The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

With a rapidly progressing bike infrastructure program, the city of Long Beach, California, is edging its way to becoming one of the country's most bike-friendly cities.

January 29 - Los Angeles Times

Traffic is expensive. This infographic from <em>GOOD</em> looks at how much congestion costs cities and what they are trying to do to cut down the traffic.

January 29 - Good

Transportation has been called the glue that hold cities together. This oped argues that Philadelphia's waterfront is sorely missing that glue.

January 29 - The Philadelphia Inquirer

Twitter, iPhones, and new sites like SeeClickFix make it increasingly easy for citizens and governments to communicate. Along with newly available data sets, these "Gov 2.0" apps may signal a new era of active citizens and responsive governments.

January 29 - CNN

Duke's Pratt School of Engineering has created a theater with projections on all four walls plus the ceiling and floor to create an immersive experience not unlike Star Trek's "holodeck" for architects to show clients their work before it is built.

January 28 - News Observer

John Portman is a rare breed: an architect/developer. In his 60 years in the business, he developed retail centers, hotel atriums, and Atlanta's Peachtree Center. The Architect's Newspaper talked to him about his career.

January 28 - The Architect's Newspaper

In one North Carolina county, the land development process -- from permitting to building plan submission to inspection -- is now organized under one electronic, online system.

January 28 - Government Technology

With the devastation in Haiti fresh in mind, <em>Good</em>'s Alissa Walker takes a look at the growing practice of sharing design ideas.

January 28 - Good

President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden are in Florida today to announce a funding package for a variety of high speed rail projects. In total, $7.9 billion in funding is being announced.

January 28 - The New York Times

Residents in one of Johannesburg's most infamous townships are hoping that a new street beautification project will bring pedestrians out onto their streets and into their shops when the country hosts this year's World Cup.

January 28 - Scripps Howard News Service

2010 may turn out to be a landmark year for public transportation in the Atlanta metropolitan area, with legislation that could let municipalities levy sales tax increases to help fund transit projects.

January 28 - Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The housing market -- and especially the exurban housing market -- played a major role in bringing about the current economic recession, according to this piece from Christopher Leinberger. He says sprawl is unlikely to regain its lost value.

January 28 - The New Republic

Increasing amounts of Americans are soccer players, and the parks and park planners in American cities are beginning to reflect the sport's growing popularity, according to this piece from the <em>Regional Plan Association</em>.

January 28 - Regional Plan Association

In the 1950s, nearly 1/5 of Americans moved each year. That trend is quickly reversing. Americans are now staying put in greater numbers than at any time since World War II, and experts have plenty of opinions on why that is.

January 28 - New York Times

FEATURE

The foreclosure crisis spreading across America has burdened cities and neighborhoods with value-draining vacancies and abandoned properties. To counteract the economic havoc they've caused, planners and policymakers must focus on restoring confidence in the market, according to neighborhood planning consultants Charles Buki and Elizabeth Humphrey Schilling.

January 28 - Charles Buki

A huge boost for the CA High Speed Rail project will result from an injection of $2.25 billion from President Obama's $8 billion HSR stimulus funds, twice as much as any other project.

January 28 - Mercury News

The increasing ubiquity of screens in our daily lives and architecture changes the way we experience the built environment, argues Christopher Hawthorne.

January 27 - Los Angeles Times

Bob Bengford discusses the feasibility of updating land use/design codes using a form-based approach for planners in the Northwest.

January 27 - MRSC Planning Advisor

This post from <em>Treehugger</em> looks at 6 cities that could potentially go car-lite or car-free.

January 27 - Treehugger

Designers in Portland, Oregon are preparing to unveil a vertical garden on a federal building that would climb 250 feet up the side of the building.

January 27 - MSNBC