The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

Private industry often points to governmental regulations as a source of added expense that makes them less competitive. In this case, NYC's requirement two years ago that taxis accept credit cards has resulted in growth in ridership and revenue.

November 9 - The New York Times - N.Y/Region

BLOG POST

My classmate was up in front of everyone, flapping and flailing, pleading his case and getting shot down at every turn. It was a bit like watching a train wreck in slow motion. <p class="MsoNormal"> It was also kind of like looking in the mirror. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"> I’m just more than halfway through a planning school studio project working on the beautiful (no, really) Lower Schuylkill River in Philadelphia. They’ve teamed up about 15 planner/urban designers with about 45 landscape architects, who, as I mentioned <a href="/node/40796">last time</a>, are reasonably bonkers. That was about a month and a half ago; since then, I’ve begun to think maybe I’m the one needing a room with padded walls. </p>

November 9 - Jeffrey Barg

<em>Cool Town Studios</em> offers this list of 19 development types for the creative class.

November 9 - Cool Town Studios

Cities across the globe are rediscovering their waterfronts. As this piece from <em>Places</em> discusses, revitalization of these former industrial areas includes more than just green space.

November 8 - Places

A group of industry and policy leaders discuss the current state of the technology and infrastructure that will drive change for the auto industry.

November 8 - The Planning Report

This week's <em>Smart City</em> features discussions with Harvard economist Ed Glaeser about shrinking cities, and with urban design critic Randy Gragg about interactive art and urban design projects.

November 8 - Smart City

Victorville, CA is a textbook case of the housing bubble gone wrong. Moving forward, Warren Karlenzig argues that places like Victorville show the need to consider a new paradigm of density and efficiency moving forward.

November 8 - Green Flow blog

After twenty years of reunification, the eastern part of Germany is finally beginning to lure educated workers back.

November 8 - The New York Times

Transit stops are now included on Walkscore, the map-mashup website that scores neighborhoods based on their accessibility and walkability.

November 7 - NRDC Switchboard

Jakarta, Indonesia is the world's sixth most populated metropolitan area, and it's on track to move up in ranks within the next decade. Some planners are trying to figure out how to guide this developing megacity onto a sustainable path.

November 7 - The City Fix

In the name of economic stimulus, the government has invested deeply in the very business (real estate) that was driving the economy down. Does that make sense? Streetsblog's Ryan Avent reports.

November 7 - Streetsblog

Experts from heritage group Historic Scotland have developed a technique using lasers to create precise digital representations of enormous sites. Mount Rushmore is the next location to be captured.

November 7 - The New York Times

The Urbanophile reports from RailVolution in Boston, including a video interview with John Robert Smith, CEO of Reconnecting America.

November 7 - The Urbanophile

Neal Peirce says that there is finally light at the end of the tunnel in the debate over homelessness, and a consensus that stopgaps don't work. The real answer is to, duh, give them homes.

November 6 - Citiwire.net

BLOG POST

If you’ve ever worked in distressed communities, you’ve faced the dilemma that there simply is no private market for what you want to see built.<span>  </span>You can chip away at the problem of vacant land with thoughtful affordable housing developments or, if you’re lucky, a new recreation center but by and large, large amounts of vacancy remain and impact the psyche of those that live nearby.<span>  </span>So working closely with residents, and really listening, has sparked a whole new sub-discipline in our world of urban planning and design - temporary use.<span>  </span> <p class="MsoNormal"> The shrinking cities movement shined a light on the potential of ad-hoc reuse and programming some time ago but so too has groups like the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society

November 6 - Scott Page

An exhibit currently at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C. explains how the architecture and design of parking lots evolved, and why. Meanwhile, the Parking Show of Shows conference takes place nearby with a different take.

November 6 - The Washington Post

Atlanta tops a list of the most polluted cities in the country, according to an analysis of EPA data by <em>Forbes</em>.

November 6 - Forbes

The Living Building Challenge is a new environmental rating system that focuses on required environmental design elements, diverging dramatically from the credit-based approach of the built environment's dominant rating system, LEED.

November 6 - Metropolis Magazine

The Winterville, GA Planning Commission rejected the idea of creating a special "assisted residential district" for a center for developmentally disabled people, saying that the proposal was too vague.

November 6 - The Athens Banner-Herald

Promoting his upcoming book on transportation planning, Randal O'Toole says his central argument is that rail is a dead end and driverless car technologies are the answer to our congestion problems.

November 6 - The Antiplanner