Land Use

Indoor Kale

Lockdown Benefits Urban Farmers In Paris

Pandemic induced lockdown kept Parisians within 1 km of their homes during lockdown, benefiting urban farmers and advocates for a diversified local food supply.

July 29, 2020 - Citymetric

Agrihood

Agrihoods: Futureproofing the Cities of America

The development and planning team behind Middlebrook Farm in Iowa explains how the master-planned community balances productive farmland with new community development.

July 28, 2020 - Jim  MacRae and Steve  Bruere

New Zealand parliament

Well Done, Kiwis! New Zealand Delivers Big Planning Policy Reforms

New Zealand’s new national urban development policy prohibits parking minimums and increases allowable building heights near transit stations. This is a watershed moment for the country’s cities and towns.

July 28, 2020 - Todd Litman

HUD Secretary

Trump Finally Follows Through on Threat to Gut Obama-Era Fair Housing Rule

It's not clear if President Trump is aware that his administration has been working to rescind the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule since 2018, but he's recently doubled down on messaging that pit suburbs against the Fair Housing Act.

July 28, 2020 - Los Angeles Times

Washington D.C. Stores

A Tale of Two Real Estate Markets

Hotels, retail, and office properties, along with renters, have been ravaged by the economic downturn of the pandemic. Meanwhile home sales are booming as people with money in the bank take advantage of low interest rates to upgrade.

July 28, 2020 - The Dallas Morning News

New Zealand Bus Transit

New Zealand Eliminates Parking Minimums and Height Limits to Increase Urban Infill

Once again, New Zealand shows the way! The national government's new urban development policy will eliminate off-street parking requirements and remove low height-limits near transit stations to encourage more efficient infill development.

July 28, 2020 - Stuff

Inwood Hudson RIver

NYC Rezoning Plan Reinstated Despite Lack of Racial Impact Analysis

The New York Appellate Division's First Department made short work of a ruling that reinstated the Inwood NYC Action Plan, which a lower court dismissed in December 2019.

July 28, 2020 - City Limits

Coronavirus in Oregon

The Great Debate: Will the Pandemic Alter the Course of Urbanism?

The geography for the coronavirus has changed, but most of the debate about the future of cities continues along many of the same lines as in the early months of the pandemic.

July 27, 2020 - James Brasuell

San Francisco, California

S.F. Rezoning Plan Paused for Equity Analysis

A plan to rezone parcels around the busy intersection of Market Street and Van Ness Avenue in San Francisco, called the Hub, will undergo an analysis of the potential impacts of the plan on marginalized communities.

July 27, 2020 - The San Francisco Chronicle

Georgia

Roswell, Georgia Limits Multi-Family Development Despite Affordability Concerns

The Roswell City Council discussed how limiting multi-family developments could increase housing costs, and then voted to limit multi-family development anyway.

July 27, 2020 - The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Southern California Coast

Community Planning Groups Scrutinized for Demographic Disparities in San Diego

Older, white homeowners take up far more than an equal share of the seats at the planning table in San Diego.

July 26, 2020 - Voice of San Diego

High-Rise Development

A Defense of 'Out of Scale' Buildings

Beauty is often known to break the rules.

July 24, 2020 - Strong Towns

San Francisco Bay Bridge

Plan Bay Area 2050 Draft Released

A regional plan for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area is available for public comment.

July 23, 2020 - San Francisco Chronicle

Dublin

Growing Anti-Development Sentiment Kills Mixed-Use Proposal in East Bay City

The city of Dublin, located adjacent to the I-580/I-680 intersection in the East Bay Area, pulled the plug on a proposed mixed-use development that would have added apartments, senior houses, restaurants, and a theater to the quickly growing city.

July 22, 2020 - The Mercury News

Houston, Texas

How Houston Achieved Lot Size Reform

Nolan Gray of George Mason University and Adam A. Millsap of the Charles Koch Institute write about a recent article they authored in the Journal of Planning Education and Research.

July 22, 2020 - JPER

Granny Flat

ADU Business Booming in California

The number of Californians adding Accessory Dwelling Units to residential properties has quickly grown during the pandemic, according to industry sources.

July 21, 2020 - The San Francisco Chronicle

The Villages, Florida

The Villages and the Dangers of Holding Too Tightly to the Past

Some parts of The Villages, Florida, the nation's largest retirement community and one of its most popular master planned communities, bear a striking resemblance to the neotraditional development favored by famous early examples of New Urbanism.

July 20, 2020 - James Brasuell

Connecticut

Pro-Development Coalition Forms in Connecticut

DesegregateCT is a growing coalition of groups coalescing behind ideas like Missing Middle Housing and zoning reform as a means to improved housing affordability.

July 20, 2020 - Hartford Courant

Hong Kong

The Greener Side of Hong Kong: Five Parks to Visit

Most people only know Hong Kong as an urban jungle and one of the densest cities in the world. However, there are actually green places where its residents can go for exercise and relaxation.

July 17, 2020 - South China Morning Post

Zoning Code

What Is a Form-Based Code?

Form-based codes are a variety of development regulation that departs significantly from the land use control approach of most zoning codes in the United States.

July 16, 2020 - James Brasuell

Urban Design for Planners 1: Software Tools

This six-course series explores essential urban design concepts using open source software and equips planners with the tools they need to participate fully in the urban design process.

Planning for Universal Design

Learn the tools for implementing Universal Design in planning regulations.

Top Books

An annual review of books related to planning.

Top Schools

The definitive ranking of graduate planning programs.

100 Most Influential Urbanists

The who's who of urbanism, according to Planetizen readers.

Urban Planning Creators You Should Know

A short list of voices on social, video, and podcasting platforms.