, nutritious, and versatile. Americans eat nearly 100 billion of them every year, almost 300 per person. But eggs, while greener than other animal food sources, have a bigger environmental footprint than almost any plant food—and industrial egg production raises significant animal welfare issues.

So food scientists, and a few companies, are trying hard to come up with ever-better plant-based egg substitutes. “We’re trying to reverse-engineer an egg,” says David Julian McClements, a food scientist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

That’s not easy, because real eggs play so many roles in the kitchen. You can use beaten eggs to bind breadcrumbs in a coating, or to hold together meatballs; you can use them to emulsify oil and water into mayonnaise, scramble them into an omelet or whip them to loft a meringue or angel food cake. An all-purpose egg substitute must do all those things acceptably well, while also yielding the familiar texture and—perhaps—flavor of real eggs.

Today’s plant-based eggs still fall short of that one-size-fits-all goal, but researchers in industry and academia are trying to improve them. New ingredients and processes are leading toward egg substitutes that are not just more egg-like, but potentially more nutritious and better tasting than the original.

In practice, making a convincing plant-based egg is largely a matter of mimicking the way the ovalbumin and other proteins in real eggs behave during cooking. When egg proteins are heated beyond a critical point, they unfold and grab onto one another, forming what food scientists call a gel. That causes the white and then the yolk to set up when cooked.

Eggs aren’t just for frying or scrambling. Cooks use them to bind other ingredients together and to emulsify oil and water to make mayonnaise. The proteins in egg whites can also be whipped into a foam that’s essential in meringues and angel food cake. Finding a plant-based egg substitute that does all of these things has proven challenging. Credit: Adam Gault via Getty

That’s not easy to replicate with some plant proteins, which tend to have more sulfur-containing amino acids than egg proteins do. These sulfur groups bind to each other, so the proteins unfold at higher temperatures. As a result, they must usually be cooked longer and hotter than ones in real eggs.

To make a plant-based egg, food scientists typically start by extracting a mix of proteins from a plant source such as soybean, mung bean, or other crops. “You want to start with what is a sustainable, affordable, and consistent source of plant proteins,” says McClements, who wrote about the design of plant-based foods in the 2024 Annual Review of Food Science and Technology. “So you’re going to narrow your search to that group of proteins that are economically feasible to use.”

Fortunately, some extracts are dominated by one or a few proteins that set at low-enough temperatures to behave pretty much like real egg proteins. Current plant-based eggs rely on these proteins: Just Egg uses the plant albumins and globulin found in mung bean extract, Simply Eggless uses proteins from lupin beans, and McClements and others are experimenting with the photosynthetic enzyme rubisco that is abundant in duckweed and other leafy tissues.

These days, food technologists can produce a wide range of proteins in large quantities by inserting the gene for a selected protein into hosts like bacteria or yeast, then growing the hosts in a tank, a process called precision fermentation. That opens a huge new window for exploration of other plant-based protein sources that may more precisely match the properties of actual eggs.

A few companies are already searching. Shiru, a California-based biotech company, for example, uses a sophisticated artificial intelligence platform to identify proteins with specific properties from its database of more than 450 million natural protein sequences. To find a more egglike plant protein, the company first picked the criteria it needed to match. “For eggs, that is the thermal gel onset—that is, when it goes from liquid to solid when you heat it,” says Jasmin Hume, a protein engineer who is the company’s founder and CEO. “And it must result in the right texture—not too hard, not too gummy, not too soft.” Those properties depend on details such as which amino acids a protein contains, in what order, and precisely how it folds into a 3D structure—a hugely complex process that was the subject of the 2024 Nobel Prize in chemistry.

The company then scoured its database, winnowing it down to a short list that it predicted would fit the bill. Technicians produced those proteins and tested their properties, pinpointing a handful of potential egglike proteins. A few were good enough to start the company working to commercialize their production, though Hume declined to provide further details.

Cracking the flavor code

With the main protein in hand, the next step for food technologists is to add other molecules that help make the product more egglike. Adding vegetable oils, for example, can change the texture. “If I don’t put any oil in the product, it’s going to scramble more like an egg white,” says Chris Jones, a chef who is vice president of product development at Eat Just, which produces the egg substitute Just Egg. “If I put 8 to 15 percent, it’s going to scramble like a whole egg. If I add more, it’s going to behave like a batter.”

Developers can also add gums to prevent the protein in the mixture from settling during storage, or add molecules that are translucent at room temperature but turn opaque when cooked, providing the same visual cue to doneness that real eggs provide.

And then there’s the taste: Current plant-based eggs often suffer from off flavors. “Our first version tasted like what you imagine the bottom of a lawn mower deck would taste like—really grassy,” says Jones. The company’s current product, version 5, still has some beany notes, he says.

