The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

<p>The epidemic of vacant housing is leading not just to squatting, but to people illegally 'renting' out homes they don't own.</p>

May 21 - Reuters

<p>Let the controversy begin -- <em>Best Life</em> Magazine named Honolulu #1 on its list of "The 100 Best Places to Raise a Family", while Flint, Michigan scrapes the bottom. Where does your city rank?</p>

May 21 - Best Life Magazine

<p>If you build it, will they come? Not in Hagerstown, Maryland, where airlines have left town despite a brand new runway.</p>

May 21 - The New York Times

<p>Plans to bring New Urbanist designs into British Columbia will do little to stem suburban sprawl, according to this column from the <em>Globe and Mail</em>.</p>

May 21 - The Globe & Mail

<p>Sprawl is consuming small towns in Utah, and creating one of the largest megapolitan regions in the U.S.</p>

May 21 - Deseret Morning News

<p>Under a bold plan from the city's Mayor, the 11 million residents of Sao Paulo, Brazil, are enjoying a city free from outdoor advertising.</p>

May 21 - Ode Magazine

<p>With Cul-de-sac restrictions catching on in the South, one Arkansas town is beginning to make plans to create complete, compact and connected neighborhoods.</p>

May 21 - Northwest Arkansas Times

<p>A committee in Baltimore charged with the task of encouraging more public involvement in land use decisions is learning how difficult that can be as it faces criticism that its own meetings didn't get enough participation from residents.</p>

May 21 - The Baltimore Sun

<p>The video website YouTube is home to a growing number of clips that document traffic conditions in cities around the world.</p>

May 21 - The Los Angeles Times

<p>Though the deal still needs approval from the Pennsylvania legislature, the state hopes to generate over $1 billion a year for road, bridge and transit improvements from the proceeds.</p>

May 20 - The Philadelphia Inquirer

<p>Hoping to head off a competing ballot measure, Miami-based developer Lennar Corp. has voluntarily agreed to set aside 3,200 of the planned 10,000 homes on San Francisco's Hunters and Candlestick Point for low- and moderate-income families.</p>

May 20 - The San Francisco Chronicle

<p>With ridership up nationwide, the next president should start getting serious about investing in passenger rail service, argues a recent column.</p>

May 20 - The Boston Globe

<p>Rising gasoline prices are breathing new life into the Miami's niche jitney service.</p>

May 20 - The Miami Herald

<p>American-style malls are cropping up in Siberia, and gobbling up land, to enable once-isolated Russians to consume in ways that might have been unimaginable a generation ago.</p>

May 20 - The New York Times

BLOG POST

<p> In 2004, voters in Denver approved the FasTracks ballot to build a regional rapid transit system. Now that planning is underway to construct about 120 miles of new rail and 60 new train stations, planners are beginning to focus on transit-oriented development (TOD) around many of these new stations. While much excitment exists in Denver for creating one of the top 21st century cities, some fears for TOD are unfounded. Mr. Ferguson&#39;s &quot;<a href="http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/may/13/four-fallacies-transit-oriented-development/" target="_blank" title="Rocky Mountain News article">Four Fallacies of &#39;transit-oriented development</a>&#39;&quot;, published May 13, 2008 in the <em>Rocky Mountain News</em> is typical of a common mis-education about TOD. What Mr. Ferguson does not realize is that TODs can help protect the rural and suburban nature of communities surrounding Denver. He proposes four tenets about why TODs are bad for the future. Below, I address each of these.

May 20 - John Renne

<p>After forty years in the statistical doldrums, what does Milwaukee make of a sudden, slight increase in population? Local expert and urban enthusiast Dave Steele reports.</p>

May 20 - The Next American City

<p>While Americans have not turned to the bicycle as a mode of transportation in the same numbers seen elsewhere in the world, some predict that soaring gas prices and increased infrastructure investments could change that.</p>

May 20 - Reuters

<p>More people die than are born in Pittsburgh every year -- seriously impacting the city's schools, laborforce and healthcare infrastructure. Other American cities will soon follow, say demographers.</p>

May 20 - The New York Times

<p>Want to learn how Americans can maintain a high standard of living in an era of sky-high gas prices? Just look at Europeans, who've been going it for decades, argues economist Paul Krugman.</p>

May 20 - The New York Times

<p>While the city's regional approach is the envy of many American planners, Shanghai is also guilty of top-down planning that may end up encouraging sprawl.</p>

May 20 - The Hartford Courant