Is New Urbanism Conservative-Friendly?

21 July 2009 - 8:00am

A conservative Christian reporter attended the Congress for New Urbanism this year, and found that many New Urbanists support strategies that don't fit neatly into Democratic or Republican platforms.

"The CNU recently had its annual convention here in Denver, and [John] Norquist was not the only surprise for conservatives who expect hostility from "New Urbanists," folks who want to renew cities and retrofit suburbs to make them less car-centric. Sure, the CNU's first board president, San Francisco architect Peter Calthorpe, ripped me a minute into our sit-down because I admitted to skepticism about global warming, but he is also a school choice proponent.

Calthorpe's reasons for supporting vouchers differ from those of many evangelicals—he doesn't want middle-class families to feel the need to live in suburbs for the sake of their children's education—but he is the type of liberal co-belligerent (to use Francis Schaeffer's term) whom evangelicals need. So is architect/community planner Andrés Duany, who grew up in Cuba, left there in 1960, flashes a libertarian streak, and garnered great respect here as the CNU's top guru."

Full Story: Building blocks
Source: WORLD Magazine, July 20, 2009

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Just use Planetizen's link above to get to the abstract, use the "E-mail" button at the top of the article abstract (next to the "Print" button I think), and they'll e-mail you a link that allows full access. I just did it.

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sorry, I'm not sending money to a christian newsrag, even though the concept is interesting.

Paid articles

I agree. I wish they wouldn't post clips to for-charge sites, much less fundamentalist ones.

too bad

Access must have expired: I could see the entire article yesterday. Too bad, it was an interesting take.

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There is lots of theory, and lots of wonderful mathematics, and even lots of dealmaking. But the financial engineers are not real engineers who take responsibility for the bridges that fall down. They have no notion of a safety factor.