Ep 11: REI MBA - Lehigh Valley Planning Commission: Discussion on Real Estate Development
On this episode, Becky Bradley joins us for an interview. Becky is extremely entertaining to listen to and very personable. In this episode, she discusses the important role that the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission plays in multiple industries. If Real Estate Investors are not listening to her and following her, they are missing out! In the middle of the interview, she provides some details that the Lehigh Valley ranked #2 in the WORLD in a specific real estate investment sector.
Becky is the Executive Director of the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission where she brings her 20 years of experience in city, regional economic development, historic preservation, transportation planning, including significant implementation experience in community revitalization, infrastructure investment, roadway redesign and trail construction. She is leading a $2.5 billion dollar regional transportation planning program as well as balancing the needs of the Lehigh Valley's rapidly growing population through this organizations county planning responsibilities. She has led the joint effort to combine the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission's General land use plan with the transportation and investment plan through the Lehigh Valley Transportation Study, which was done in 2019. The result which is FutureLV: The Regional Plan, is one of the first regional transportation comprehensive land use plans in the nation and sets the direction for the region for the next 25 years.
You can reach out to Becky through the LV Planning Commission’s website: https://www.lvpc.org/
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Interview Transcripts
Tejas Gosai: Hi guys. It's Tejas Gosai and I have my co-host Jeremy Moyer over here. I am pulling over in just a couple minutes to conduct this interview, but I could not miss it. I'm super excited about our guest today and we have been producing a ton of our podcasts. We have a bunch of support and our goal was really just to share information about our beautiful Valley and this one is super special because the guest we have today has been beautifying the Valley herself. I can't say single-handedly because we now know how networked and what you've had to go through here. But with that said Jeremy do you mind introducing our guest?
Jeremy Moyer: Absolutely. So we're excited to have Becky Bradley with us today. So Becky has 20 years of experience in city, regional economic development, historic preservation, transportation planning, including significant implementation experience in community revitalization, infrastructure investment, roadway redesign and trail construction. She has been the Executive Director of the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission since August of 2013 and is leading a $2.5 billion dollar regional transportation planning program as well as balancing the needs of the Lehigh Valley's rapidly growing population through this organizations county planning responsibilities. She has led the joint effort to combine the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission's General land use plan with the transportation and investment plan through the Lehigh Valley Transportation Study, which was done in 2019. The result which is FutureLV: The Regional Plan, is one of the first regional transportation comprehensive land use plans in the nation and sets the direction for the region for the next 25 years. So Becky, I want to thank you so much for joining today. I know you're super busy with everything that's on your plate. We definitely have a bunch to get through and your resume definitely had a lot more on it than what I read. And it was all really impressive. Can you give our listeners a brief explanation of how you got involved in planning, economic development side? And then how did you also came to the Valley?
Becky Bradley: Sure, I actually started my career working for two different successive Lieutenant Governors in the State of Illinois, specifically in their Illinois Main Street program. So that was downtown revitalization. And you know at the time, it was the 90s, so a lot of you know big strip centers were being built, you know Walmart was coming to Rural America and so there were new challenges on Main Street and I learned about planning then. I'd never heard of it before. And I had you know an undergraduate degree at the time. And so I decided after working there to go pursue a Master's Degree at the University of Pennsylvania...specifically in City and Regional Planning. So that's how I found planning and that's how I got out here. And then I met my husband right after I graduated Penn and he's from the Lehigh Valley. And so his family's been here since 1732 and when you know Columbus sailed the ocean blue. We always joke or dinosaurs roamed the Lehigh Valley. But that aside....that's how I came up here and I was lucky enough to start working in the City of Easton and got to be integral to you know, kick starting their revitalization and got to do some really amazing things with the people there. Which ultimately led me here. What year was that when you were in Easton or what time period? From 2005 to 2013. So you were the person that we have to thank for what is happening in Easton now? One of several, you know, we have Mayor Panto, of course, he's you know, one of the, biggest mentors in my life. He's a fantastic human being. He gave a bunch of us young kids, you know young punk kids a chance. He hired a bunch of us and just said like look do what you you need to do to turn this around and all of us worked together to make that happen. So it was a great group of people from the Police Department to Public Works to Economic Development to Planning, Codes and Development. Like I had that really built the city back up and now it's just like….it's amazing.
