Vacant Lots

About half of commercial mortgage defaults in Las Vegas last year were for vacant land. With loans impossible to get and construction at a halt, vacant land is a hard sell.

A review of a new book Building Commons and Community by Karl Linn, a landscape architect and psychologist who worked to create vibrant community spaces in abandoned lots and boring institutional settings.

Officials in Fort Worth, Texas, are searching for ways to deal with buildings left vacant by businesses struggling during the recession. Other cities and the state of Texas are also addressing the issue.

Vacant lots and underutilized dirt patches are the the romping grounds of a new breed of activists. Known as "guerrilla gardeners", groups of people all over the world are reclaiming their cities' public spaces and landscapes by planting seeds.