While gentrification is sometimes villainized, the "Jacob's Curve" suggests that there is an optimum level of reinvestment in neighborhoods that creates more diversity of place. The drawing, by planner and architect Michael Mehaffy, is named after...

Mews homes are an affordable and flexible model for mid-block family housing.

The Side Hustle House has been designed to supplement primary income and evolve as household needs change.

A new urban tool is designed help cities, planners, and developers with scenario planning.

Let’s Move Nashville is a transformative transit initiative that is now in front of the electorate—alternative futures for the city are at stake.

Eastside Savannah, a less affluent area adjacent to Savannah's historic core, was the subject of a CNU Legacy Project.

Bicycling infrastructure is a suburban retrofit strategy in Northwest Arkansas.

New urbanists lost a respected and capable leader early this week. Hank Dittmar made a difference in urban planning and transportation on both sides of the Atlantic.

CNU Legacy Project shows how Southside Savannah can leverage a growing university campus to improve quality of life.

We need a strategy for taming deadly thoroughfares that go through cities and suburbs.

CNU partnered with a small city and citizens to create a toolbox with immediate practical usefulness for a segment of the old Dixie Highway in Georgia.

I found this satirical floor plan on the 21st Century City Twitter feed—illustrating the absurdity of automobile-oriented community design. Just like the heart of many cities and towns built since 1950, there is more space for vehicles than people....

Suburban Remix, a new book, reports on commercial development of mixed-use, walkable centers as a powerful force in the American landscape.

A Midwest city considers an affordable option to house more families in walkable neighborhoods.

A new report by Todd Litman offers a vision for optimal urban growth for affordability and livability—laying down a challenge to Wendell Cox, smart growth critic and author of a widely cited report.

A four-story-high mural of Vincent Scully, a Yale professor of architectural history over five decades, was unveiled at Seaside, Florida, in late February. The mural, commissioned by Seaside developer Robert Davis and DC-based architect Dhiru...

Downtown has come back to life while the city is building a transit framework for walkable, mixed-use growth along corridors.

I don't often write about skyscrapers, but this proposal includes smart urban design moves.

A citywide comprehensive plan joins progressive vision with detailed implementation.

In a half century, a neighborhood was cleared for public housing towers. Then the failing towers gave way to a new neighborhood.

Transit-oriented project provides housing for public employees next to public housing in buildings inspired by the District's successful vernacular patterns.

A dilapidated former municipal building, embodying decades of history in the historic Mexican city of San Cristobal, has been converted into a civic museum complete with an elegant and dignified new plaza. “Making the City Hall a museum was an...

Architecture that is scaled to and reflects the human body is endlessly fascinating.

Plan Westside in Atlanta looks at revitalization of a city sector that has declined economically and socially from its civil rights heyday.

The asphalt-industrial complex—otherwise known as Big Asphalt—took control of our cities and towns. Here's how we can take it back.

Nashville uses Tactical Urbanism to test out ideas on public space and street improvements downtown.

A pedestrian fatality spurred a transformation of a thoroughfare in Raleigh, linking a college campus to neighborhoods.

New deco mixed-use building in Pasadena broke a community log jam with distinctive and lovable design that responds to its surroundings.

In an area that once suffered in-city freeway blight, this mixed-use housing project creates a beautiful urban streetwall with modern sensibility.

Roundabouts and reductions in lane widths helped to restore civic life along a US highway in a western New York village.

These photos are taken from the same spot in Buffalo, New York (see highlighted church steeple)—in the early 20th Century and recently. The photo at left captures the city in the early stage of demolishing a beautiful street to make way for a...

The timeless and artful Plaza La Reina, a new hotel in a transit-oriented Los Angeles neighborhood, shows the impact of a building on a city.

Parsons Alley activates abandoned properties, creates a popular and lively new public place, and attracts businesses that appeal to young professionals.

South Miami, Florida, has completely transformed since 2000—largely following the context-sensitive transformation of its main street.

This is a list of the most dangerous intersections in each state. It is also a list of heavily engineered, "big asphalt" intersections in road networks that are built to modern transportation engineering standards. For many of these intersections,...

Why street design has not kept pace with automotive safety improvements, and what you can do about it.

The great Yale lecturer had an impact on movements that are changing the face of communities in the US and beyond.

A breakthrough design on La Jolla Boulevard in San Diego cuts crashes by 90 percent and gives local business a shot in the arm.