Jeremy Moyer: It's so amazing what's happening there. A lot of change for sure. Becky....we...you and I had an opportunity to talk like a week or two ago for a good hour and I've learned...I learned just from conversation; I learned quite a bit. Can you explain to our listeners what the Planning Commission does and how it works with all these different groups in the the area here in the Lehigh County...the Lehigh Valley, sorry. And how where does it fit within everything? Sure. So the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission was actually founded back in 1961. So we're in our 59th year of existence of 60 years, next year, which is it's a big deal. But we were really founded for a couple of reasons. Initially it was because the interstate highway system was starting to be envisioned and built across America. So they needed an agency regionally to figure out how and where the roads could go and then where we could grow the existing system. So and then also LVPC as a part of that, then needed....it was at the time was called The Joint Planning. Commission of Lehigh in Northampton counties. Simultaneously the State of Pennsylvania passed the Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code, which then required counties to have planning. So that's where we got our advisory role to all 62 municipalities and 17 school districts and 16 watersheds and all these other cool things we get to do. So we see every subdivision, land development plan, every municipal ordinance change. We actually do work and serve as the local Planning Commission for about a handful of communities that just decided that it was easier for us to do it, than for them to set up their own. So it turned out to be like a hybrid of federal rules, and roles and responsibilities around Transportation tied in with County Planning responsibilities. And then over time that has kind of grown into some other things like Global Water Quality and Watershed related items and things like that. So it's...I have two boards. Interestingly enough, we have the LVPC which everybody knows about. That's a County Planning Commission and everybody just calls us that. But then we have the Lehigh Valley Transportation Study....innocuously named...worth a billions of dollars in Road and Bridge and Transit planning and investment. And that's a separate board though there are some similarities between the people on both. That's under the federal law. So we do lots of really cool stuff. But really at the end of the day, if you want to put it together outside of the complicated bits, we really are kind of the umbrella agency that kind of does a lot of the management or getting everybody to work together and figuring out how to you know, get this puzzle piece put together with this puzzle piece to just make it all work. Whether that's water and sewer and storm water, to land use and development, to housing, the economy, the environment, parks, recreation and open space, transportation. You get the idea.
Jeremy Moyer: I think that's a great explanation. There's a lot of moving parts to what you guys do and I'm sure there's a lot more than I even understand. I can only imagine the amount of data that you guys have to look at and crunch through and the studies that you do. Can you, and you did talk to me briefly about this when we had a one-off call. Can you…and it was pretty impressive what you do and what you go through before you even publish the data. Like if the data is not sound, you don't publish it. Can you just kind of give an idea and explain that to the listeners like the...the type of...what you look at?
Becky Bradley: Yeah. We're the official Census Bureau affiliate for the the region and we run neutral governmental entity. So we are not selling you anything. We're not marketing anything. Our job is to report what's actually going on. And one of the responsibilities of being a data scientist is that you have to be neutral on these things and let the numbers tell you what the conclusion is; not come into anything with a predefined answer that you want to get out of there. And I mean there are times that I'm like, oh, I would have never thought it was that but you find out it is and you have to accept that. And that is really critical to who we are. We have to be reliable. We have to be accurate. The integrity of the Commission is absolutely everything. One of our major responsibilities is providing accurate and timely information to folks, and working with our partners at the federal and state levels whether it's the Bureau of Labor Statistics or the Census Bureau or the US Department of Transportation, whomever, the Penn State data center. Working with all of these folks to try to make sure that we have accurate information to give out to the people in the Lehigh Valley. And the people is anyone...private sector, individual people, nonprofits, other governments. And so we do a lot, including population projections that are an employment projections by sector. That are then given out to the federal agencies and they use those to kind of cross-doc some of the more aggregated information and work that they do. So we have to be accurate and if we cannot be accurate, it will never come out of this office and that's critical. I mean the the community needs that information. They need it to be good or what's the point. Developers make decisions based on where we're telling them things are growing.
