The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

<p>In California's Inland Empire, abandoned houses are plentiful- the fallout from the subprime mortgage mess. Bill Fulton reports on what some cites are doing to keep the abandoned houses from dragging down neighborhoods.</p>

May 30 - California Planning & Development Report

<p>Gina Olszowski's first book focuses on the personal stories of rural residents impacted by sprawl.</p>

May 30 - The Beacon News

<p>Household sewage is currently fueling cars in Sweden, and has for years. But Swedish industry has given up on the idea, investing in ethanol-based gasoline.</p>

May 30 - International Herald Tribune

<p>Will laser-projected pedestrians make crossing the street safer in South Korea?</p>

May 30 - Streetsblog

<p>Tyson's Corner, an auto-oriented suburb of Washington, D.C., reveals ambitious plans to become a dense, urban community. Officials are bracing themselves for tough opposition from locals. The Washington Post story includes a video report.</p>

May 29 - The Washington Post

<p>As the cities in the arid Western United States face huge water shortages, officials and scientists are trying to convince the public that recycled wastewater can be clean and safe.</p>

May 29 - Governing

<p>With dramatically increasing fuel costs, European consumers formerly amenable to "green" taxes are turning against them, leading to fears that ambitious emission-control policies may not be achievable.</p>

May 29 - The Globe & Mail

<p>New schools are consistently built far from community centers, while historic school buildings near where people live are demolished, The Blue Ridge Press reports.</p>

May 29 - The Blue Ridge Press

<p>New research from the Brookings Institution claims that Los Angeles has the second smallest carbon footprint of big American cities -- a finding that contains a few caveats.</p>

May 29 - The Los Angeles Times

<p>By some counts, the number of homeless people in New Orleans has more than doubled since Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005. Aid workers are hoping a bill in Congress will bring extra aid to the struggling city.</p>

May 29 - The New York Times

<p>With some predicting that this fast growing metropolis will run out of water within the decade, the head of the region's water authority has a tough job ahead.</p>

May 29 - Metropolis Magazine

<p>Offshore drilling company StatoilHydro is finding a new way to get energy at sea- with large-scale wind turbines.</p>

May 29 - Energy Business Review

<p>A recent report by a Federal Reserve Bank senior economist argues that Houston's resiliency during the ongoing housing crisis is due in part to its lack of zoning regulations.</p>

May 29 - The Houston Chronicle

<p>Requiring all cities and towns to building affordable housing is bad policy. The focus should be on building housing in existing urban areas near jobs and transit, not in rural and suburban towns.</p>

May 29 - The New York Times

<p>BART, the region's rail transit agency, is negotiating with a private company to install a wireless network that would allow riders to check email and access the Internet.</p>

May 28 - PC World

BLOG POST

<p> Today, I turned in my grades for my seminar on &quot;Sprawl and the Law.&quot; It occurred to me that some readers of this blog might be academics, and might be interested on how one can teach a course on sprawl. </p> <p> I began by defining the issue. As I pointed out in an earlier post (at <a href="/node/31063)"><u><span style="color: #0000ff">http://www.planetizen.com/node/31063)</span></u></a> the term &quot;sprawl&quot; has two common meanings: where we grow (city or suburb) and how we grow (pedestrian-friendly or automobile-dependent). Policies that affect the first type of &quot;sprawl&quot; need not affect the second (and vice versa). </p>

May 28 - Michael Lewyn

<p>The City of Saco, Maine is turning land the federal government once labeled a toxic Superfund site into a hub for hiking, fishing, and recreation.</p>

May 28 - Portland Press Herald

<p>Developer Casey Roloff has built an ambitious new community on the Washington coast with New Urbanist ideas and a Northwest flavor.</p>

May 28 - The News Tribune

BLOG POST

<span style="font-size: x-small"> <p> In his annual tour-de-force presentation on the state of Vancouver&#39;s housing market recently, marketing guru Bob Rennie (referred to often as Canada&#39;s &quot;condo king&quot;, and thus often accused of having a vested interest in a continued strong market for condos here in Vancouver) had some new, controversial points that are still being debated locally. Perhaps the most provocative was his call to action for the development industry to get back into building housing that is more affordable to ordinary Vancouverites (as opposed to being geared to the international market - his comment was that we know how to serve that world market, now we need to show that we can serve the local market better, or words to that effect). Given that he included details like &quot;capping developer profit at 10%&quot;, I found his comments pretty brave in front of an audience of 700+ developers and clients. </p>

May 28 - Brent Toderian

<p>Thick congestion has politicians in Budapest looking at ways to improve mobility -- mainly by encouraging bicycle use.</p>

May 28 - AFP