Exclusives

BLOG POST

<p> <span style="white-space: pre" class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>One of the ways we identify places is by foods for which those places are known. Baltimore – crab. Maine – lobster. Cincinnati – chili. San Francisco – sourdough bread. Vienna – pastry. Even for a city to which you’ve never been, chances are that in your mind that city has some food association. </p>

June 28 - Lisa Feldstein

FEATURE

June 28 - John Wilbanks

BLOG POST

I appreciate natural environments. I have always enjoyed walking in wilderness and cycling on rural roads, and I understand the ecological value provided by undeveloped lands, which include clean water, air and wildlife habitat. I also enjoy local fresh vegetables and fruits and so appreciate the value of preserving regional farmlands. Planners call these "greenspace," or more generally "openspace" since some, such as deserts and waterways, are open but not necessarily green.

June 27 - Todd Litman

BLOG POST

<p> Arguments over transportation policy often run as follows: </p> <p> HIGHWAY SUPPORTER: Highways pay for themselves! Buses/trains don&#39;t! So highways good and everything else bad bad bad! </p> <p> TRANSIT SUPPORTER: But highways create bad externalities like pollution and climate change! So if highways were taxed at their true cost gas would cost a zillion billion cajillion dollars per gallon! (followed by numerous counterarguments and counter-counterarguments that I won&#39;t bore you with, except as written below...) </p> <p> It seems to me that these arguments miss one point: even if the highway system as a whole pays for itself, the system is so chock full of cross-subsidies that each individual road doesn&#39;t (except for toll roads). </p>

June 26 - Michael Lewyn

BLOG POST

I don’t know what it is about New Orleans that makes me wax rhapsodic. But something about the city makes everyday life look poetic. I returned to the Crescent City last week after having last visited just seven months ago, when a tree planting

June 25 - Jeffrey Barg

BLOG POST

<p> The High Line curving through the west Chelsea section of Manhattan bordering the Hudson River has to be one of the most successful planning and design stories in New York City in recent years, touted as a crowning achievement of the reign of Mayor Bloomberg, to be emulated in cities across the country. </p> <p> Testimonials and awards not withstanding, I am wary of the cloying elitism of a crowing Bloomberg. Having followed the project’s promotions for the last decade and the community’s evolution for the last half century, I am skeptical of its heralded success. And with the recent sounding of related development controversies, a second opinion is in order. </p>

June 21 - Sam Hall Kaplan

BLOG POST

This week the American Planning Association proudly released the results of a recent poll entitled <a href=http://www.planning.org/policy/economicrecovery/>Planning in America: Perceptions and Priorities</a>, which it commissioned indicating that Americans are overwhelmingly supportive of community planning. Given the state of national politics, it's no wonder that Americans are reserving their passions for local issues. Boss Tweed and Mayor Quimby are looking like angels by comparison. Some of the results are beyond obvious -- such as the fact that 77% of Americans "agree that communities that plan for the future are stronger" -- while others could, if heeded, foretell profound changes for the profession.

June 15 - Josh Stephens

BLOG POST

<p> <em>Editor&#39;s Note: A <a href="/node/56493" target="_blank">recent Planetizen blog post</a> by the University of South Florida’s Steven Polzin voiced several criticisms about the Housing + Transportation (H+T®) Affordability Index, created by the Chicago-based Center for Neighborhood Technology (CNT). We have provided a venue for Scott Bernstein, founder and president of CNT, to respond below.</em> </p> <p align="center"> <u>CNT’s H+T Index Fills Gaps in Data that Others Don’t Provide</u> </p>

June 7 - Jonathan Nettler

BLOG POST

<p class="MsoNormal"> Congratulations to this year&#39;s high school, college and university graduates! The current crop includes our son, who was recruited by a major corporation. The location of his new job will affect his travel patterns and therefore the transportation costs he bears and imposes for the next few years: until now he could get around fine by walking, cycling and public transport, but his new worksite is outside the city center, difficult to access except by automobile. As a result he will spend a significant portion of his new income to purchase and operate a car, and contribute to traffic congestion, parking costs and pollution. This is an example of how land use decisions, such as where corporations locate their offices, affects regional transport patterns and costs.