Tejas Gosai: Yeah, I gotta jump in. So first of all, you mentioned Penn State. I went there for law school. We Are! I have to say it. So.....you're right in my world. So in my early 20s and 30s, I built almost a $100 million dollars worth of hotels and gas stations, convenience stores in the Pittsburgh, Ohio, West Virginia Market during the oil and gas boom and it was all data. There was nothing about... And then what was really interesting from a teeny tiny person (like) me doing this, is it was more about being able to prove the data and then build on that, you know, in the following quarter, the following year and things like that. So, you know, somebody me now, who married somebody from the Valley, had to move here in 2017, got my real estate license, rebuilt my life and fell in love with this place. I keep saying in every interview...like I owe it to you guys; you know us Realtors, the 2742 of us as of this morning owe it to you guys. And I mean we're growing by leaps and bounds through COVID which is crazy. You couldn't even take exams during that point. So, you know, your data you've been along here now, where you've used data, you've pushed it out there, developers have relied on it. It was proven. The numbers worked. The bank financing worked, the debt-to-income ratios worked and you know, their personal guarantees didn't get called in through COVID because things were okay and that's really why we started this show. People don't really understand what you do, or what other people do and it's really a village. And now is the time. This is post-COVID now; is the time that it's meant to be for the Valley. So sorry I talk so much, but that's just to it say.... that's a big thank you. And also to explain to our listeners, you know from my perspective, this is so much to unpack. We're already at 12 minutes. We're not going to be able to do it. So let's hit some high points like you have helped beautify the community, you've helped turn it into what it is and it's not really about this year or next year. It's about 2022 and 2023 and things like that. I don't mean to jump the gun, but that's where I want to go later on and I'll shut up and let Jeremy ask a couple things. But go ahead with that. I guess the question is...my question is like, how do you, how are you guys looking at the future, because we're in a very pivotal moment this month and this quarter and next month and next quarter and all that stuff?
Becky Bradley: Yeah. It's interesting because one of the reasons why you know, we work so hard to get the Lehigh Valley Transportation Study and their transportation planning and investment program to align with the County's planning program and what they wanted to see for the environment and land use and Parks and Recreation and our Municipal governments needed to just continue to function because if they don't function, business doesn't function. Business doesn't function, they don't function. Those things are inextricably linked and we need to talk about society that way because that's actually the way it works. So at the end of the day...they're not separate sorts of things. They are separate but they work together every single day. If one isn't successful the others isn't successful. So one of the things that we did in 'FutureLV' and why we called it 'FutureLV' is we knew the world was already changing. We were already in the middle of the fourth Industrial Revolution. We're already writing and talking about the growth in automation, the growth in 3D printing, what the....really the 'retail apocalypse', which now has just been accelerated because of COVID, was going to mean to land use and development. And so we were already writing about those things. And so I think we have a really good strategy about thinking forward to the future, but once COVID hit it got really interesting. I made the decision to not close our office. We're a government agency and we knew developers still needed to drop off plans. They still needed to be reviewed. Financing still needed to move forward, municipal governments still needed to hear what we had to say about how these plans fit into their plans and what their goals for their Community were. Find the commonalities. Find some things we could work on together or not work on together and in some cases as well. Communities needed to change their ordinances and other things. So we stayed open. Minimal staffing and we're still that way. So we do in office and then some remote work. But the reason for that is because development was also high. It is still high. We have the same level of growth and development during the pandemic as we had in 2019 and in 2018. So that just tells you that growth and development was already accelerating before the pandemic hit and the train had already left the station. That's a positive thing. Whether real estate transactions get happen for housing or not. They were about to happen and people were already planning to make those Investments. Interestingly enough, between January and the end of July, we had over 2,500 new housing units proposed in the Lehigh Valley alone. We didn't see those numbers in 2019 at all. And so it's part of the reason why we developed this workshop on housing that anyone can join. You're welcome to be a part of it where we're actually bringing everybody together to say.... Okay, we have to figure out where we don't have housing, by income because...and by job type. So if you're a teacher, where can you live in the Lehigh Valley? Is there enough housing for you? If your...insert profession here right...insert income there. We need to figure that out. So the Housing Workshop, which actually started last December, is working on that problem. And we were all set to like put out a report in September on it. And then we were like huh...pandemic's going to change all of this. Our unemployment rate is you know at 14%. We don't know what's going to happen when they lift the eviction and foreclosure ban, which happened on Monday essentially. So we need to work on those things right now. And then take what we've learned from this pandemic, put it together with all these development proposals / locations and then put out, we're hoping December / January time frame, a more accurate version of what we're going to need in terms of housing and where. And so you know, that's a really positive thing. In the meantime the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia heard what we were up to. They literally called us two weeks ago and said, 'Hey we're working on this project, where we're taking...finding out what professions are actually vulnerable, and then we're trying to tie that to housing because we know that's going to affect banking, interest rates, these other things that we work on.' And we said, 