The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

Recent headlines over the fight to protect a home designed by Frank Lloyd Wright for his son in Phoenix touch upon the city's larger struggle to protect its dwindling cache of historic buildings, reports Fernanda Santos.

October 22 - The New York Times

Does density cause higher housing prices? Can the private market supply low-income housing? What will it take to maintain housing affordability in successful, growing cities? Dan Bertolet seeks an answer to these questions in a piece for Citytank.

October 22 - Citytank

BLOG POST

<p class="MsoNormal"> <a href="http://www.dot.gov/map21">Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century (MAP-21)</a>, the new U.S. federal transportation law, has the following main goals: </p> <ol style="margin-top: 0cm"> <li class="MsoNormal">Safety</li> <li class="MsoNormal">Infrastructure condition</li> <li class="MsoNormal">Congestion reduction</li> <li class="MsoNormal">System reliability</li> <li class="MsoNormal">Freight movement and economic vitality</li> <li class="MsoNormal">Environmental sustainability</li> <li class="MsoNormal">Reduced project delivery delays</li> </ol> <p class="MsoNormal"> &nbsp; </p>

October 21 - Todd Litman

Katie Pearce discusses the surprising findings of a new study from the Center for Housing Policy and the Center for Neighborhood Technology that evaluates why it can be more affordable to live in an “expensive” city.

October 21 - Streetsblog D.C.

To address the growing linguistic diversity in urban areas, the fall issue of the journal Current Issues in Language Planning is devoted to exploring social equity in "urban multilingual ecosystems." [Login required]

October 21 - Current Issues in Language Planning

With the nation's first, broad application of cap & trade to reduce greenhouse gas emissions set to begin on January 1, <em>The New York Times</em>' environmental reporter Felicity Barringer writes about the key role of carbon offsets.

October 21 - The New York Times - Environment

An informative, detailed, and attractive infographic from the vacation rental website HouseTrip compares the environmental credentials of London, New York, Vancouver, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, and Stockholm, across a range of categories.

October 21 - Fast Company Co.Exist

Close to twenty five years after Denver debated the future of its historic, but blighted, Lower Downtown district, the city is reaping the benefits of its decision to preserve the “region’s largest collection of urban historic buildings.”

October 21 - Urban Land Magazine

BLOG POST

If you are applying to graduate school in planning, how much do GREs matter? Like many things in planning the answer varies with the person and program. Below I provide some general advice.

October 20 - Ann Forsyth

Taking advantage of low borrowing costs, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced this week that New York City will spend up to $1 billion on “critical” infrastructure, including bridges, roads, schools and libraries over the next 20 months.

October 20 - Bloomberg

The <em>Economist</em> examines how London's inner city neighborhoods are well past an inflection point in crime rates. In many cases inner city neighborhoods are now safer than suburban neighborhoods and the trend is set to continue.

October 20 - The Economist

Like its beloved baseball team, downtown Detroit is on an upswing, writes Bill Morris. The area's rise as a desirable neighborhood can be attributed in no small part to new sports facilities located in close proximity.

October 20 - The New York Times

Is waste disposal a local or regional issue? A new CA law written by a S.F. lawmaker nullifies a voter-approved Solano County measure that limits the amount of outside garbage their landfill can accept. It is being challenged by environmental groups.

October 20 - The Wall Street Journal - San Francisco Bay Area

In a provocative essay, Mitchell Sutika Sipus examines the dangers of subscribing to conventions such as style or planning trends, and argues why planners must forgo ideologies to create better solutions for community problems.

October 20 - Humanitarian Space

Dillon Fenner looks at early Superman comics and finds him to be not only less-than heroic, but a planner's nightmare: wiping out slums because he assumes the government will rebuild them, and declaring war on the car [language warning].

October 19 - CRACKED

Charles Marohn discusses the CNU NextGen initiative "Investment Ready Places" by Street Sense. The new booklet provides strategies for identifying and investing in America’s “new frontier for development.”

October 19 - Better! Cities & Towns

In the next 20 years, the D.C. area is expected to have nearly 3 million job openings. With the resulting demand for new, diverse and more affordable housing outpacing supply, some fear that the city’s housing deficit will derail its robust economy.

October 19 - Greater Greater Washington

City officials and leaders are considering an adaptive reuse ordinance for industrial buildings, modeled on the one that helped spark downtown L.A.’s residential boom, to help push forward the sputtering vision of a "CleanTech Corridor."

October 19 - Los Angeles Downtown News

A recent Pew survey of Chinese residents points to increasing anxiety among participants with the country’s problems. Despite continued economic growth, at an average of 9% per year over the past four years, the Chinese are growing dissatisfied.

October 19 - The Atlantic Cities

From the "world’s first floating village" to the "world’s most audacious balconies," New York Magazine surveys "9 Experiments in Large" for their special feature on "Global Urban Design 2012."

October 19 - New York Magazine