June 3 - Todd Litman

FEATURE

May 31 - Alesia Hsiao

BLOG POST

Unless they are independently wealthy, students thinking about graduate school in planning need to consider the cost.

May 29 - Ann Forsyth

BLOG POST

<p> One of my prerogatives teaching a landscape design studio exploring public space at UCLA Extension is being able to pick the class projects with which to challenge the students. Time for them to get real and get down, walk the streets, wallow in the sites; to see, hear, smell, taste and touch. </p> <p> Me and my colleague, the loquacious landscape legend Rhett Beavers, are in effect the clients, the students the professional consultants, and the particular projects our whim, no matter how it might be a sugar coated pedanticism in the school’s offering of an urban laboratory. </p>

May 24 - Sam Hall Kaplan

BLOG POST

<p> I occasionally have speculated that our aging society would lead to increased transit ridership, as seniors lost the ability to drive. But I recently discovered that seniors are actually less likely to use public transit than the general public. One study by the American Public Transit Association showed that 6.7% of transit riders are over 65 (as opposed to 12.4% of all Americans).(1) The oldest Americans are even more underrepresented on America&#39;s buses and trains: only 1.5% of transit riders are over 80, about half their share of the population (2). The only other age group that is underrepresented on public transit is Americans under 18. </p>

May 17 - Michael Lewyn

BLOG POST

<p> The work of planning at some point becomes the work of doing. </p> <p> Few communities move from planning to executing easily. This is especially notable in weak markets, though it occurs in strong markets too. In weak markets, planning does not typically require anyone to make a commitment. Or to put it more directly, it too seldom requires the community to really make choices. </p>

May 17 - Charles Buki

FEATURE

Our annual list of the 10 best planning, design, and development websites represents some of the top online resources for news, information and research on the built environment.

May 15 - Abhijeet Chavan

BLOG POST

<p class="MsoNormal"> People love statistics. They let us understanding the world beyond our own senses. <em>USA Today</em> publishes a daily <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/news/snapshot.htm">Snapshot</a> which presents a graph of random statistics. Sports talk and business analysis are dominated by statistics. We measure our progress, or lack thereof, and compare ourselves with others, based on statistics about our size, activities and accomplishments. </p>

May 11 - Todd Litman

BLOG POST

Each year a lot of students ask me "how can I get a degree in urban design?". This is a very big question but in this blog I outline some key questions that those interested in urban design in planning need to consider.

May 9 - Ann Forsyth

BLOG POST

A few weeks ago I had lunch with a friend and fellow urbanist, Bob Ransford. Lunches with Bob are never boring, as we get right into things, and often debate. Bob’s a communications specialist and a longtime member of the Twitteratti (<a href="http://twitter.com/BobRansford" target="_blank">@BobRansford</a>), so amongst discussions about strengthening urbanism in the Cascadia Region, and affordability debates in Vancouver, I asked him a question that’s been on my mind for the last month: Is Twitter a positive tool for global urbanism? Put another way, is twitter facilitating smarter discussions on international city-building, or are we all getting dumber, 140 characters at a time?<br />

May 9 - Brent Toderian

FEATURE

May 8 - Ross Chapin

BLOG POST

<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt" class="MsoNormal"> <span style="font-size: small"><span style="font-family: Calibri"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman"> </span>Over the past few years a variety of documents ranging from contemporary media to more serious research efforts have addressed the cost of auto ownership and use.<span>  </span>These estimates are often used to address two important transportation issues, the household benefits of using transit in lieu of auto ownership and/or the consideration of household location decisions in the context of the total cost of housing and transportation.<span>  </span>Two often referenced sources of research on these issues are the Center for Neighborhood Technology’s (CNT) initiatives in developing a housing and transportatio

April 30 - Steven Polzin