The first urban president

Christof at Intermodality blog points out that Obama is the first Urban president in modern times, whose home is within walking distance of public transport:

Obama lives only four miles from the center of the third largest city of the United States, and his political roots are unquestionably urban. That should not be remarkable in a country where 80% of the population lives in metropolitan areas. But our politics has valued "small town values" and as a result the issues of cities -- traffic congestion, for example -- have not been a major part of the national dialog. But we can hope that's changing. Many of the places that helped swing this election -- the Philadelphia suburbs, Northern Virginia, Denver -- are places that have rail transit, are building rail transit, or are demanding rail transit. Will that shape the policy debates to come?

It should be noted that Joe Biden has been a proponent of - and daily commuter on - Amtrak for decades. I think at bare minimum, grand designs like the Midwest Regional Rail Initiative are suddenly on the table, and voters in California already approved Proposition 1A, a high speed rail initiative between Los Angeles and San Francisco. The argument for rail is also part of the energy independence argument, as rail is more fuel-efficient per passenger than flying, especially for shorter distances.

On a more prosaic level, instead of hearing about President Bush clearing brush from his Crawford ranch, we are going to be hearing about President Obama returning home to the Chicago suburbs. As a result, there's going to be enormous media scrutiny on Obama at "home", far beyond what Bush dealt with, because of the increased accessibility. In that sense even Obama's vacations will be working ones, because his largest constituencies are right outside his front door, and more immediate in his face than they are from behind the walled compound at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue or out on some country ranch.

Recall that President Clinton's offices are in Harlem, NYC - that location has given Clinton a more direct, tangible connection with the issues he fights for in the abstract using his Clinton Global Initiative. The same dynamic of engagement will apply to Obama. It's important for a President to get outside the Beltway, but equally important they don't go so far away that they are removed from everything else.