The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

The city of Baldwin Park, California -- purported home of the world's first drive-thru -- is temporarily banning any new construction of drive-thrus to try to combat obesity.

August 4 - The Christian Science Monitor

With the controversial mosque near Ground Zero clearing its last major legal hurdle, Mayor Bloomberg explains why the proposal should never have been opposed.

August 4 - The Huffington Post

Neighbors are in uproar over a 71-unit affordable housing project planned on a bus-turnaround in a residential area of San Francisco because it provides only 7 parking spaces. Is smart growth planning getting ahead of itself by becoming top-down?

August 4 - San Francisco Chronicle

BLOG POST

<p> &nbsp; </p> <p> <em>Burning rainforests. Smog alerts. Gridlocked cities. Seabirds caked with oil. That&#39;s how it was, ladies and gentlemen, as we entered the &#39;90s.</em> </p> <p> This list of environmental peril is familiar still today, although we can cite some success fighting the smog. In this case, the quote is from a TV reporter in 1984, a character in a Ray Bradbury story called &quot;The Toynbee Convector.&quot;  </p>

August 4 - Tim Halbur

Small and mid-sized cities in Canada are taking innovative steps to revitalize their downtowns, and lure businesses and entrepreneurs back.

August 4 - The Globe and Mail

The Albuquerque City Council and staff are drafting plans for Volcano Heights, Volcano Cliffs and Volcano Trails, three sites bordering Petroglyph National Monument. A simmering debate over open space conservation seems cooled by public process.

August 4 - Albuquerque Journal

To publicize an urban agriculture project in Middlesbrough, England, organizers threw a town meal for 8,000 people sharing the food grown by the gardens. The growing experiment was so popular that many locals don't want it to stop.

August 4 - The Guardian U.K.

Urban agriculture is becoming a well-known idea all around the world. Most of it is done at the small-scale, but there's still the idea of creating large skyscraper farms to feed our cities. <em>Smithsonian</em> takes a look at the idea.

August 4 - Smithsonian

<em>National Journal</em> asks its panel of transportation experts whether the car is really threatened by the rise in policy focus on pedestrians and cyclists.

August 4 - National Journal

With mounting traffic and road space at a premium, a Chinese company is proposing a unusual new idea for public transportation -- a bus/light rail system that cars can drive underneath.

August 3 - Geek.com

Cities make more sounds than just cars driving by or factories humming. Trevor Cox says we should embrace the subtle sounds of cities, and update our urban design to make sure we can.

August 3 - New Scientist

John Lorinc, author of the New City, points out the many ways that the Canadian long-form census -- which is set to be scrapped -- informs city planning, strategic planning and social service provision.

August 3 - The Globe and Mail

While acknowledging that the 18.4 cent gas tax is insufficient to meet today's and tomorrow's transportation needs, LaHood said that increasing fuel taxes now would jeopardize the economic recovery.

August 3 - The Journal of Commerce

Frequent street closures due to unregulated protest -- up to about 7 per day -- clog the streets of Mexico City, leaving some hungry for a more active response from the government.

August 3 - The New York Times

The bust of the housing market has put a fleet of atypically nice homes into the Section 8 subsidized housing pool.

August 3 - The Wall Street Joural

BLOG POST

<p> &nbsp; </p> <p> Recently, a Briton armed with a metal detector uncovered a trove of more than 50,000 Roman coins, which archeologists believe was an ancient farming community&#39;s offering to the gods to ensure a bountiful harvest. Our own agricultural practices have moved past any pleas to the gods to incorporate instead an industrial-scale arsenal of petrochemical fertilizers, pesticides and genetic modification.

August 3 - Michael Dudley

A marsh in Iraq drained by Saddam Hussein and believed by some to be the site of the Garden of Eden is being restored -- despite dangerous risks.

August 3 - Der Spiegel

Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood is paying close attention to the link between transportation options and obesity in America. <em>Next American City</em>'s Willy Staley looks at whether this attention will fight the epidemic.

August 3 - Next American City

Three cities -- St. Louis, Houston and Detroit -- have gained new urban parks that are playing big roles in reviving parts of town.

August 3 - The Washington Post

This piece from <em>The New York Times</em> looks at how an ill-fated development plan for the island of Alameda fell apart, and the city official tied up in the controversy.

August 3 - The New York Times