A recent snow captures the beauty of a 1.7-acre cottage development, a new extension of the Village of Cheshire in Black Mountain, North Carolina—near Asheville. Architect and urban designer Tom Low designed the Pocket Court Project around two oval...

In Boston, a Transportation Department guide lays out a vision for streets as shared public spaces.

Streetscape improvements have helped bring back an 18-hour-a-day character to the corridor. Crime has dropped and property values have risen.

An esplanade park at the center of a Cincinnati neighborhood had been whittled away. Returned to its former glory, the square has revitalized business and boosted safety.

The issue has changed from whether the city will grow to how and for whom the development is taking place.

A tunnel would cost nearly three times as much as converting the aging I-81 in Syracuse to a boulevard—as suggested by CNU's Freeways Without Futures report.

Lancaster, California, has lit the local economy and secured a social heart with one transformative street project.

A key goal of the Seven50 plan is to ensure that development along the coastal areas is resilient and sustainable.

Here are streets that are more than just conduits for cars—they are places that support social and economic life, walking, bicycling, and transit.

A sprawling land that’s crossed by freeways—put a few thousand down and rent a room. Be a part of the next technology boom.

A horizontal weave brings disparate threads together and creates a fabric—a metaphor for resilience.

Reducing state and federal infrastructure costs while boosting local economies by strengthening urban places is a win-win from in-city freeway transformation.

The rapid change in the District has fueled concerns that investment will leave existing residents high and dry, so the city is working with the community toward a better result.

Review of Cities Alive: Jane Jacobs, Christopher Alexander, and the Roots of the New Urban Renaissance, a book by Michael Mehaffy.

One gaggle of girls, 270-plus trick-or-treaters, 20 pies, and one streetwise cat are vital statistics for this urban thoroughfare.

The domination of the streetscape by garages is common in drive-only suburbs. There are no "eyes on the street" from inside the houses—so the connection with neighbors is tenuous. What you don't see in this photo—because it is out of the scope of...

The New Urbanism is a design movement toward complete, compact, connected communities—but it is also a generator of ideas that transform the landscape. Communities are shaped by the movement and flow of ideas, and the New Urbanism has been a...

These photos of Over-the-Rhine in Cincinnati were taken and assembled by architect Tom Low. These 4- and 5-story masonry buildings were built circa 1900 on 25-wide lots—a standard American system of platting. They all have interesting detail on the...

The first step to good design is avoiding the bad, says Kate Wagner. Why not start with shutter crimes, poor proportions, and clashing architectural references?

Market and local government support for new urbanist values is rising and that is changing the planning mindset in many regions.

When you have a chicken and egg problem, have a chicken omelette.

Urbanists can contribute mightily to solving the climate problem—got any plans for the next few decades?

Restoring the human-scale to the modern built environment is a long-term task, key to human health and welfare, that has barely begun.

Chris McCahill of the State Smart Transportation Initiative explains how vehicle miles traveled (VMT) has become decoupled with Gross Domestic Product (GDP). While Americans’ driving habits have long been linked to economic activity, this...

Walkable places are vital to health and welfare—and contrary to perceptions, they also reduce household costs.

Park Van Ness has remarkable details—and opens up a view from a major thoroughfare to a major urban park.

A well-known new urban project has begun to reshape the relentless sprawl around it, but communities shouldn't wait for that to happen.

Harvey and Irma point out the need to think deeply about resilience to major storms in the era of climate change.

Plan NoBe in the North Beach neighborhood of Miami Beach sets the stage for higher construction standards to withstand sea-level rise—while strengthening defenses like sea walls, mangrove islands, and barrier beaches.

Citizens have a chance to go beyond business-as-usual to achieve a higher potential through recovery from the historic 2017 hurricane season.

As low-income people migrate further out to the suburban fringe, they become more isolated from services and transportation, according to a report by CNU focused on Seattle.

An Oakland redevelopment shows how urban design and historic preservation can support a social agenda.

Building thoroughfares as places of beauty and social interaction requires a context-based approach to design.

Two mixed-use buildings face a new square with fountains and activities like ice skating and concerts, forming the core of Long Island's first major transit-oriented development.

How urbanism can bring hope and change to a working-class African American neighborhood.

Blue Water workforce housing on Tavernier Key, Florida, created a system that of density that fits into the surrounding one- and two-story fabric.

Walkable mixed-use neighborhoods help families build wealth—enough to help fund big-ticket items like college and retirement.

