Social Equity
Active Transport (Walking and Cycling) Planning for Equity
A new FHWA report, "Pursuing Equity in Pedestrian and Bicycle Planning" identifies practical ways to achieve social equity by better responding to the active travel needs of currently underserved populations.
Prioritizing Park Equity in Planning and Policy
The APA blog issues a call to action to promote park equity.
Social Equity: The Missing Leg of the Three-Legged Stool of Climate Action
Climate action plans cannot succeed without bona fide action on social equity and job creation, argues Murtaza Baxamusa who teaches planning at USC and develops affordable housing Murtaza Baxamusa.
5 Social Equity Problems Planners Should Help Solve
Urban planners should take a leadership role in placing social equity at the top of planning goals, argues planner, teacher, and affordable housing developer Murtaza Baxamusa. He looks at five socio-economic problems planners should strive to solve.
A Counterpoint in the Great Uber Dialogue
An op-ed counters concerns about the social equity consequences of Uber by allowing the possibility of public benefits arising from transportation network companies.
Smart Planning for Economic Opportunity
The Center for Opportunity Urbanism has a wonderful goal—to improve economic opportunities for working class households—but uses terrible research to reach confusing recommendations about which policies are best. Please do better!
Using Data to Plan for Equity
Denver’s Equity Atlas is a pioneering effort between private, public, and non-profit interests to visualize a variety of statistics for the Denver metro area.
Transit Irony: The More You Rely on It, the More They Cut
Transit authorities often push cuts on the people most dependent on public transit, sometimes called "captive riders." Instead, they focus resources on luring tourists and "choice riders" out of their cars. An article by Samantha Winslow explains.
Are Social and Economic Justice Planning Outcomes?
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio appointed Planning Commission Chair Carl Weisbrod while promising planning decisions that produce economic and social justice benefits. The question is to what degree planning can influence those outcomes.
Seven Strategies For Inner City Growth
Participants from a conference called the Inner City Economic Summit offer a variety of themes on "What Works" for meeting the needs of inner cities economies.
What Medellin Teaches Us About Design and Social Engagement
Michael Kimmelman ventures to Colombia's reborn second city to explore what new buildings and infrastructure have brought to the city's residents, what it has not, and what remains to be done.
Urban Equity to be Focus of New Academic Center
Launched May 1 within the Spitzer School of Architecture at the City College of New York, the new J. Max Bond Center on Design for the Just City will pursue the ways in which design can make "American cities more just and inclusive places to live."
A National Model for Transit Equity
Kaid Benfield looks at a groundbreaking new report compiled by Reconnecting America and the equity coalition Mile High Connects, that suggests how the expansion of Denver's transit system could reach traditionally underserved populations.
Federal Government to Consider Social Equity in Funding Decisions
In new rules published in the Federal Register on Wednesday, the Department of Transportation is amending Bush era policies on awarding grants for Light Rail, Subway, and Bus Rapid Transit projects.
Planners Must Speak for the Disadvantaged
"No one other than we as planners has the responsibility for decisions today that will profoundly affect others," says Attorney/Planner Dwight H. Merriam.
The Shrinking Middle Class
A new report from Stanford University looks at the changes in incomes and neighborhoods.
Another Look at Bicycle Advocacy
Blue argues that bicycle advocates need to consider the economic perspective of all individuals that use bicycles as transportation. Not all who bicycle do it by choice, says Blue.
How Would MLK, Jesus or Che Plan?
I spent last week at the Asian Development Bank (ADB) headquarters in Manila, in the Philippines, where we are starting on an exciting but humbling project: developing a more comprehensive framework for transport project evaluation. Among other factors, this project will develop better methods for incorporating social equity impacts into transport planning. This is important in any community, and particularly in developing countries where many people are extremely poor. What transport policies and planning practices respond to their needs?
"Urban Renewal Was Never Really A Planner's Idea"
So says APA President Mitchell Silver, AICP, in a recent interview. "...but planners were the agents, they had to implement it."
Has American Individualism Failed Society as a Whole?
Mary Newsom questions the current and diminishing lack of public worth in the United States today. " Americans have stopped believing that value is something everyone deserves," she writes.
City of Costa Mesa
Licking County
Barrett Planning Group LLC
HUD's Office of Policy Development and Research
Mpact Transit + Community
HUD's Office of Policy Development and Research
City of Universal City TX
ULI Northwest Arkansas
Town of Zionsville
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.
