The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

Parking

A New Era of On-Street Parking Policies

The influence of Donald Shoup's classic book, "The High Cost of Free Parking," is becoming more and more apparent in more and more cities around the country.

February 5 - Pew Charitable Trusts

Mapping Ten Years of Affordable Housing Projects in Chicago

The power of open data and mapping is on display in a map by Chicago Cityscape that shows all building permits for affordable housing in Chicago over the past decade.

February 5 - Chicago Cityscape

Urban Fringe the New Frontier in China's New Urbanism

The Chinese government wants an influx of nearly 100 million new urban residents by 2020. In order to accommodate a migration of this nature, China's urban planners are tasked with creating cities to be more livable.

February 5 - CityLab

Georgetown-Rosslyn Gondola Proposal Gets a Funded Study

The idea of a gondola crossing the Potomac might still seem a little pie in the sky, but it has legs.

February 5 - The Washington Post

This Valentine's Day, Celebrate Neighborhood Revitalization With #LoveThatLot

The #LoveThatLot campaign is the Center for Community progress' way of celebrating the hard work of transforming vacant, blighted properties into neighborhood assets and amenities.

February 4 - Center for Community Progress


Streetcar Connection Between Queens and Brooklyn Proposed

Mayor Bill de Blasio is expected to announce ambitious plans for a 16-mile, $2.2 billion streetcar route to connect some of the city's up and coming, but still transit-light, neighborhoods.

February 4 - The New York Times

Cortright: Oregon Legislation Would Make Housing Affordability Worse

Inclusionary zoning and weakened urban growth boundaries are not effective tools for reducing the price of housing. Joe Cortright of City Observatory suggests ending parking requirements instead.

February 4 - City Observatory


Detroit Gets Another Round of Property Tax Reductions

In an effort to bring relief to homeowners, the city will reduce property taxes on 95 percent of the city's residential properties.

February 4 - The Detroit News

Volkswagen Submits Another Recall Plan for Diesel Cars

Volkswagen has already submitted its recall plan for its 2-liter diesel engines—it was rejected by both the EPA and California Air Resources Board. It also needed to submit a recall plan for 3-liter diesel engines to CARB by Feb. 2, which it did.

February 4 - Bloomberg Business

Highway Construction

The Little-Known Pollutant That Could Finally Reprioritize Transportation Projects

When the public learns that freeway pollution discriminates against nearby residents with devastating health consequences, the tide of public opinion will finally turn against the automobile—a call to action by Bill Adams.

February 4 - UrbDeZine

Planning History: The Roman Empire and Public Health

Although the cities of the Roman Empire are typically regarded for their focus on health and hygiene, they may have struggled to manage many poor sanitation parasites.

February 4 - Next City

One Simple Way to Anger Pedestrians: Give Snow Removal Priority to Cars

A large backlash followed a large winter storm on the East Coast.

February 4 - Brokelyn

Main Street

Preserving Main Street in Large Developments

The Terraces, a mixed-use project in Charlottesville, Virginia, adopts a design that reflects its historic downtown surroundings. Oliver Kuttner, the developer, says that "breaking up" large buildings can make them more palatable on street level.

February 4 - Market Urbanism

Palm Trees

A Wind Turbine Acting Like a Palm Tree Delivers Five Times the Electricity

It's still a longshot for full-scale production, but a unique research partnership has produced a unique example of biomimicry: a wind turbine that borrows from palm trees to achieve new levels of energy production.

February 4 - ASME

Feds Coming Around to Level of Service Reform

Streetsblog USA notes that the federal government is following the lead of California in awakening to the negative effects of Level of Service.

February 3 - Streetsblog USA

Los Angeles' Contentious 'Neighborhood Integrity Initiative' Explained

The soul of planning in Los Angeles will be up for vote in the citywide election that will occur on the same day as the U.S. presidential election.

February 3 - California Planning & Development Report

Highway Widening Plan Meets Resistance in Birmingham

A petition and a lawsuit are so far the tactics used by local advocates to oppose a plan by the Alabama Department of Transportation to widen an interstate that runs through the heart of Birmingham.

February 3 - Over the Mountain Journal

San Francisco Homeless

Homeless Are No Longer 'Out of Sight, Out of Mind' in Booming Cities

One of the sad contradictions of the revival of core urban areas has been the clash between waves of investment and affluence with large populations of homelessness. Many cities are still coming to terms with the issue, much less solving it.

February 3 - The Wall Street Journal

Video game door

What If Gordon Freeman Was a Civil Engineer?

The video game INFRA trades your typical Russian ultra-nationalists and Nazi zombies for a city on the verge of ruin. The protagonist, an engineer, is tasked with the seemingly mundane tasks that will bring the place back to life.

February 3 - CityLab

Iowa Caucus Results: Cruz wins, Ethanol Mandate Loses

The only major candidate, Democrat or Republican, to call for an end to the contentious ethanol mandate won the Republican caucus, clearly beating Donald Trump. That could doom what many even in Iowa, among even some farmers, call a boondoggle.

February 3 - The New York Times - Politics

Post News

Top Books

An annual review of books related to planning.

Top Schools

The definitive ranking of graduate planning programs.

100 Most Influential Urbanists

The who's who of urbanism, according to Planetizen readers.

Urban Planning Creators You Should Know

A short list of voices on social, video, and podcasting platforms.

Urban Design for Planners 1: Software Tools

This six-course series explores essential urban design concepts using open source software and equips planners with the tools they need to participate fully in the urban design process.

Planning for Universal Design

Learn the tools for implementing Universal Design in planning regulations.