Urban freeways never deliver the congestion relief that transportation planners promise, according to Norm Marshall of Smart Mobility. Marshall created this map that shows examples from around the country where urban freeways have disappointed...

Public housing in the form of complete or partial neighborhoods started with HOPE VI and became standard practice, impacting the lives of people in cities and towns across America.

Hands-on process is changing the planning and development culture of San Marcos, a suburban Texas municipality.

This diagram [FOOTNOTE:1] explains a key difference between conventional suburban (top) and sustainable urban (bottom) development patterns. The conventional suburban area, governed by conventional zoning codes, separates uses into distinct areas...

More and more people are appreciating that architecture and urban design of streets and public spaces have the power to connect, engage, and inspire all of us.

The Choice Neighborhoods development brings order to a city sector laid out in squiggly postwar cul-de-sacs. Newly redesigned streets lead directly to shops, transit, and other services.

At the turn of the millennium, the 26-acre Pearl Brewery in San Antonio was abandoned and desolate—a collection of empty buildings and pavement with only five trees. Now the ambitious Pearl Brewery Redevelopment is an economic and social powerhouse...

A recently released nationwide study strongly correlates greater transportation "modal diversity" with better health for the population as a whole.

The noose around Rochester's downtown has been partly removed, breathing oxygen into the repopulation of the city center.

The principles of neighborhood structure and buildings that relate positively to public space resonate with traditional Zulu culture and village geography.

The redo of the Boston Public Library 1970s wing shows how a building can be reform and adapted to today's needs.

For those who are not land-use planning and development geeks, it may seem like communities are built by market forces or just happen randomly. But most development in America is shaped by zoning codes, other land-development regulations, and...

The transformation of a New Orleans retail box into a music hall with magnetic street presence is a remarkable urban achievement.

One of Buffalo's brightest spots of resurgence, Larkin Square combines adaptive reuse, restoration, and new buildings and public spaces that complement the old.

The Storefront Theater is a unique and creative use of a vacant space in a small-town Main Street.

The nation has a large supply of mid-century neighborhoods that are ripe for changes that will make them more walkable and appealing to new generations of residents.

Prices for real estate in many cities have recently stalled, The New York Times reports, yet the development boom continues.

Stunning historic rehabilitation provides affordable housing in New Orleans.

Once a railway coal siding and more recently a full city block of asphalt surface parking, North Philadelphia’s Paseo Verde now provides affordable, high quality, sustainable housing for a range of income levels. The former 1.9 acre brownfield site...

From coast to coast and in middle America, more sensible parking policies are taking hold and may be the quickest path to urban revitalization.

Lean Urbanism seeks to bring common sense back into the planning and development process—because great neighborhoods are built with many hands, often in small increments.

Restoring an original square in Savannah revives a neighborhood.

The 710 Freeway in Pasadena CA has no future, only an ugly past—one of scores of in-city highway struggles that began when many officials thought that traditional cities had no future.

A new book offers an in-depth report on how public officials, citizens, and developers are working together to create walkable and inclusive communities.

While vehicles miles traveled (VMT) have risen in 2015 in the last three years after nine years of historic lows, the nation is still in a 20-year downward trend relative to economic growth, according to Chris McCahill of the State Smart...

Streets support commerce, social interaction, physical activity, recreation, and multimodal transportation—yet DOT funding criteria are stuck in the past.

A leaner, lighter approach to infrastucture is more cost-effective, sustainable, and livable—an idea worth considering for America in National Infrastructure Week.

New urban codes have allowed cities and towns to code for complete neighborhoods and public spaces as shared-use places.

Many winners this year show how history and old buildings lead to richer neighborhoods and communities.

Speed of automobiles is a critical factor in determining whether a street feels safe and comfortable for people outside of motor vehicles. This graphic illustrates why, in symbols that bring home the point very clearly. People on the street, in the...

The market is much more receptive to the benefits of mixed-use today, but it is still easier to talk about main street retail than to effectively build it.

Architect Laurence Qamar recently created a series of step-back proposals for the Woodstock Corridor In Portland, Oregon, illustrated above. "Instead of the boxy, ungainly 'space invaders' that have bedeviled other parts of the city, Qamar’s step-...

A set of principles that are clear and generative provide a solid foundation for the New Urbanism. Those principles have withstood the test of time and empirical research, and they can be implemented in countless ways.

This series of drawings was inspired by the idea that physical communities have enabled nearly every human advancement since the dawn of history. Communities are hubs where people protect themselves, trade, specialize, and share collective memory...