Those beany flavors aren’t caused by a single molecule, says Devin Peterson, a flavor chemist at Ohio State University: “It’s a combination that creates beany.” Protein extracts from legumes contain enzymes that create some of these off-flavor volatile molecules—and it’s a painstaking process to single out the offending volatiles and avoid or remove them, he says. (Presumably, cooking up single proteins in a vat could reduce this problem.) Many plant proteins also have molecules called polyphenols bound to their surfaces that contribute to beany flavors. “It’s very challenging to remove these polyphenols, because they’re tightly stuck,” says McClements.

Experts agree that eliminating beany and other off flavors is a good thing. But there’s less agreement on whether developers need to actively make a plant-based egg taste more like a real egg. “That’s actually a polarizing question,” says Jones.

Much of an egg’s flavor comes from sulfur compounds that aren’t necessarily pleasing to consumers. “An egg tastes a certain way because it’s releasing sulfur as it decays,” says Jones. When tasters were asked to compare Eat Just’s egg-free mayonnaise against the traditional, real-egg version, he notes, “at least 50 percent didn’t like the sulfur flavor of a true-egg mayo.”

That poses a quandary for developers. “Should it have a sulfur flavor, or should it have its own point of view, a flavor that our chefs develop? We don’t have an answer yet,” Jones says. Even for something like an omelet, he says, developers could aim for “a neutral spot where whatever seasoning you add is what you’re going to taste.”

As food technologists work to overcome these challenges, plant-based eggs are likely to get better and better. But the ultimate goal might be to surpass, not merely match, the performance of real eggs. Already, McClements and his colleagues have experimented with adding lutein, a nutrient important for eye health, to oil droplets in plant-based egg yolks.

In the future, scientists could adjust the amino acid composition of proteins or boost the calcium or iron content in plant-based eggs to match nutritional needs. “We ultimately could engineer something that’s way healthier than what’s available now,” says Bianca Datta, a food scientist at the Good Food Institute, an international nonprofit that supports the development of plant-based foods. “We’re just at the beginning of seeing what’s possible.”

This story originally appeared in Knowable Magazine.

Read full article

Comments

Dear Winnipeg,

Today is the one-year anniversary of the day the City suddenly and indefinitely closed the Arlington Bridge, having let it fall into disrepair because they didn’t have the money to repair or replace it.

Time to, um, celebrate?

Like I mentioned at the time, this wasn’t the first piece of infrastructure we had abandoned, and nor would it be the last. In the 12 months since then, the City has also announced the closure of the Portage & Main concourse, Happyland Pool, Windsor Park Pool, Eldon Ross Pool, plus 20 more wading pools.

Yeah, I heard the sad trombone too.

And sadly, but in no way surprising to anyone who has been reading here for any amount of time, according to a news article referencing the mayor last week, “the City of Winnipeg is heading into a 2025 budget cycle with few good options when it comes to delivering all the services the city offers, building and maintaining infrastructure and replenishing a rainy-day fund that was depleted during the pandemic.”

It’s easy to feel depressed about it all, but sometimes, the Universe throws you a bone.

The mayor said in an interview back in October, “It’s no secret that Winnipeg, like every other city in the country, is dealing with financial challenges.”

That’s quite a departure from when he was campaigning for our vote two years ago, when he told Winnipeggers that “our biggest challenges are short term and especially on the operating (budget) side.”

Today though, there’s finally recognition that our financial problems run much deeper. The city is no longer “talking about trying to get funding for bells and whistles of legacy projects,” the mayor said in a speech to a roomful of lobbyists on October 22nd. “We’re talking about funding for basic services.”

In trying to explain why we’re in this mess, he then went on to say that “the City of Winnipeg has to wait until the pipe’s in the ground, someone comes in to build a widget-making factory, builds their building, and the assessed value of that property goes up and they start paying property taxes.”

“Our return of investment on an economic investment takes years and years to begin to recoup.”

Oooh, so close, yet somehow so, so far!

It’s crucial to understand that what the mayor is describing here is actually a cashflow problem, not a revenue shortfall. It’s not something that requires any new revenues at all, much less a whole new “revenue model.” It just requires debt. And the judicious use of debt to smooth out delayed cashflows from capital investment is precisely what debt should be used for.

Making investments that take many years before they pay off is common in the business world. Take True North’s proposed redevelopment of Portage Place, for example. They were spending money on due diligence even before committing to the project. And they’ll spend hundreds of millions more over several years, most of it borrowed, before their first tenant ever pays them even a single dollar in rent.

In the words of the mayor, their return on investment will take years and years to begin to recoup.

