Vote for the Finalists in Dwell Magazine’s Reburbia Design Contest
Airbia: The PRT of the future? I mean, of the future future?The good people at Dwell Magazine and Inhabitat.com have narrowed submissions in their Reburbia: A Suburban Design Competition to the top...
View ArticleMore People, Less Driving: The Imperative of Curbing Sprawl
Experience with case studies has made it clear to many urban planners and environmentalists that to maximize the benefits of transit investments, and to slow growth in traffic congestion, vehicle miles...
View ArticleCan State DOTs Be Trained to Kick the Sprawl Habit?
I had the chance to listen in yesterday to top staffers from USDOT explain their collaboration with HUD and the EPA -- the "Partnership for Livable Communities" that was first unveiled in March and...
View ArticleCongress Set to Double the Size of Sprawl-Centric Home Buyer’s Tax Credit
The $8,000 tax credit for new home buyers — which was wracked by fraudulent claims after its creation as part of the nation’s economic recovery effort — is on the verge of a significant expansion by...
View ArticleThe Missed Opportunity For an Urban Stimulus: Mayors ‘Were Ignored’
Two-thirds of America's population, and more than three-quarters of its economic productivity, come from major cities. So why did the Obama administration's economic stimulus law end up giving...
View ArticleThe Urbanist Case Against Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
The Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU), an advocacy group working to reform local development practices, is seizing on House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank’s (D-MA) recent call...
View ArticleA Fresh Look at American Sprawl
There’s only one Concrete, WA, but concrete and asphalt are the welcome mats for towns across America. Image: Gord McKenna/Flickr. American advocates for livable streets know that our addiction to the...
View ArticleDodd’s Livability Bill Earns Praise from Local Governments
With financial reform nearly complete, the Senate Banking Committee turned its attention today to one of Senator Chris Dodd’s (D-CT) next priorities, the Livable Communities Act. Local government came...
View ArticleMTC Adopts Aggressive 15 Percent Target for Reducing Emissions by 2035
Photo: KeenahnThe Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), in a historic vote Wednesday that will help guide the future for more sustainable land use and transportation planning in the Bay Area,...
View ArticleSprawl Anemones
Photos: Christoph Gielen Rarely would one describe sprawl as beautiful, but photographer Christoph Gielen managed to find some of the more incredible developments in the country and depict them in...
View ArticleIn Historic Vote, CARB Adopts Targets Under Landmark Anti-Sprawl Bill
Photo: Mark Stozier In a historic and unanimous vote yesterday, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) adopted ambitious targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 and 2035, a move that...
View ArticleReport: Want to Ease Commuter Pain? Highways and Sprawl Won’t Help
An analysis by CEOs For Cities shows that contrary to previous reports, the longest commutes are in sprawling Southeastern cities. View a larger version of this infographic. Image: CEOs for Cities...
View ArticleA Metro Detroit Business Owner on the Talent-Repelling Effect of Sprawl
The owner of a patent law firm in recession-battered metro Detroit may have to leave Michigan, and it’s not because of the taxes, says Andrew Basile, Jr. His firm, which employs 40 people in the city...
View ArticleBay Area Governments Begin Developing Regional Smart Growth Plan
Image: OneBayArea Local governments in the Bay Area have begun a coordinated regional effort to shift toward more sustainable urban planning mandated by the state’s landmark anti-sprawl bill, SB 375,...
View ArticleThird Houston Outerbelt Would Turn Prairies Into Texas Toast
There’s a place just outside Houston where the vinyl siding and attached garages thin out and recede into grasslands. The Katy Prairie, one of the country's last remaining natural grasslands and an...
View ArticleMeet the Obscure Unelected Agencies Strangling Many U.S. Cities
Transit investment lagged in regions where MPO boards did not give equal representation to city populations, Detroit (SE Michigan) being an especially bad example. In more democratic metros, investment...
View ArticleThe Incredible Shrinking Megastore: Retailers Think Outside the Big Box
They lord over empty parking lots in Hazard, Kentucky; Twinsburg, Ohio; and Lewiston, Washington like the ruins of a lost civilization. Vacant Walmart stores are slowly decomposing in more and more...
View ArticleThe Strain of Job Sprawl on Two-Income Households
When Mark Lampert was a kid, his mom stayed home with him and his brothers. His dad was out the door by 4:30 every morning, driving to the commuter lot in their distant Houston suburb to take the bus...
View ArticlePaul Krugman Links Sprawl to Persistent Social Inequality
Is sprawl holding back social mobility in America? Paul Krugman didn’t mince words yesterday in a follow-up to a post he wrote soon after the Detroit bankruptcy was announced. In that initial blog...
View ArticleWhat Drives the Google Bus?
Forget measuring carbon emissions and counting blocked Muni buses. The real meaning of the Google bus is the deeper illness it reveals – a co-dependent relationship in which sprawl and gentrification...
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