A study prepared for the McKnight Foundation’s Food for Thought series has searched far and wide for lessons for keeping Minneapolis-St. Paul a prosperous and livable place.
Over two articles for MinnPost, Jay Walljasper identifies 27 ideas for improving education, attracting young talent, encouraging diversity, boosting planning and design, and addressing a host of other issues that could benefit Minneapolis-St. Paul, or any other metro area. Each idea has been inspired by specific examples from other locales.
"I present the following ideas not as a detailed road map to a brighter future," writes Walljasper in the introduction to "27 Bright Ideas We Should Steal from the Rest of the World" [PDF], "but as a way to stimulate our own creativity to tackle problems and seize opportunities that lie ahead. In a world becoming ever more global in its outlook and operations, it’s crucial to find inspiration and borrow ideas from everywhere."
FULL STORY: How to keep Minneapolis-St. Paul prosperous

Florida Considers Legalizing ADUs
Current state law allows — but doesn’t require — cities to permit accessory dwelling units in single-family residential neighborhoods.

HUD Announces Plan to Build Housing on Public Lands
The agency will identify federally owned parcels appropriate for housing development and streamline the regulatory process to lease or transfer land to housing authorities and nonprofit developers.

Has President Trump Met His Match?
Doug Ford, the no-nonsense premier of Canada's most populous province, Ontario, is taking on Trump where it hurts — making American energy more expensive.

OKC Approves 7.2 Miles of New Bike Lanes
The city council is implementing its BikeWalkOKC plan, which recommends new bike lanes on key east-west corridors.

Preserving Houston’s ‘Naturally Occurring Affordable Housing’
Unsubsidized, low-cost rental housing is a significant source of affordable housing for Houston households, but the supply is declining as units fall into disrepair or are redeveloped into more expensive units.

The Most Popular Tree on Google?
Meet Rodney: the Toronto tree getting rave reviews.
Urban Design for Planners 1: Software Tools
This six-course series explores essential urban design concepts using open source software and equips planners with the tools they need to participate fully in the urban design process.
Planning for Universal Design
Learn the tools for implementing Universal Design in planning regulations.
Florida Atlantic University
City of Grandview
Harvard GSD Executive Education
UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies
City of Piedmont, CA
Great Falls Development Authority, Inc.
NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service