World

The demand for air travel may seem to be on the decline, but it's actually rising -- and playing a major role in determining which places are more economically successful.

February 3, 2011 - The New York Times

The cities of the future should be "smart" -- equipped with data-collection tools and technologies to improve city functionality -- but being smart also means being a good listener, writes Saskia Sassen.

February 3, 2011 - What Matters

A recent international design competition sought innovative and attractive solutions for allowing wildlife to cross busy highways. The winning designs take various strategies to go over or under the traffic.

February 2, 2011 - The Globe and Mail

In Barcelona, Mario Ballesteros says that now is the time to change the perception of historic preservation from a staid, conservative activity to an active, contemporary approach.

February 2, 2011 - domus

With recent uprisings in Cairo and Tunis, we are reminded that the city has been the center of revolutionary action for hundreds of years, according to this piece from Edward L. Glaeser.

February 2, 2011 - The New York Times

Barun Roy says that some of the most adventurous, bizarre and impractical architecture is being built in Asia.

January 28, 2011 - Business Standard

Karl Chu sees a future of architecture that combines artificial intelligence and biological processes resulting in fantastical organic buildings.

January 27, 2011 - IEET blog

Peace and Security professor Michael Klare warns that we are entering a period of global resource scarcity and unrest.

January 24, 2011 - AlterNet

This TIME video is titled, "What Makes Cities Smart?" But the mayors interviewed - Villariagosa, Daley, Nutter - are mostly obsessed with building public transit and high-speed rail.

January 24, 2011 - Time

A new report from BP projects world energy use for the next 20 years: decreased oil growth but more OPEC-dependent; increased coal, natural gas, and renewable usage; and a major growth in carbon emissions.

January 24, 2011 - USA Today

Streetfilms looks back at Professor Donald Appleyard's pioneering work observing the social life of streets, which proved that streets with less traffic fostered more social interactions than those with heavy traffic.

January 23, 2011 - Streetfilms

Dickson Despommier says that the goal of cities today should be to be a "closed loop" ecosystem, where everything that is needed to support the city - energy, food, etc. - is contained within its borders.

January 22, 2011 - McKinsey & Company

Urban Fabric, a landscape architecture and urban design firm in Israel, uses recycled tiles, benches and more in their park designs.

January 22, 2011 - Ha'aretz

Volvo is taking things a step closer to the "driverless car" idea with their "road train" concept: cars can "hook up" to a lead car or bus with a professional driver and ride along in their stream until they need to disembark.

January 20, 2011 - Grist

As the world's population urbanizes, rural areas are being abandoned. But they don't have to sit empty and unused, according to this piece from GOOD.

January 18, 2011 - Good

Hybrid technology for marine transportation is a growing industry, as startup business in New Brunswick, Canada attests.

January 17, 2011 - New Brunswick Business Journal

The Language of Towns & Cities: A Visual Dictionary, by Dhiru A. Thadani is a doorstopper of a book. Philip Langdon looks at this giant guide to New Urbanist ideas.

January 17, 2011 - New Urban Network

Thomas Schielke, an architectural lighting expert, gives an inclusive overview of building facades that include media from the 1931 addition of color at the top of the Empire State Building to a 2010 building that converts brainwaves to light.

January 15, 2011 - arclighting

The Polis Blog presents a huge list of "urban favorites" -- songs, movies, initiatives and places that explain or highlight the best of the world's urban areas.

January 15, 2011 - The Polis Blog

For ninety days, Ben Brown lived out of a 308-square-foot cottage designed by Marianne Cusato. He discovered that you really needed to be connected to your community when living in tight quarters.

January 14, 2011 - PlaceShakers