The New Urbanism brought the environmental transect methodology into planning and development of human-scale, complete communities. Now the human habitat can be analyzed as a continuum with the natural world.

A CNU "Legacy Project" explores how to initiate suburban retrofit in the diverse Seattle suburb of Tukwila.

See how pre-Revolutionary War structures compare to Walmart.

Great places are built in small increments, and urbanists are restoring America's know-how and capacity for small-scale development by many individuals in their own communities. Do you want to be a small developer?

Creating holistic neighborhoods from scratch was one of the first and still effective strategies of the New Urbanism.

Increasingly in demand today, missing middle housing forms the backbone of the quintessential American neighborhood.

Transit-oriented development links transportation and land use—providing people with maximum choice in how to get around by intensifying activities near transit nodes with high quality public space.

"The prime ingredient of urbanism is really public space and the public realm. So the urban plan comes first and the building second."

Sundance Square in Fort Worth, Texas, is a pioneering example of New Urbanism in a sprawling, Sunbelt city.

In order to get good streets, you have to think beyond any single street—an idea that is at the core of New Urbanism. Dendritic networks lead to fragmented and dispersed land uses.

The cute Katrina Cottage has proven the versatility and usefulness of cottages that are designed to fit into complete neighborhoods.

Charles Marohn of Strong Towns and Joe Minicozzi of Urban3 have been sounding the alarm across America about the financial unsustainability of fragmented development patterns and conventional suburban infrastructure.

A time-compressed design process that gathers all of the stakeholders and practitioners together has great potential for creating more holistic communities, experts say.

The latest trend in urban design and planning gets them off of the paper and out of a big room, testing ideas in the real world. It is fun and hands-on, and making many converts.

Suburbs are becoming more diverse and connected to meet the needs of Americans of all ages in the 21st Century.

America's most automobile-oriented cities are changing their growth patterns, making room for new urban planning and development.

Pedestrian sheds are a foundational idea of designing cohesive communities, but the challenge is the gap between what planners know and developers are building.

The trend toward complete communities shapes the debate on sustainability and environmentalism, and vice-versa.

From Pasadena, California, to Buffalo, New York, cities in this report have the chance to remove a blight and improve prosperity, health, and sustainability.

New rail and bus rapid transit routes are being built in virtually every large metropolitan area in the US, Canada, and Mexico. Almost 800 route-miles of new transit infrastructure–most of it with dedicated lanes–is now under construction, at a...

There are two models for development of cities and towns. One, the neighborhood model, founded on thousands of years of trial and error, brings people together.

The carnage continues. We need to go beyond policies and transform streets themselves, according to a new report.

To bring citizens together is the very purpose of a city. Nashville’s sidewalk deficit emerged for many reasons, but it boils down to this: Planning and development during the Age of Sprawl was designed to keep people apart.

Connecting housing by using a neighborhood pattern improves the lives of moderate-income residents.

Cities that blend old and new are helping to define urbanism in the 21st Century.

The Great Lakes city needs clear direction in building and revitalization, and the new Unified Development Ordinance can provide it.

The transportation engineering toolbox is missing key tools when it comes to traditional cities, towns, and neighborhoods.

There is no compelling reason to build a five-mile freeway through the east side of the city, according to engineer Ian Lockwood. A boulevard would do the job better.

The good news: The highway will be improved. The bad news: The boulevard idea is officially dead.

A "new analytic framework" by the Urban Land Institute ignores walkability and sets back our understanding of cities and suburbs.

The Mercado District takes its urban design and architecture cues from Tucson's historic adobe neighborhoods.

Strong demand for historic downtowns and neighborhoods brings a surge of population at a level not seen in 70 years.

City planning department, with funds from the Knight Foundation, hires teams to explore reducing red tape in development projects.

Here's how Orlando replaced a hole in the city with connective tissue.

Proposed code changes are designed to reduce teardowns and encourage multiple small units in existing neighborhoods.

From California to the New York Islands—more business activity, affordability, and diversity can be found in neighborhoods with a range of old and new buildings.

The often quoted cliche that millennials are moving downtown is not quite accurate. The greatest share of young adults is choosing urban neighborhoods outside of downtown. Just over a third of millennials identified in this 2014 nationwide survey...

Affordable housing is built in the suburbs in automobile-dependent places, forcing low-income and working-class residents to spend too much on transportation.

Many suburbs would like to revitalize infrastructure and assets, but they don’t know what problems to tackle first. Not knowing can lead to paralysis.