'Oh, well, we are already figuring out what areas of the Lehigh Valley people are paying more than 30% of their income, or considered cost burdened, for rental and homeownership.' We'd already been monitoring changes by type of housing, costs, and that sort of thing. We do that anyway and issue reports out every other year on that. And they said, "Oh, well, let's work together.' So in the span of two weeks, now we have this huge partnership between the three City Mayor's, the two County Executives, Us, and the Federal Reserve. And we're actually having a meeting on it next week that anyone can attend by the way. You could check it out on our website. It's called 'Workshop Housing' where we're actually then going to figure out what that next level, even beyond what we're going to do before, we can achieve going forward in the future. And they're also going to provide us a benchmark. So where does the Lehigh Valley fit within the NorthEast Market? How do we compare? We can do that very easily for Industrial, because truth of the matter is, is there's less of it, compared to the total number of houses. So it's harder with housing. And there aren't like entities like CBRE that monitors the Industrial Market, you know, and does Leasing and other things for their business in the same way on the housing. So we had to develop different infrastructure for that. And I know that was like way too long of an answer. You asked me about the future. It's all like this.
Tejas Gosai: That was awesome. And I know when Jeremy has to ask a question. Go ahead man.
Jeremy Moyer: My question was going to be what are the big things that are happening right now, but I think we kind of tackled some that. Is there anything else Becky that you think is relevant towards Real Estate and initiatives that, or projects that you're currently reviewing and tackling that would be relevant to our listener base?
Becky Bradley: Yeah one interesting new... I mean the industrial Market has been hopping here forever. And again, every time I bring that up people like want to shoot the messenger but our job is to tell people what is actually happening in a neutral way and I'm sorry, you don't want to hear it, some people, but if you stick your head in the sand, you can't invest in the infrastructure around it. You still going to have congestion problems and you're still going to mobility issues and other things and we have to address those. It's irresponsible not to. So we've been monitoring big changes. In this case, it's the Industrial Market and then our population growth, though that has slowed but we're still growing. And the other thing I want to say on population and then I'll go back to the Industrial piece and how that's really important now. But we have been growing every year for over 60 years. So change is something that the Lehigh Valley has been doing as a full-time job in terms of population growth for more than my lifetime. And so it's not something that we're unable to handle. In fact, the reason why the Valley is successful is because we constantly have new people coming in to you know, help supplement the people that have been here, like my husband's family, for you know hundreds of years. But at the end of the day, it all matters. And everyone has a place and it's still beautiful here, but like balancing all those things is the tough part. So we have some exciting initiatives going on within the LVPC, Lehigh Valley Transportation Study, with some of our partners. I think one of the most exciting is our Transportation Planning. Just in June, the Lehigh Valley Transportation Study adopted like almost a $452 million dollar plan for the next four years to invest in road, bridge, bike, pedestrian and transit infrastructure. And it's basically a short-term cash flow model for that 'FutureLV', long range plan. And we kind of, as an LVTS made some decisions that we didn't necessarily make before, and one of them is to invest more heavily in what Lanta....a program Lanta has going called 'Bus Rapid Transit'. And that essentially enhances bus rapid transit. It basically in its full build-out is almost like 'Train-bus', but it would be through the Lehigh Valley. So roughly from the Walmart in Whitehall down to the Allentown Transportation Center to the Bethlehem Transportation Center and then over to Easton. And that would then create this opportunity for us to densify where we have existing infrastructure, redevelopment opportunity, connecting places that are already successful and already have significant population in them. Connecting people to businesses. So that's something that's really exciting. We balance that out with a 'Commuter Trail Network' as well. That's really important. Our outdoor recreation economy is enormous and we have not capitalized on that in the way that we could and so we had to start laying the foundation for that infrastructure. We're doing that through 'FutureLV', but also then through a targeted partnership called "The LINK", which brings together the Trail Community, with the Transportation Community, US, funding partners, like Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources to figure out then where we can target that 'off-road infrastructure' to tie it to 'on-road infrastructure' and make it easier for people to move around and to leverage the assets that we have. One of our big projects is closing the Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor Trail gap, which is also part of the 9/11 Memorial Trail. It's a statewide priority. But we essentially had the vision between Whitehall and Allentown of creating our own version of the San Antonio Riverwalk. We will achieve that and we actually have a huge private sector investment over $20 million dollars in that project, to then match up with public sector investment at the State, Federal and Regional level and local level too. So we're figuring out how to put it all together. To me that's exciting stuff. Because you have the vision you have the ideas, but then how do you implement it? And so, we're focusing very much on what we can do to achieve the outcomes that the community has come together and said that it wants for itself. That is the most exciting part of my job, is to be able to go from the Big Picture the Big Vision up here and build that with the community. Then kind of work it down to a policy perspective. What do our local governments need? What county policy, state policies can we advocate for? Can we work with communities to build to then support the vision and then your next level is the implementation. And that's done by all kinds of people and entities and the like. But I really loved that piece of it and it really comes down to management and being able to follow through and that's what we get to do at the LVPC.
