Business

Following Oakland’s failed ban on coal transport, Richmond officials will consider their own

The Richmond City Council will soon consider an ordinance that would restrict the handling of coal and petcoke, a byproduct of oil refining, on port terminals in Richmond. A draft of the ordinance, introduced in December, has been approved by the city attorney, and it is expected to go to the council for a vote, although according to that office, a date has not been set yet.  The ordinance, authored by Councilmember Eduardo Martinez, calls for “the prohibition on the…

Tales of Two Cities Podcast: Guilty Pleasures

Welcome back to the Tales of Two Cities podcast!  This episode is all about our guilty pleasures. This week we’ll take you to Zoonie’s Candy Shop in Oakland to relive your childhood, learn about how people who have shopped too much are managing all the stuff they have, and hang out with a group of friends trying to solve a murder mystery — and who want you to know that games aren’t just for kids. And finally, we’ll meet up…

Is lab-grown cheese more environmentally friendly than traditional cheese? Oakland biohackers want to find out

Based out of Counter Culture Labs, a community-owned lab in Oakland, Real Vegan Cheese is working on making a cheese that would have less of an environmental effect than making traditional cheese, which requires collecting milk from cows. They are using yeast and E. Coli to create the cheese proteins. In this video, scientists at UC Berkeley discuss whether or not the lab-grown cheese will be sustainable and if people will want to eat it.

BART shifts weekday morning service one hour later

Last Monday, the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) service moved its morning service one hour later in order to conduct a seismic retrofit on the Transbay Tube that will allow it to withstand major earthquakes in the future. BART shifted its systemwide service from 4 to 5 a.m., allowing work crews to have an extra hour each morning. The retrofit and service shift will last for the next 3.5 years in order to complete a “waterproofing project” to protect the…

Bicycle shops in the county are closing for business

Local bicycle shops are dying off in the East Bay. In the last two months, five of them have closed their doors in Alameda County. One of them is Oakland’s Manifesto Bicycles. Owners Sam Cunningham and Mackay Gibbs explain how a decline in bicycle commuting and competition from online retailers affected their business and led to them having to shut it down.