Benjamin Forgey reviews the architecture and urban design of two mixed-use development projects in Virginia.
"I went to Pentagon Row and to the Market Common, Clarendon. Both are...mixed-use retail complexes in older, close-in Virginia suburbs...As glorious as they may be, [big box shopping outlets are] acreage-eating consumer cornucopias -- located ever farther on the metropolitan fringes and hugely overdependent on the automobile -- have contributed mightily to the environmental mess we've come to know as urban sprawl. They've also siphoned economic life from existing town and city centers...The two Virginia developments, by contrast, might be characterized as smart money doing smart growth."
Thanks to Abhijeet Chavan
FULL STORY: Newfangled and Old-Fashioned: A Curious Hybrid Of Town and Mall

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Urban Design for Planners 1: Software Tools
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