Tejas Gosai: It's fantastic. It's what you guys have done and Don Cunningham, everybody, the whole, you know, just a whole entire unit is really clean and organized and we see that stuff. Sorry Jeremy. I just monopolized this. So transportation and Industrial. Can you confirm a transportation fact for me before I ask you about industrial. I listened… Actually, I'm not going to say I listened. John Levine, my partner in the Lehigh Valley Private Equity Fund listened to the like 2-hour Transportation Committee, you know one of the talks or something. And it was said that pre-COVID, our trucks and our transportation numbers were so high and then we went through COVID. Yes, they dipped, but now post-COVID that they are higher than they were a pre-COVID. Do you know about any...is that possible?
Becky Bradley: Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's us. There's 4 embedded traffic counters in different roads in the Lehigh Valley. They'll be more. PennDOT's working on putting more of those in. And then we take that information; we report on it...Yeah. We report on it monthly. And I mean, I was already obsessed with the 'retail apocalypse', like it's just my thing. There's things we all like really cue in on, that's one of my things. Future forces, the 4th Industrial Revolution, and Retail Apocalypse. Love it. So you know me, I'm like, okay, we're all shopping online all the time. I haven't...I mean truth be told, I have not gone into buy...to a store to buy clothing in like four years. I haven't and I love clothes. I'm a girl, like I got that girl piece of me, you know, and I own it, I'm okay with that. But online shopping and actually I shouldn't even say online shopping.... I shop on my phone. I don't even use a computer to do that most of time. I knew that stores were going to decline. I'm also an avid daily reader of The Economist. I love that. I love the Wall Street Journal too. I read that every day, like I'm a junkie...for that stuff. So I started hearing all these different reports and I was like, okay this is going to happen here too. But the Lehigh Valley's delay...usually has a delay on those things. So what's our timeline on that? And so we started, you know, I specifically, but other people on the staff, I kind of enlisted them, and we started looking at what this meant. And I can monitor traffic and I can tell whether there's more tractor-trailer movements or not. What that means for the supply chain. How that affects things like the Retail Economy. How does that affect our Industrial Market and the growth that we've seen here and the like. And so, you know the majority of new industrial facilities that have been built and there's been over 33 million square feet proposed in the Lehigh Valley in under six years. It's the second highest growth rate in the world. So the majority of that is eCommerce.
Tejas Gosai: Pause! ....
Becky Bradley: Yeah, I'm not kidding.
Tejas Gosai: Wait. Can you repeat that, because I need to understand the significance? Yeah.
Becky Bradley: Yeah. So in under six years we've had over 33 million new square feet of industrial building....development proposed in the Lehigh Valley. So now not all of that's been approved but a significant portion of it has been approved by the municipal governments who have final say in that. And so the majority of those facilities are occupied by e-commerce businesses. And so I knew that the transition...we were living...living the the retail changes, or what people call the 'retail apocalypse', in real time here in a way that no other place in America has or is living it. And so I knew that we had to rise to that challenge. That's what made 'FutureLV' so important, from a policy perspective, but then also a transportation investment perspective. Because our road system, by and large, is not built to withstand all of these tractor-trailer movements. And if the federal government who's the primary funder of transportation in America, doesn't continue to increase funding to places like the Lehigh Valley, you can see over time, we're sort of on a collision course for...(all right, that was intentional). They're sort of on a collision course for our infrastructure. So we have to talk about the good with the bad, the jobs and the opportunities. But then also what we need to do to manage our future situation or we're being irresponsible. And so that's where I think monitoring these things become so important. And the warehousing industry literally changes every six months and we're watching the types of buildings, how they're built, they’re building up, they’re automating, existing warehouses, lease terms are changing, per square foot cost is changing. All of this is changing like every six months. I would say probably every quarter but it's noticeable every every 6 months.
