The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

<p>Officials in Russia are hoping to help kick-start a population boom in the rapidly depopulating country by declaring September 12 the "Day of Conception" and awarding prizes to those who give birth exactly nine months later.</p>

September 11 - Associated Press via Contra Costa Times

<p>As downtown Los Angeles undergoes a massive redevelopment, the major concern is not whether it will be another New York, nor if its public spaces will improve, but rather how much worse traffic will get, writes Sam Hall Kaplan.</p>

September 11 - L.A. Downtown News

<p>Walls and checkpoints intended to bolster security in Baghdad have made cross-town journeys almost impossible and turned the city into a collection of ghettos that are reinforcing sectarian divisions.</p>

September 11 - The Independent (UK)

<p>The U.S. coastline, home to 53% of the nation's population, is at catastrophic risk from just a 1-meter rise in sea level concludes a major new study.</p>

September 11 - Washington Post Writers

<p>Plans to buy up land in the Great Plains and repopulate them with pre-settlement species such as buffalo have many cattle ranchers on edge. But proponents say these species are meant to be there -- in both an economical and and ecological sense.</p>

September 11 - Long Haul Productions

<p>The ever-growing size of American homes means that, regardless of how "green" the construction techniques, they will be rapacious users of energy for decades to come.</p>

September 11 - Michael Dudley

<p>Despite minor speedbumps in the permitting process, an explicitly green home is now being built in Kendall, a suburb to the south of Miami. The owners expect it to be the greenest home in the region.</p>

September 11 - The Miami Herald

<p>Former Milwaukee Mayor John Norquist visits Buffalo to protest state DOT's plan to expand freeway infrastructure on city's Outer Harbor, calls for demolition of elevated freeway and replacement with at-grade urban boulevard.</p>

September 11 - The Buffalo News

<p>Residents of the South Bronx are opposed to new parking garages for Yankee Stadium, which will be subsidized with tax-exempt bonds issued by New York City.</p>

September 10 - Streetsblog

<p>The rapid rural-to-urban population shift is felt heavily in many African cities, but especially so in the continent's smaller cities, such as the Botswanan capitol of Gaborone.</p>

September 10 - The Christian Science Monitor

<p>The growth of Vancouver has far surpassed what planners projected half a century ago. And though some problems have followed, the region's growth hasn't wrought the city's downfall, as many expected.</p>

September 10 - The Vancouver Sun

<p>The city of Coral Gables, Florida, has tight regulations that keep its neighborhoods and homes beautiful. But a regulation that forbade residents from parking pickup truck on streets and in driveways at night has been ruled unconstitutional.</p>

September 10 - The New York Times

<p>A measure on the Alaskan ballot this October could require a local government to compensate landowners if new land use regulations hurt property values -- a measure similar to Oregon's controversial Measure 37 that is meeting similar resistance.</p>

September 10 - Anchorage Daily News

FEATURE

One citizen planner's journey across the United States provides a glimpse at how stronger connections between people and places can create better communities.

September 10 - Wayne Senville

<p>Getting to the airport is oftentimes a headache. But in these 10 American cities, easy transit access makes the trip before your trip a breeze.</p>

September 10 - MSNBC

<p>Japan's leech invasion may be an unintended consequence of successful reforestation efforts combined with rural population declines.</p>

September 10 - Salon

<p>Microsoft has announced the launch of a private 14-bus transit system to serve its employees in the Seattle area. Transit advocates say the plan underscores the transit deficiencies faced by the region.</p>

September 10 - The Seattle Post-Intelligencer

<p>With little money available in county coffers, residents in an Indiana subdivision are hoping to create a special assessment district that will allow them to personally pay for road maintenance.</p>

September 10 - The Detroit News

<p>Wal-Mart's efforts to reduce waste and operate in an environmentally-friendly manner has fueled a green business boom in an Arkansas town near the corporation's headquarters.</p>

September 10 - The Washington Post

BLOG POST

<p><font face="georgia, bookman old style, palatino linotype, book antiqua, palatino, trebuchet ms, helvetica, garamond, sans-serif, arial, verdana, avante garde, century gothic, comic sans ms, times, times new roman, serif"><em> It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them. Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle.</em> ~Ernest Hemingway</font></p>

September 9 - Mike Lydon