The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

<p>Residents of Briny Breeze, a 43-acre incorporated town of trailer homes the hugs the Atlantic Ocean between Miami and Palm Beach, are considering accepting an offer of $510 million from a developer.</p>

January 3 - Associated Press via Gainsville Sun

<p>Commuter rail is an outdated model of transportation, and does little to reduce car use or promote transit-oriented development.</p>

January 3 - The Boston Globe

<p>Houston leaders need to be cautious that their 'plans' for the city don't stifle its greatest asset -- its economic opportunity and quality of life -- by introducing prescriptive land use zoning.</p>

January 3 - The Houston Chronicle

<p>A broad and controversial watershed protection plan for Florida's Miami-Dade County was released recently. It calls for a time extension on the county's urban development boundary to 2025 to help protect the area's water quality.</p>

January 3 - The Miami Herald

<p>Residents in one New York City neighborhood are split over whether the creation of an official historic district would help or hurt their community.</p>

January 2 - The New York Times

<p>Many in Toronto are hoping that this year's groundbreaking on the new Lake Ontario Park will help to create a new identity for the city. The park's designer is confident that it will.</p>

January 2 - The Globe and Mail

<p>Though hemmed in by urban development and eclipsed by the city's other two airports, plans to close down Tempelhof continue to meet resistance.</p>

January 2 - The Washington Post

<p>The Seattle Green Factor asks developers to choose from buffet of architectural features and landscape design options to decrease the environmental burden of new development.</p>

January 2 - The Seattle Post-Intelligencer

<p>Monica Howe, outreach coordinator for the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, believes bike culture can transform Los Angeles.</p>

January 2 - The Los Angeles Times

<p>A Reagan-era "free market approach to conservation" that would deny federal flood insurance to sensitive lands is being undermined through the political process. Congress has granted two exceptions to the law for coastal areas in Georgia and Florida.</p>

January 2 - AP via San Francisco Chronicle

FEATURE

Though the program has good intentions, APA's proposal for mandatory continuing education could just encourage more planners to attend the National Planning Conference than to actually get more training.

January 2 - Leonardo Vazquez, AICP/PP

<p>Transit officials in Washington D.C. have announced plans to build a new trolley car system beginning in 2007. Many in the city hope the new project will ease congestion in what is ranked the third most congested city in America.</p>

January 2 - The New York Sun

<p>In Massachusetts, some cities are changing their zoning rules and restrictions, encouraging more developers to building higher density "cluster" developments in traditionally low-density areas.</p>

January 2 - The Boston Globe

<p>Residents near Seattle are upset after transit officials altered plans for proposed extensions of the area's light rail system. Concerned citizens claim that the transit authority's decision to scrap two lines puts politics above effective service.</p>

January 2 - The Seattle Times

<p>Smart City Radio features a show focused on the impact of transportation on land use, including interviews with Robert Puentes and Katherine Perez.</p>

January 2 - Smart City Radio

<p>Over security concerns, the U.S. government has moved some of its federal offices outside the "nuclear blast-zone" of Washington D.C. The move of offices about 75-miles from the D.C. ground zero is bringing an economic boom to the area's small towns.</p>

January 2 - The Washington Post

<p>A battle is raging in rural Illinois over a proposed multi-county water authority that would control the use and tax of water within the heavily farmed region. Many farmers fear a loss of control, and developers anticipate more restrictions.</p>

January 1 - The Chicago Tribune

<p>Curbed Los Angeles names its hysterical 2006 winners for "The NIMBY Award", "Dumbest Planning Scheme", "Broker Boys &amp; Babes Awards", and our favorites, the "Most Horrendous McMansion of the Year" and the "Worst Garagemahal."</p>

January 1 - Curbed Los Angeles

<p>The New York Times offers a fascinating insider's view of the massive $5.4 billion purchase by Tishman Speyer Properties of 80 acres of Prime Manhattan land -- Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village.</p>

January 1 - The New York Times

<p>Arizona State University will launch the nation's first School of Sustainability next month.</p>

January 1 - The Christian Science Monitor