The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

Innovative Designs for Car Parks

Donovan Gillman writes that since most of us can't simply get by without cars, we need "more livable and likable places to park them." His post at Sustainable Cities Collective includes photos of some interesting car parks.

June 8 - Sustainable Cities Collective

Kotkin Compares California to Iran

Calling California's attempts at environmental responsibility a "green jihad," Joel Kotkin argues that the state's "ideological extremism" has led to illogical economic and political decisions - similar to those made in the Islamic Republic of Iran.

June 8 - New Geography

Urban Planners as "Zookeepers"

At the National Building Museum's Intelligent Cities Forum, one participant compared creating healthy cities to creating healthy animal environments in zoos.

June 8 - THE DIRT

Fixing "A Hole in the Urban Fabric"

That's how Christopher Hume describes the Toronto area that will soon be Underpass Park, a mixed-use, mixed-income neighborhood for 6,000 people.

June 8 - The Toronto Star

LaHood and DOT Employees Bike to Work (VIDEO)

This two-minute video features U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood discussing the merits of bicycling and bike friendly places as he and other DOT employees bike to work.

June 8 - Vimeo


Section 2 of NY's High Line Park Opens

A slideshow from <em>Good Magazine</em> highlights the newly opened section of the popular High Line Park in NYC.

June 8 - GOOD Magazine

Tea Party Sinks Planning Meeting

Public outreach on SB 375, California's climate change bill, began last month in the San Francisco Bay Area. But the East Bay Tea Party had other plans.

June 8 - Contra Costa Times


Rethinking South Street Seaport

Vicky Plestis reports that Manhattan's South Street Seaport, long criticized for failing to live up to its potential, is being rethought and redesigned by its developers.

June 8 - The Gotham Gazette

Want an Empty Philadelphia Building?

The Philadelphia Housing Authority owns over 3,000 homes and would like to get rid of 1/3rd of them.

June 8 - The Philadelphia Inquirer

Local Planning Offices Eliminated

Gov. Bill Haslam of Tennessee has slashed 58 jobs from the Department of Economic and Community Development -- including the entire local planning assistance division.

June 8 - Tennessean

Janette Sadik-Khan's Take on L.A.

Sadik-Khan writes a guest blog for Streetsblog on lessons Los Angeles could learn from New York's embrace of public spaces and streets.

June 7 - Streetsblog

More Evidence That Preserved Buildings are Greener Than New Ones

New studies are proving that replacing already built buildings with new, energy-efficient ones is not good environmental sense.

June 7 - Miller-McCune

Would You Like a Latte With That?

Toronto's new Presto smartcard for transit riders may soon allow you to pay for your parking and a coffee as well, according to Gary McNeil, president of GO Transit.

June 7 - The Toronto Star

Green Development in Seattle Hits it Out of the Park

The project converted a nine-acre parking lot into an ambitious urbanist community, which revitalized a nearby natural water channel, added high density housing, retail, and integrated a walkable design.

June 7 - Grist

The Importance of Delight

On top of all of the planning factors that make a place great, David Roberts adds the element of delight.

June 7 - Grist

Turning to the Crowd for Ideas

Alexandra Lange highlights a crowd-sourced urban design that actually worked.

June 7 - Design Observer

Raleigh Developer Thinks PRT is "Fun"

Developer John Kane of Raleigh, North Carolina rode the personal rapid transit (PRT) system at Heathrow, and decided it would be a perfect fit for Raleigh's North Hills area.

June 7 - TV News Channel 14 Carolina

Explaining Induced Traffic

Eric Jaffe at The Infrastructurist explains the non-intuitive reason why often removing freeways means less traffic.

June 7 - The Infrastructurist

The 100 Best Cities for Doing Business

Area Development Online looks for the most desirable locations to locate a business, and finds that smaller cities are outperforming larger ones. Austin, Texas was the indisputable winner.

June 7 - Area Development Online

Bicycles as an African Way of Life

Rural Africa is learning to embrace bicycles as a means of transportation.

June 7 - TheCityFix.com

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