The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

FEATURE

As part of our effort to slow global warming, we should be correcting one of the great errors in the history of American city planning: the post-war binge of urban freeway building.

March 19 - Charles Siegel

<p>With urban areas across the nation facing increasing challenges, some are wondering if the old style of leadership displayed by New York City's legendary public official is required to actually get things done.</p>

March 19 - Columbus Ledger-Enquirer

<p>The city's attractiveness has bred gentrification of many neighborhoods, and small businesses and creative types are fleeing for cheaper pastures.</p>

March 19 - The Oregonian

<p>Though criticized for their flawed vision, Modernist architects tried to engage and improve the broader city -- something some say their contemporary counterparts have completely neglected to address.</p>

March 19 - The Boston Globe

<p>A top architect is advocating the use of zoning and urban design to transform a key urban thoroughfare into a "zipper" bringing together many of the city's top assets and neighborhoods.</p>

March 19 - Memphis Commercial-Appeal

<p>The new wave of residents in downtown Orlando are helping to resurrect long-time churches that never fled to the suburbs.</p>

March 19 - The Orlando Sentinel

<p>A Wayne State University professor has created an urban planning simulation game that allows Detroiters to change a neighborhood along Mack Avenue, one of the city's major thoroughfares.</p>

March 19 - Metro Times

<p>UCLA planning professor Matthew Kahn describes his personal experience publishing his book, <em>Green Cities</em>.</p>

March 18 - Urban Planning Research, A blog by Randall Crane

<p>While Congress is eager to increase fuel economy standards to lower petroleum consumption, ill-planned regulations could do more harm than good, says a senior researcher at RAND.</p>

March 18 - The Detroit Free Press

<p>Thousands of demonstrators in St. Petersburg call for a halt to the proposed Gazprom headquarters, a high-rise tower that would be taller than New York's Empire State Building.</p>

March 18 - INTBAU News

<p>The most recent Canadian Census shows that Canada is rapidly urbanizing. Unfortunately, writes Jeffrey Simpson, its systems of government and economic development strategies are stuck in a rural past.</p>

March 18 - The Globe & Mail

<p>Even with the constant threat of Harvard's ongoing expansion and new attention from developers, the Riverside neighborhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts, still manages to preserve its quirky atmosphere and charm, though affordability has declined.</p>

March 18 - MIT Tech

<p>The Economist reports on how San Jose, CA and Las Vegas, NV, have tried -- and failed -- to revive their downtowns.</p>

March 17 - The Economist

<p>One Chinese lawmaker is claiming the coffee chain's outpost in Beijing's Imperial Palace Complex, a venerable symbol of American capitalism, is tainting the national culture that the site represents.</p>

March 17 - Forbes

BLOG POST

<p class="MsoNormal"><strong>Information Strategies for Answering Fundamental Planning Questions</strong></p> <p class="MsoNormal">In universities in the northern hemisphere, April and May are months for completing work and moving closer to graduation. Assignments are due. Exams are looming. Students are too tired to write well and professors are too tired to notice. In the crunch for time, enterprising students look to the power of new information and communication technologies to reach out beyond their harried contexts to experts who can help them answer important questions. If Paul Davidoff (now dead) had email, they reason, he would have been happy to respond.</p>

March 17 - Ann Forsyth

<p>Emory University hopes wants provide affordable housing for faculty and staff and tackle the area's traffic problem by building pedestrian-friendly, mixed-use communities on land near campus -- though some area residents aren't sold on the idea.</p>

March 17 - The Sunday Paper

<p>The new Paris-Strasbourg TGV line is the continent's fastest high-speed rail link yet, and will connect France with Germany and Eastern Europe.</p>

March 17 - Der Spiegel

<p>The suburbs of Brisbane, Australia could soon be home to 20-story high-rises under a new plan to accommodate the city's projected growth.</p>

March 17 - The Courier Mail

BLOG POST

<div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"> </div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Helvetica" class="Apple-style-span">First, let me begin by introducing myself. I am Parris Glendening, and I serve as the president of the Smart Growth Leadership Institute in Washington, D.C., which is part of Smart Growth America. From 1995-2003, I was Governor of Maryland, and for more than 20 years before that I served at various levels of local and county government. I am excited about being part of the network of contributors here at Planetizen and participating in the discussion.<br />---<br /><br />In 1956 Pres. Dwight Eisenhower shepherded the Interstate Highway into existence, fulfilling a decades-long aspiration to link the nation with highways that could move both people and materiel as efficiently as those he had seen in Germany. Later, he would warn us against the military-industrial complex, but with a bit more foresight he might have warned against the asphalt-industrial complex, as well.

March 16 - Anonymous

<p>A real estate company in Chongqing city, China, turns the home of a man who refuses to move into an island. [Includes a stunning photo.]</p>

March 16 - Ananova