The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

BLOG POST

<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center"> <tbody> <tr> <td class="content" valign="top" bgcolor="#f1f1f1"><span style="font-family: Arial"> <div> <span style="font-family: Arial"><span style="font-family: Arial"> <div> <p> <span style="font-size: x-small">For over a year now, calls have multiplied to give the surface transportation program a new sense of direction. With near unanimity, the transportation community, along with most congressional lawmakers and state and local officials, have concluded that the current program has lost its focus and lacks a clear mission and a guiding purpose. A bipartisan consensus has developed that perpetuating the status quo is not the answer.

August 3 - Kenneth Orski

<p>The new Harley-Davidson Museum recently opened it's doors to the public, and the architecture firm Pentagram designed both the enormous exhibit space and the outdoor public spaces that connect the museum to the grid.</p>

August 3 - The New York Times

<p>An audio artwork called "Bus Station" will be installed in Olympia, WA's downtown transit station, to be heard over the public-address system.</p>

August 3 - The Olympian

East Fourth St. is a popular spot in downtown Cleveland, an alley lined with tables from onlooking restaurants. A recent renovation has resulted in an explosion of flowers.

August 3 - The Cleveland Plain Dealer

<p>In the summer, a handful of New Yorkers like Calvin Tsao remake public space into their own personal dining rooms.</p>

August 3 - The New York Times

<p>Architect Robert Adam likens modern architecture to modern democracy, where decisions made on high supposedly represent the will of the people.</p>

August 2 - Building

<p>This article from <em>The New York Observer</em> looks at how New York City might be different with more "livable streets".</p>

August 2 - The New York Observer

<p>Robert Poole, director of transportation at the Reason Institute, delivers an open letter to Los Angeles-area elected officials in the hopes of persuading them to adopt a federally-supported pricing system for the region's freeway network.</p>

August 2 - The Planning Report

<p>The 'Winglet' is a new, Segway-like vehicle in development by Toyota. The video shows the Winglet in action.</p>

August 2 - The Guardian U.K.

<p>San Francisco's latest attempt to mandate employers to provide benefits to their workers is to provide economic incentives to use public transit or vanpools. However, unlike prior mandates, e.g. health care, the business sector appears OK with it.</p>

August 2 - The San Francisco Chronicle

<p>This just in from The Onion.</p>

August 1 - The Onion

<p>Author Alan Ehrenhalt says that conditions are ripe for the permanent return of downtown residential neighborhoods, and that a "demographic inversion" has already begun in Manhattan, Chicago and Washington, DC, among other cities.</p>

August 1 - The New Republic

<p>In the same week that Congress passed the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008, Los Angeles announcemed the New Generation Fund, a $100 million program for affordable housing.</p>

August 1 - The Planning Report

<p>A popular swimming area at the San Diego area beach of La Jolla has been overrun by seals, making swimming unsafe. Many community members want the seals out, but animal rights activists say they should be allowed to stay.</p>

August 1 - The Christian Science Monitor

<p>This article from <em>USA Today</em> looks at how some big cities are reacting to rising energy prices. Two examples from metropolitan Phoenix highlight the fact that it is not only suburbs that are being forced to respond.</p>

August 1 - USA Today

<p>As the downtown master plan of Baton Rouge turns ten years old, planners are looking at the next stages of development. They say eight factors play into making this and other downtowns successful.</p>

August 1 - Baton Rouge Business Report

<p>An online "time bank" has opened in Los Angeles, allowing members to barter services with each other.</p>

August 1 - The Los Angeles Times

<p>A $300 million mixed-use development is bringing new life to a long-neglected industrial district of Providence, RI.</p>

August 1 - The New York Times

<p>Christopher Hume argues that Toronto's planners, in planning for easy vehicle access to the revitalizing waterfront, will be harming it as a pedestrian environment.</p>

August 1 - The Toronto Star

<p>Orange County, CA's new $480 million Groundwater Replenishment System is the world’s largest water recycling facility of its kind. It can turn wastewater and into drinking water, churning out up to 70 million gallons a day.</p>

August 1 - The Christian Science Monitor