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Since the coronavirus pandemic sent Washingtonians indoors to help flatten the curve of infection, Seattleites who open a window or venture outside for socially distanced nature therapy swear something’s different in the air. “It’s for sure much cleaner,” says lifelong Seattle resident Cathryn Stenson, who has been walking through nearby parks more than normal to take…

Catch the light rail southbound, and when you erupt from the tunnel after Beacon Hill station, you see a city shifting: multicolored duplexes and mixed-use buildings. Continue, though, and development dissipates. In Rainier Beach, Seattle’s southernmost neighborhood, empty lots and old buildings flank the tracks. “Many of the things we were told would occur as…

Washington’s overloaded unemployment system has been a vexation for many of the hundreds of thousands of newly jobless workers trying to file claims. But those frustrations may be forgotten when the benefit checks start coming. Thanks to an infusion of federal emergency funds, weekly unemployment benefits for many lower-income workers in Washington will equal — or…

In 2016, Spencer Rascoff sold one of his homes, a Madison Park three-story, for $1.05 million. Days later, Seattle-based Zillow estimated the value of that house at $1.75 million. Here’s the real estate rub: Rascoff was Zillow’s CEO. If an extreme example of an errant “zestimate,” the PR debacle points to a curiosity. Zillow and Redfin…

A UW study abroad program empowers students from all disciplines to apply their skills to real-life problems — such as food insecurity, water scarcity, and a lack of adequate housing and education. At the end of the program the students create videos to share their projects. Participants in the Grand Challenges Impact Lab, directed by UW…

Recent years have brought unusually large and damaging wildfires to the Pacific Northwest – from the Carlton Complex Fire in 2014 that was the largest in Washington’s history, to the 2017 fire season in Oregon, to the 2018 Maple Fire, when normally sodden rainforests on the Olympic Peninsula were ablaze. Many people have wondered what this means for our…

Preliminary demographic data – where available — and early anecdotal evidence suggest that poor African-Americans are contracting and dying from the coronavirus in disproportionate rates. In the state of Michigan, while blacks represent only 12% of the total population, they account for at least 40% of its coronavirus-related deaths, said the Michigan Department of Health and…

A small silver lining of coronavirus social distancing measures is we are likely experiencing a temporary drop in emissions, experts say. NASA satellite images show significant drops in nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in the air above China after lockdowns went into effect. Similar satellite imagery from the European Space Agency shows reductions in Italy, which is also keeping people…

In a typical year, homeless shelters experience the biggest surge in demand not during the cold winter months, but rather during the summer. In the summer, schools close and parents lose the usual daily eight hours of childcare and meals. With the additional burden of sleeping on the streets, parents seek out shelter more often, research…

The Cascadia Urban Analytics Cooperative (CUAC) has released a comprehensive program report detailing collaborative research and training activities between the University of Washington (UW) and the University of British Columbia (UBC) over the last three years. CUAC supports interdisciplinary studies of large urban data sets that use the latest data science techniques to address policy-relevant issues affecting…