The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

The Southwest Corridor light-rail project appeared before the Minneapolis City Council last week, which prompted James Linbeck to write a scathing op-ed in opposition to the project.

August 28 - Minneapolis Star Tribune

The American Institute of Architects conferred its top award—the Gold Medal—posthumously to Julia Morgan in December 2013, making her the first woman to receive the honor.

August 28 - The Planning Report

Plan 2040 is the Atlanta region's plan to accommodate about 3 million new residents in the next 25 years. A new survey is looking for feedback about just how the region should approach that staggering growth.

August 28 - Curbed Atlanta

Although, in its current computerized form, bike share began in France in 1998, giving Europe a substantial head start, nothing compares to the size of China's programs.

August 27 - Vox

"The St. Louis region doesn’t face the prospect, as Western states do, of running out of water," according to Jacob Barker. But the region is facing a water problem: "aging infrastructure and capital spending that isn’t keeping up."

August 27 - St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Pete Saunders, blogger with the Corner Side Yard and professional planning consultant, wrote a post explaining Chicago for the U.K. publication Guardian Cities.

August 27 - Guardian Cities

The path to a distributed solar future just got clearer in California, thanks to new bill approved by the State Legislature and awaiting Governor Jerry Brown's signature.

August 27 - Los Angeles Times

Reflecting a series of recent initiatives by city leadership in Houston to promote bike safety and road diets, a vehicle lane will soon be removed and handed over to bikers in Downtown Houston.

August 27 - Houston Chronicle

Sunday's powerful Bay Area earthquake brought attention to the urgent need to retrofit existing buildings in California. One expert stated the damage in Napa "was predictable." Do you know the three types of construction that need to be reinforced?

August 27 - The Wall Street Journal

The Mid Ohio Planning Commission (MORPC) is working with Columbus 2020, ULI Columbus, and planning firm Calthorpe and Associates to head up a new effort called insight2050 that will develop "objective analytical tools" to prepare for growth.

August 27 - Columbus Underground

Josh Brown reports for the Tennessean on the unintended consequences of a fee waiver meant to encourage infill development—developers are readily choosing to pay the fee instead of building sidewalks.

August 27 - The Tennessean

The latest installment of the GOOD Cities Project has produced an infographic that provides a look at the "ever-vital urban park" by comparing the park efforts of cities around the country.

August 27 - GOOD Magazine

Neil Irwin takes an optimist's view toward recent data that show a slowing rate of increase for the price of housing in many parts of the country: "the new data offer hints that a disastrous era for housing may be ending."

August 27 - New York Times - The Upshot

Belt Magazine is publishing the second edition of its "Rust Belt Chic: The Cleveland Anthology" next month. The edition's new introduction sums up will the complicated issue of Cleveland's renaissance.

August 26 - Belt Magazine

Geoff Kees Thompson digs into one component of this old city's proposed mayoral platform for Philadelphia: the need to organize the city's alphabet soup of planning agencies under one director and give the Planning Commission teeth.

August 26 - This Old City

Anna Louise Bardach tells the story of Montecito, California, an extremely wealthy enclave near Santa Barbara, which has enough money to buy its way out of the drought.

August 26 - Politico Magazine

In this Sunday Review editorial, The New York Times applauds China's announcement that it will ban coal burning in the Beijing region by 2020, but warns that some solutions to air pollution will exacerbate climate change.

August 26 - The New York Times

After initial designs were critiqued as inauthentic to the Seattle experience, the park's designers are reaching out to the region's Native American population for advice on how to improve the plans for a new waterfront park.

August 26 - The Seattle Times

Jonathan Walters details the new thinking that is redefining how Community Reinvestment Act funds are invested.

August 26 - Governing

An op-ed in the Chicago Tribune addresses the long history of tax increment financing abuse in Chicago, but supports a proposed TIF district for Washington Park.

August 26 - Chicago Tribune