Housing
Obama's Housing Policy Expanded
At a town hall meeting this week, President Obama proposed a new initiative that would give unemployed homeowners more wiggle room on their late mortgage payments.
Belgians Create "the Architectural Equivalent of A Mullet"
A post at Fast Company describes the House in the Outskirts of Brussels as business in front and a party in back. (SEE IMAGES).
Discrimination Case Over Katrina Housing Settled
A discrimination lawsuit filed against the federal government and the state of Louisiana was settled this week in favor of homeowners who claimed that the way funds were distributed was biased against the poor.
Sustainable Practices Find a Home in the Americas
Whether in Cupertino, Calif. or Curitiba, Brazil, cities are starting an aggressive move toward sustainability in the Americas. In this evolution, technology, citizen involvement and innovation will play a role transforming cities, Leon Kaye writes.
Graying of the Suburban Image
The 2010 Census showed that the baby-boom generation led to the growth of older populations settling in suburbs, which is causing local governments to rethink whom their services should cater to.
How ARRA Affects the Homeless
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) claims that Obama's economic stimulus bill helped contain the number of homeless people in 2009 and 2010.
Slow Progress in East New Orleans
In this piece from Places, Deborah Gans offers a firsthand look at planning for recovery in the city's neglected East side.
Section 8 Hits the Suburbs
The federal rental assistance vouchers known as Section 8 are increasingly putting low-income families into empty homes in the suburbs.
Smart Growth Weathered Housing Crisis Better Than Sprawl
Abigail Gardner of Smart Growth America takes aim at a recent article based primarily on Wendell Cox's correlation of smart growth policies to the housing market bubble and collapse.
A Neighborhood of Stairs
The La Independencia neighborhood in Medellin, Colombia sprawls up a hillside, leaving the inhabitants to walk up to 10 flights of stairs every day. An ambitious development program is considering building an outdoor network of escalators.
Higher Vacancy Rates in Walkable Neighborhoods
In comparing data collected during the 2010 Census, walkable neighborhoods are shown to have greater vacancy rates than the cities they're in.
Stalled Developments Documented
Photographer Daniel Kariko focuses on issues of land use in sensitive environments. His latest work looks at stalled suburban housing developments in the U.S.
Census Data Reveals Fundamental Changes in Modern Families
Think your living arrangement is unique? You aren't alone. The New York Times parses the vicissitudes and permutations of the twenty-first century American households.
Dwindling Sprawl: The End is Near for Suburbia
As mobile technology is fast becoming more mainstream, Urban Land Institute's CEO Patrick Phillips envisages more mixed-use developments in the next decade.
Stagnant Sales Hamper Chicago's Revitalization Efforts
Failing to attract buyers even with deep discounts, developers are starting to bail out on Plan for Transformation, an ambitious program that seeks to replace moribund public housing projects with mixed-income housing.
New Housing Starts Reveal Shift Toward Multi-Family Housing Construction
AP reports on the Anderson Forecast from UCLA that looks into CA's housing slump and shows two distinct markets, one on the rise and the other (single-family housing) falling.
Density, Closer to the Ground
Vancouver, Canada, famous for its dense downtown development, is changing tack slightly with a transit corridor from downtown to the airport, bringing building heights down mostly to 4 to 12 stories.
China's Property Bubble May Be Bursting
Years of price hikes and a booming real estate sector look to be coming to a close in China.
Destroyed by Tsunami, Small Village Considers Move
A small community in tsunami-ravaged Japan considers a plan to move the entire village farther above sea level.
Rural Development Attempts Alternative to Suburban Sprawl
In rural Georgia, a New Urbanist style development is slowly materializing, andhoping to be a sustainable antidote to urban sprawl.
FREE Course: Walkable City 1: Why Walkability?
After describing his path towards focusing on walkability as the essence of good planning, Jeff Speck marches through his five principal reasons for making more walkable places.
Reinventing Malls: Planning Alchemy—Turning Gray Fields Into Gold
The course focuses on the opportunities and imperatives that shape reinvention of mall sites.
City of Rosemead
Rutgers University, Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy
One Hundred Miles
University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability (SEAS)
Hunter College, City University of New York (CUNY)
The Architects Foundation
City of Cambridge
The Pocatello Development Authority
The Urban Renewal Agency of the City of Pocatello