“Sense of place” is not some nebulous, mystical idea. Sense of place is the emotional or psychological reaction to "place," as shown in the graphic above, created by Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA). Communities and...

After a year of work, the Build a Better Burb website has been upgraded, offering an improved platform for suburbs that are rethinking their planning and development.

Urbanists face considerable uncertainty and concerns in a Trump presidency, but there may be silver linings.

In small to mid-sized cities, the impact of New Urbanism can be dramatic.

Justin Fox of Montgomery, Alabama, has watched downtown return from the dead in the last quarter century. Montgomery has benefited from a form-based code and new urban planning, and, most of all, the nationwide resurgence in urban living. Fox, a...

The State of New York is nearing a decision on whether to demolish or rebuild the aging elevated I-81 expressway through downtown Syracuse, and the city’s daily newspaper, the Post-Standard, thinks the highway will be replaced by a surface boulevard...

Compact development is the best for protecting watersheds because it reduces per capita runoff, according to this graph from the Crabtree Group. Most stormwater narratives state that density is bad because the increased runoff is only considered on...

Older and smaller buildings and a wide range in building age offer real economic and social benefits for neighborhoods and urban centers.

Little in this world is more powerful and satisfying to humans than a well-designed human habitat juxtaposed against nature.

Historic buildings create the kind of character and vitality that makes older communities perform well economically, socially, and environmentally—and that is the central thesis of a new book.

A walkable community is the most common term to describe the alternative to drive-only suburbia. Yet walking is so basic to human life that we often take it for granted. Perhaps a more inspiring term is livability.

Big box retailer evolves; chases customers to walkable urban locations.

The movement of millennials toward major city centers has been well reported—but many are locating in smaller, second- and third-tier cities, as noted by Gizmodo. The reason is economics. As the graph shows, some major cities have an affordability...

“Thanks to skilled designers, a clear, implementable code, and a truly capable client, this plan is getting built, and well.”

It's easy to divide the country into those who have sidewalks, and vote one way, and those who do not, and vote another way. Yet sidewalks, and all they symbolize, are gaining political recognition.

Grids are easy and inexpensive—they are a natural way to design streets. But the convention for much of the last century is to model streets on sewer systems.

Some suburbs are building an entire urban downtown from scratch to provide a unique identity and appeal.

Urban design and architecture on a leftover parcel bring a campus and a Los Angeles neighborhood closer together.

An iconic new urban diagram from the 1990s shows a walkable neighborhood, top, compared to conventional suburban development, below. The uses are the same but the organization of the uses are different. This drawing by Thomas Low for DPZ was widely...

When the research favors compact, mixed-use neighborhoods, why do our policies often favor sprawl?

Administration calls for local laws to allow accessory dwelling units and denser development and eliminate off-street parking requirements, among other changes.

As usual, Washington Post cartoonist Tom Toles was ahead of his time when he drew this in June of 1998. Toles condensed the history of race and urban demographics in the last half of the 20th Çentury into six panels. Despite a massive recession 10...

"Porches become stages, yards become venues, and radical generosity and good will rule the day."

A study by Redfin, the owner of Walk Score, shows that true walkability has tremendous economic value—but Walk Score itself has problems.

This is what urban economic analyst Joe Minicozzi calls "The Money Shot," comparing a Walmart in Asheville, NC, to a downtown mixed-use building in the same city. He puts all of these economic indicators side by side that show the relative poor...

Commuters cut crash risk by more than 90 percent when taking public transit instead of driving, and investment in transit may reduce a community’s automobile crash risk in half, according to research.

A diverse group is promoting "cost effective," place-creating alternatives to rebuilding an ugly freeway in Providence, Rhode Island. The current 6-10 plan "feels like they are screwing poor people, like it's urban renewal 201," says a Coalition member.

Do you love to hate the over-the-top residential architecture of outer-ring suburbs?

Every time an in-city highway has been replaced by more human-scale infrastructure, the city and region has benefitted, according to transportation experts who led workshops for USDOT.

Saving historic facades and modernizing buildings were key to revitalizing an important downtown square.

The ‘elephant in the living room' of rising and preventable US traffic deaths and injuries is government-funded roads in drive-only places.

The Portland Streetcar is one of the most successful and cost-effective economic development drivers anywhere in America in the new millennium.

In Lancaster, California, a simple change in street design was a catalyst for economic and social activity.

Developer Bob Turner talks about Habersham, the future of traditional neighborhood developments, and current development trends.

