Every city with neighborhoods in decline and a lack of demand for new investment is faced with the challenge of how to address blight. Each city's challenges are unique, but many are finding new and effective strategies to end the spread of blight.
Emily Badger reports on novel techniques in cities around the country to combat blight—especially the creeping kind of blight that starts small and picks up momentum as it consumes whole blocks and neighborhoods.
Badger introduces a few examples of the blight reduction work from Detroit, Philadelphia, Chicago, and Jacksonville before providing in-depth analysis of work by the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society to clean newly empty lots and maintain exiting ones. "Today, it regularly maintains about 6,500 greened vacant lots, April through October (the program has also created a landscaping industry in the city from scratch). Another 2,100 lots receive care once a month from paid neighbors. Since the start of the program, about 700 lots have gone on to be redeveloped."
All that hard work in Philadelphia has produced a wealth of academic research, listed by Badger, on the benefits of blight reduction programs.
FULL STORY: How cities are starting to turn back decades of creeping urban blight

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Planetizen Federal Action Tracker
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Ken Jennings Launches Transit Web Series
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California has awarded $500 million to fund 1,000 zero-emission school buses and chargers for educational agencies as part of its effort to reduce pollution, improve student health, and accelerate the transition to clean transportation.

Congress Moves to End Reconnecting Communities and Related Grants
The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee moved to rescind funding for the Neighborhood Equity and Access program, which funds highway removals, freeway caps, transit projects, pedestrian infrastructure, and more.

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How the Covid-19 pandemic taught us new ways to reclaim city streets from cars.
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