And yet Mark Chipman’s company could keep doing this forever, getting wealthier and wealthier every step of the way.

So why is it different for the city? Why is it getting poorer with each passing year?

The difference is that Chipman makes sure his investments are profitable. That means the financial returns will be high enough to cover not only the interest and principal on the debt used to finance it, but also future costs like maintenance, wages, eventual replacement, with some left over for profit.

The mayor, on the other hand, is proposing the city borrow money to invest in the widening of Kenaston, which a cost-benefit analysis showed would provide a return of 1.4 per cent. Meanwhile, the city’s latest bond issue has it paying 4.65 per cent interest on its borrowed money.

That’s the actual issue. Not that our infrastructure investments provide “delayed” returns, but that the returns they provide don’t even cover the interest on the debt, much less any principal, maintenance, wages, eventual replacement and any left over to fund “bells and whistles” elsewhere in the city.

In other words, it’s not a cashflow problem, it’s an insolvency problem. And mixing up those two –— deferred returns and negative returns — is a fatal mistake.

But it would be short-sighted to blame this all on our current mayor. He’s just the latest one left holding the bag.

For nearly eight decades, we’ve been investing in a development pattern that costs more to maintain and service than it returns in taxable economic value. And when the chickens came home to roost along the way, we just doubled-down on another round of outward expansion using the same unproductive development patterns, hoping the new growth would pay for the old growth. And again, and again. You know, the same way a Ponzi scheme works.

Instead of investing in infrastructure and development that enables more car-centric, segregated-use, all-at-once-to-a-finished state greenfield growth, we need to invest in making our existing neighbourhoods into walkable, bikeable, transit-friendly neighbourhoods that allow gradual intensification through mixed-use infill.

Not because we prefer them, but because those are the profitable investments for a city. Just ask any city that’s bothered to do the math on it.

Here in Winnipeg, our net financial position, a type of liquidity-solvency measure for cities, currently sits at negative $1.2 billion. It’s been steadily worsening for decades.

Unsurprisingly, the eight years Gillingham has been mayor (or finance chair before that) have had no impact whatsoever on its trajectory. Because actually reversing that trend to improve our financial position would require us to change how we grow, by changing what types of infrastructure we invest in and what types of development we allow and encourage.

That’s why the proposed zoning changes that City Council has been hard at work discussing this week are so encouraging. Let me catch you up.

Last year at this time, Council approved changes to its federal funding application in order to access $122 million of Housing Accelerator Fund money to help create 14,000 housing units in the city over the next 3 years. The Feds had made the funds contingent on the City making some changes to their zoning by-law, and this was the City pinky-promising that they would do them.

By doing that, the City committed itself to the following “Rapid Zoning Changes”:

1. Allowing residential development to happen on mall properties and on commercial corridors (like Marion St, Henderson Hwy and St. Mary’s Rd.
2. Allowing up to four units to be built on any residential property in the city.
3. Allowing up to four storeys on any residential property that is within 800m of a frequent transit route.

So here we are, twelve months later, and Council is now headed into a vote on the first of those items. The other two will be dealt with in March 2025.

Yes, that’s considered a “rapid” zoning change in city terms.

And although the vote hasn’t yet happened (the meeting is into its 18th hour over two days as I write this), the mayor has signaled his support for the changes. That’s very encouraging.

And if that passing vote does happen today, I can’t help but appreciate the sweet sense of cosmic justice for it to happen on the 1-year anniversary of the closing of a major piece of city infrastructure, to take a first step towards rectifying the root causes of it. Thanks for the bone, Universe!

Kissy-smoochy,

Elmwood Guy

P.S. If you’re interested in learning more about this, the Housing Accelerator Fund, and abundant housing in general, I invite you to come join us next week at Sargent Tommy Prince Place, where YIMBY Winnipeg is hosting an informative infill event. Here are the details:

Bringing Housing Home
Thursday, November 28th, 2024, from 7pm to 9pm
Sargent Tommy Prince Place (90 Sinclair St, Winnipeg MB)

Take in presentations by local experts, an interactive panel discussion, and learn how you can support more housing in your neighbourhood!

With presentations by: Brian Pincott (former Calgary City Councillor, current Winnipeg resident and board member for several non-profits) as well as myself!
And a panel discussion featuring: Richard Mahé (Planner & HAF manager, City of Winnipeg), Mel Marginet (Sustainable Transportation Coordinator, Green Action Centre), Kathryn Davies (More Homes Calgary), and myself. Moderated by Brian Pincott.

This event will be in-person AND online! It’s open to everyone, so subscribe to their YouTube Channel to join in online if you can’t make it in person.

The post Happy Anniversary, Arlington Bridge Closure! first appeared on Dear Winnipeg.