Business Week

When governments use public money to woo national chains, economic growth and job creation aren't worth the cost, says Stacy Mitchell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Independent retailers also suffer.

The economic stimulus of China has focused billions of dollars on building skyscrapers. Some wonder whether a building bust may soon follow.

This piece from Business Week lists the most anticipated architecture projects to watch in 2010.

Saul Kaplan says cities should be transformed into innovation centers to stay competitive and become the venue of a "new economic conversation".

By the end of the year, more than 3.9 million homes will have been foreclosed in the U.S., the second year in a row that figures have broken previous records.

Business Week looks at the recovering housing market, and believes that even though it was driven by massive government support there are signs that it might actually continue.

The failing world economy put many large eco-developments on hold, but many projects like the Amsterdam's 'smart city' and Germany's Eco City Hamburg-Harburg are on track and forging new ground in sustainability practices.

According to some real estate data, there are more than 30 housing markets in the U.S. that are seeing increases in housing prices. Topping the list is Boulder, Colorado.

Amsterdam has taken its smart grid live, installing solar panels and 300 electric car recharging stations throughout the city.

The consensus seems to be that its so bad, we must have hit bottom. But "a drop in housing starts might actually be good news," says one economist.

The Indian discount automaker Tata is now venturing into home production, building 1,000 apartments near Mumbai with prices starting at $7,800.

If the list provided by Business Week is accurate, the Stimulus package includes many tens of billions of dollars for investments in sustainable energy and energy efficiency, infrastructure, rapid transit and the environment.

When Sony was preparing to build a virtual meeting space for Playstation 3 users, they took the unusual step of hiring a real-world architect, Kenji Ikemoto.

As President Elect Obama delivers his weekly address via YouTube, half of all Americans don't have the broadband access necessary to watch.

China is on a path to become an overwhelmingly urban country -- in sharp contrast to its largely rural recent past. Cities across the country are hoping to make the transition gracefully.

New office and apartment buildings in New York City are now mandated to provide a certain proportion of secure bike parking spaces.

In a time of plummeting oil prices, one might think rail would lose business to trucks, but the freight business is more detailed. In this interview with Burlington Northern Santa Fe CEO Mathew Rose, one gains an insight into freight rail's future.

As China embarks on the greatest rail-building investment since the U.S. built its transcontinental railroad, this article points to the urgent need to reform its state-controlled pricing system, both for freight and passengers, to make it effective.

A team of management consulting and foreign policy professionals has released a report analyzing which cities of the world are most global in reach, looking at business activity, human capital, and information exchange. New York comes out on top.

Business Week looks for the most recession-proof cities, using as their main criteria an abundance of jobs in stable industries like government, health care, and education.