Tejas Gosai: I'm on this like crazy weird receiving end of this where I have Brokers from New York that are like I need a warehouse. I got clients that want warehouses, blah, blah blah, for like most of last year. And you know COVID hit and you know, the calls never stopped during COVID. It's like, you know, we all know like New York is, I mean I can say this maybe you don't have the ability to, but New York is dead from an investment standpoint and people have been leaving there since they changed the laws, for rental increases last year in July. So it's just awful what's happening there. You can't sell the multimillion-dollar buildings. You can't refi them. New Jersey.... Everyone's flocking here in droves, from my perspective. The gas stations, just a simple thing just maybe you don't know this, but from my perspective, there's a ton of Indian gas station owners selling their gas stations in New Jersey because they're raising the minimum wage, and you have to have somebody pay to pump. They're all come in here. They're not going to Scranton or Philadelphia or Harrisburg. They only want to come here. And just dollar-for-dollar if they just move over here, they're just not paying to pay at the pump. And it's just such a like, you know different galaxy that I'm in. And I got to say I knew this would be the best podcast we've had to date. You're confirming all the crap that I've been saying for a couple years and you know...
Becky Bradley: See...it's not crap, you know what you're talking about.
Tejas Gosai: But I have to say it is different from your seat to the seat of a guy who's trying to make a commission and you know, like make...you know, I'm being trusted on my judgment. And so that's one of the reasons we created this podcast. Like we have to have you back on. It's 33 minutes. This is over time now, but I'm like you should be on this type of stuff all the time because people don't hear it enough. And you know...I send out mass emails...20,000-30,000 people. I send emails with all of your information on it like all the time. So I know your names. I study you guys, and I don't think enough agents even know to do that. It's actually sad because it would help their business and we all lost. We were the only state out of 50 states that lost almost 65 days of market time this year because, it was a really weird time frame for us. But you know like, the best is yet to come and you know, that's one of the reasons in COVID we were like we need to get voices that are logical, that can say it and you know, respectfully I'm a nerd, you're a nerd, like your nerd data is like this is exciting for me.
Becky Bradley: I've that my whole life. It's okay.
Tejas Gosai: It's just great, you know and the Nerds rule the world and the people who get the best data end up being the most trustworthy and that's really what I see the Lehigh Valley as a whole. From a consumer standpoint, like I now live here. I bought a house here. My kids are going to school here. You know, I am telling everybody I'm like guys if anyone's looking to move anywhere like this is like heaven. This is literally like the best place in the world. And I can see bears in an hour. I can go to the alligator place in the Poconos, Route 611. You know, we have everything here. We have water, we have fishing, you know, like so I love it. I just can't hide my excitement and I'm in a gas station parking lot for the interview with you.
Becky Bradley: I mean honestly, there are so many things we have on our website and we really changed a couple years ago because the technology allowed us to...to start doing more online interactive tools. It became affordable for agencies like us; plus the technology actually existed in mass. So we're doing all of these searchable things online. So and I would direct anybody to our Data LV page on LVPC.org. We have so much on housing, on COVID, the truck stuff you're talking about. Monthly, we put up graphs on our COVID page. You can look at the infection rate if you want to for COVID. You know, you can find it on....
Tejas Gosai: Where is that on here? I just want everyone to know where it is.
