Shrinking Cities
Lessons for Shrinking Cities from Youngstown, Ohio
The city of Youngstown, Ohio has lost 60 percent of its population since the 1960s. The Youngstown 2010 plan attempted to redevelop a new, smaller city, but how well has it accomplished its goals so far?
Bikeable Cities: Lessons from Pittsburgh
While many of the cities leading the resurgence in the popularity of biking are growing, Pittsburgh has found its own reasons for making the city a better place to bike.
Flint, Michigan, Declares ‘War on Blight’
Flint Mayor Dayne Walling used the occasion of his recent State of the City speech to call for a $70 million “war on blight” that would include the demolition of 6,000 buildings.
Lessons for Detroit—from New Orleans
Detroit recently replaced New Orleans as the American city with the highest rate of blight. As Detroit undertakes its plans to shrink, which includes a massive blight removal campaign, what lessons from New Orleans bear repeating?
Gentrification Also Hurts Shrinking Cities
Recent research calls for policies to incentivize affordable housing in the urban cores of shrinking cities like Buffalo and Cleveland, lest gentrification drive low income residents away from the resources and efficiencies found in urban density.
Struggling Cities Demolish Their Way to Growth
Saddled with thousands of vacant buildings, and little hope of recovering lost population, cities such as Baltimore, Buffalo, and Cleveland are pursuing large-scale demolitions. Shrinking cities are changing the very practice of urban planning.
What Will It Take to Move Detroit's Holdout Homeowners?
Marooned in an ocean of crumbling homes, declining city services, stray dogs, and crime, as many as 10,000 Detroiters live in areas that are unlikely to rebound. What incentives can the city devise to get them to relocate?
A Plan To Shrink Detroit (Well)
Justin Hollander, PhD, AICP, looks closely at Detroit’s new Strategic Framework Plan and finds a compelling plan to manage depopulation. The plan takes a realistic view of what it would take to make Detroit a great city without growing.
Prescription for Shrinking Cities: Don't Demolish, Preserve
For cities across the U.S. facing mass foreclosures and shrinking populations, demolition of abandoned homes is an attractive avenue (see Detroit and Cleveland). Roberta Brandes Gratz argues that the value of preservation deserves to be considered.
Detroit Unveils Plan for Shrinkage
Last week, Detroit Mayor Dave Bing released the much anticipated Detroit Works Project for "shrinking" the city. Reporter Nancy Kaffer says it isn't quite what everyone was expecting.
Downsizing Detroit: How They Found the Money to Shrink, and What We Can Learn
Cities like Detroit can find the funds and initiative to make downsizing work by identifying as many stakeholders and potential partners as possible, writes Alison Bates, who thinks that "right-sizing" is the right move for the city.
Consolidating Detroit
As Detroit shrinks, a team of consultants and city officials are faced with the daunting task of reforming a city that is largely full of holes.
Reasons and Options for Shrinking Cities
As cities like Detroit show major population losses in the enumeration of the 2010 Census, experts discuss why cities are shrinking on this episode of the Diane Rehm Show.
Richard Florida Tells Cities to Stop Shrinking
Richard Florida says that shrinking is not necessarily a good idea for cities like Detroit and Cleveland that are losing population, and that it could do "more harm than good."
Shrinking Cities Means Shuttered Churches
The Archdiocese of Detroit is working with city planners and local demographers as they develop their plans for Catholic parish closures.
Urban Homestead Sectors, Naturescapes, and Green Venture Zones
A group called The Community Development Advocates of Detroit (CDAD) released a report this week that breaks the city down into 11 different district types, each with their own character and policy recommendations.
Applying "Smart Decline" in Vegas
Las Vegas columnist Scott Dickensheets turns to Tufts planning professor Justin Hollander to ask what Sin City should do to combat plummeting home values and draining population.
More Ways to Shrink
Drake Bennett rounds up a host of new ideas for cities like Detroit and Cleveland that are forced to consider how to manage their shrinking cities.
Cities Shrinking to Survive
"More cities in the developed world shrank than grew in the last three decades. More than 40 of those cities were in the United States, according to City Mayors, an urban affairs think tank," writes Gordon Young.
New Consensus in Detroit Behind Shrinking
The mayor, non-profits and a growing section of Detroit residents are getting behind the idea of making Detroit smaller by demolishing buildings and cutting off dead sections of the city.
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
Tufts University, Department of Urban and Environmental Policy & Planning
City of Universal City TX
ULI Northwest Arkansas
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.
