Crowdfunding

Crowdfunding for Affordable Housing
A new experiment in funding affordable housing is underway in Seattle.

Civic Crowdfunding to Mitigate 'Bikelash'
Public outcry about the priority given protected bike lanes on streets can be mitigated when civic crowdfunding is part of the planning process, according to this article.

Philadelphia Project Seeks Diverse Array of Investors
A development project in Philadelphia is raising funds through a combination of Opportunity Zones benefits, federal tax credits, and crowdfunding.
Chariot Commuter Shuttle in San Francisco Expands 50 Percent After Ford Acquisition
Chariot shuttle service, recently acquired by Ford Motor Company, may soon be a more formidable competitor for San Francisco's public transit provider, Muni, due to an expansion to 150 vans. Expect new routes, five-minute headways, and $4 rides.
Vanpooling the Green Way
Vanpooling in a gasoline powered vehicle is heavily polluting, according to Green Commuter, a new car share and vanpooling service that rents all-electric vehicles, such as the Tesla Model X.

Let's Talk About Civic Crowdfunding and Government Responsibility
A reply to skeptics about the democratic power and potential of civic crowdfunding platforms.

More Than Money: Civic Crowdfunding for Participatory Community Development
Crowdfunding platforms have attracted attention for their capacity to bring together likeminded people from far-flung corners of the world. Worth building on, however, is the ability of some platforms to bring together neighborhoods and communities.
Friday Funny: $2 Billion in Crowdfunding Sought for Replica of Middle Earth's Minas Tirith
If you always thought you'd fit in better in Middle Earth than Anywhere, U.S.A., a group of architects and engineers would like to give you a chance to test your theory.
Questioning the Wisdom of Crowd Funding
After a splashy project recently hit its crowdfunding goals, one write dares to suggest that such fund raising methods might not be the best idea.
Crowdfunding Campaign Raises Money and Awareness for Boston's MBTA
A Boston resident has launched a not totally-serious crowdfunding page called "Modernizing Boston's Transit" to help raise the $30 billion needed to fix the MBTA.
Bakersfield Turns to Crowdfunding for Downtown Revitalization Plans
Here's an experiment worth watching: Bakerfield's Downtown Business Development Corporation (DBDC) has launched a crowdfunding website in the hopes of seeing its urban design plans come to fruition.
Crowdfunding Civic Spaces
Although crowdfunding initially developed to support artists and entrepreneurs, crowdfunding sites are funding a growing number of public space projects.
MARTA Crowdfunds Bike Repair Facilities Near Stations
The Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) turned to crowdfunding for a small project that could have big returns in luring bikers to go multi-modal on public transit.

How to Crowdfund a Bike Lane
A PeopleforBikes post explains why the crowdfunding model made sense for a proposed project by the Downtown Denver Partnership to create a protected bike lane on Arapahoe Street.

Friday Funday: Turning a City Street into a Giant Waterslide
Artist Luke Jerram recently installed a 300-foot waterslide on Park Street in Bristol, UK. The "Park and Slide" event was massively attended and wildly popular.

The Best Urban Crowdfunding Projects
Guardian Cities has compiled a list (with pictures!) of the "smartest" urban crowdfunding projects from around the world.
Kansas City Bike Share Program Crowdfunds to Expand (Updated)
The B-Cycle bike share program in Kansas City is using a crowdfunding platform to generate funds for capital investments after an underwhelming attempt to generate funds for operations.
The Promise and Peril of Eco-Crowdfunding
Officials in Oregon, New York, and California have embraced crowdfunding as a way to push forward with environmental projects in a time of constrained budgets. Though the emerging tool is attractive to many, others see danger.
Festival Makes Crowdfunding a Community-Building Affair
An innovative event held recently in Jacksonville, Florida used a festival as a means to bring crowdfunding to the people; providing a platform for community building and branding in the process. Could this be the future of financing public projects?
Crowdsourced Project Turns British Streets Into Massive Art Gallery
At 22,000 sites across the United Kingdom, space normally reserved for billboards and poster advertisements will become frames for great works of art. For the Art Everywhere project, the public played curator and donated online to help pay the costs.
Pagination
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.
City of Brookings
City of White Salmon
Harvard GSD Executive Education
Chaddick Institute at DePaul University
M-NCPPC Prince George's County Planning Department
HUDs Office of Policy Development and Research
NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service