Becky Bradley: Okay. Well we have the hero slide there. That's the one that scrolls back and forth. All of the current stuff we're working on is in there, but that COVID...like the little virus thing. Click on that. That'll get you to that truck data, but the regional plan is there. The first one I think is...we just did a new multi-modal transportation plan and that's just 'nerd code' for bike, pedestrian, and transit. Your development folks, this 'Build Monthly' report... Every month, we put it out. We tell you. We have an online interactive map for that too. Where...What is being proposed. What type of housing. Is it, you know commercial? What's going on? You know, we're the only agency that sees that stuff Valley wide. And so we report on that pretty widely. That comes out about the 15th of every month. And we just call it 'BuildLV' because it's really about building and development. But there is, you know, the housing stuff, there's pages and 'DataLV', specifically targeted to that. We did an equity analysis of the Lehigh Valley as well and that includes everything from race and ethnicity. It is also educational attainment, zero vehicle households, unemployment...all of these things. Because there are all these factors that tie into whether a person successful or not. You have an online interactive map for that too. And it looks at everything from disability to poverty rate to income, and... So, I mean the…if we've got it, we're trying to get it online as fast as we can, so people can use it. Because we know people make decisions by this information and often times people just need someone to put it in a place where it's easily accessible to them, or do some small interpretation so they know what they're looking at and what it means. So there's so much going on.
Tejas Gosai: Yeah, it's beautiful. It's really magnificent. It's really magnificent for how long it must have taken and... I know how annoying it is to build a website like it's not easy and you have probably....
Becky Bradley: No, we do everything internally.
Tejas Gosai: Yeah, that's a billion dollars worth of data right there.
Becky Bradley: Yep.
Tejas Gosai: Right.
Becky Bradley: Yep, and it's free.
Tejas Gosai: Yeah, it's free. Hey Jeremy, it's 38 minutes. I could make this go another 20 minutes, but you know what the last question is.
Jeremy Moyer: Yeah, we have to ask it. So Becky...what's your favorite restaurant in the Lehigh Valley?
Becky Bradley: My favorite restaurant. Okay.
Tejas Gosai: We ask everyone on the show.
Becky Bradley: Sure. I'm not going to give you a political answer. I could. But I'm going to tell you what...for real my favorite restaurant is and why. Switchback Pizza in Emmaus. A number of reasons why. First of all, it's completely nondescript. Little railroad building from back in the day, that is owned by a husband and wife that actually were really into Artisan food and they locally source everything they can. They make everything from scratch. Their food is fantastic. And before the pandemic you could go... I mean the place is like five tables inside, but they have a little patio to the side. And you can...you've been there... obviously you know. And we go there with our friends all the time. Hang out. Go over to Yergey's or Funk's and get a Growler and hang out or bring wine or whatever the case and just you know, fantastic people. It's what I love about the Lehigh Valley. It's because you can invent Yourself here. You can be what you want to be and that's attainable for anyone. And that's not an opportunity that you see in...maybe some of our neighboring metros where you have to have millions of millions of millions of millions of dollars to do anything. You can still have your American Dream here regardless of where you start from. It's a lot more attainable and then you get these beautiful things that happen. These gathering places whether it's parks, whether it's restaurants that make the Lehigh Valley...our arts and culture and entertainment. I mean SteelStacks...Hello. The Allentown Art Museum. my God, the amount of stuff we have here. The Nurture Nature Center in Easton. It's just like endless...I could keep going of the opportunities here.
Tejas Gosai: The car museum.
Becky Bradley: I know.
Tejas Gosai: The Crayola Factor...Bacon Fest. Bacon Fest gets how many people every year? It's insane. It's like 60,000 people and that's Easton.
Becky Bradley: Yeah. I mean, I'm OG Bacon Fest when it was like just some balloons that said Bacon Fest, you know, and they ran out of bacon in the first hour. And you know now it's just like nationally-known. I mean, what more can you say about the Lehigh Valley? We got bacon. But that aside I really appreciate you guys having me on and you know, I encourage your listeners to reach out. We're here to support our entire community and to be an accurate, timely and positive partner in the work that we all do. We don't do it without each other. So I appreciate you guys recognizing that and having me on to talk a little bit about it.
Jeremy Moyer: Well, thanks so much for joining... And if the listeners want to get ahold of you just go to the website LVPC.org; go to the Contact page route... Is that the best way?
Becky Bradley: Yeah it is and to the staff here. You see a transportation planner. You have a transportation question. I mean, they're very cool people. And they're very very smart and you know, anybody here is willing to help you. Just reach out.
Jeremy Moyer: Perfect. Thank you so much Becky. This is Jeremy Moyer and Tejas Gosai. This is a RealEstateInvestorMBA.com We appreciate you joining. Have a great day. Bye.
Becky Bradley: You too. Bye.