The announcement creates holes in enclosed shopping malls—meanwhile the department store chain is looking to open downtown locations.

For most of the 20th Century, US vehicle miles traveled (VMT) rose relentlessly. At the turn of the new millennium, the pattern changed substantially, but the view of the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), did not. Above is a graph that shows...

This article is part of our ongoing coverage of the Ladders of Opportunity Every Place Counts Design Challenge, a program of the U.S. Department of Transportation with design assistance from CNU. Learn more at cnu.org/everyplacecounts.

This article is part of our ongoing coverage of the Ladders of Opportunity Every Place Counts Design Challenge, a program of the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) with design assistance from CNU. Learn more at cnu.org/everyplacecounts.

This article is part of our ongoing coverage of the Ladders of Opportunity Every Place Counts Design Challenge, a program of the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) with design assistance from CNU. Learn more at cnu.org/everyplacecounts.

This article is part of our ongoing coverage of the Ladders of Opportunity Every Place Counts Design Challenge, a program of the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) with design assistance from CNU. Learn more at cnu.org/everyplacecounts.

There is still time for public comment on an ill-considered rule tying lower speeds on urban streets to "excessive delay." Please read the article and tell FHWA to drop or change this proposal.

Ponce City Market in Atlanta unites four neighborhoods and brings high-tech businesses back to the city.

People with moderate incomes end up spending less of their hard-earned income in walkable places for two reasons.

A holistic neighborhood plan created with the help of citizens is designed to improve health.

Outside Buena Vista, Colorado, on the site of a former garbage dump, 40 acres of riverfront land sat vacant for years. It took two nature-loving developers—risktakers with a background as competitive kayakers—to see what it could become.

In Detroit, the neighborhood of Brush Park stands between three of the city’s fastest revitalizing areas: Midtown, Eastern Market, and the Central Business District.

“The hospital can be a catalyst to create healthy communities in which walking, social engagement, and positive economic transformation are facilitated.”

The "community listening chart" from Nashville, Tennessee, outlines the discussion that is taking place around the I-40 corridor through the city. The discussion is part of US Department of Transportation's Every Place Counts workshop this week—one...

US traffic deaths are way beyond peer nations and the gap is widening, according to a report released this week from the Centers for Disease Control. Traffic deaths in the US have dropped since 2000, due to safer vehicles and declining miles driven...

Although Lakewood, Colorado, is the fifth largest city in the state, until the last decade the city had no true downtown. Instead, the Denver suburb boasted one of the country’s largest indoor shopping malls, built in the 1960s—but by 2000, that...

Walkability leads to higher social equity, even in cities that have higher housing costs, according to research in the new report Foot Traffic Ahead. The graph above shows that cities with more office, retail, and multifamily development in walkable...

Mixed-use, walkable commercial development is outpacing large-scale conventional suburban construction in every major metro area, according to the new report Foot Traffic Ahead: Ranking Walkable Urbanism in America’s Largest Metros, 2016. For...

Sadik-Khan's approach is both radical and practical. Instead of relying on traffic "models" that are rarely tested against reality, she made changes with temporary materials that could be reversed if the benefits failed to materialize.

Detroit wrote the history of the motor vehicle age in America, and Detroit is one of the most automobile-oriented cities in America. Yet less than 50 percent of the adults in Detroit own a car. That fact says a lot about how Detroit has failed, and...

The most successful new urbanist politician ever gave CNU attendees a role model for how to transform cities, how to care about character and beauty, and why urbanism is most important for those with the least money and privilege. Joe Riley was the...

After two decades, Mashpee Commons is moving forward with 300-plus residential units, more shops, and civic spaces with support from the regional planning authority.

Daniel Hertz at City Observatory introduced what he called the “Sprawl Tax” last week—defined as the cost associated with excess commuting distance for the top 50 metro areas. This distance adds real costs for gas, depreciation, and wear and tear on...

How many gables does this house have? I lost count at 11. The fake dormers and complicated roof line are meant to make up for the lack of variety in this Maryland exurb. Every house nearby has a similarly expansive lawn that is rarely used. Need to...

The Build a Better Burb Sprawl Retrofit Council met in Miami to explore opportunities for promoting land-use diversity and transportation choice in the suburbs—with particular focus on the needs of smaller suburbs with less robust markets. A follow–...

For those who are concerned that too many big developers dominate urban revitalization, the Naked Philly blog is an antidote.

Joel Kotkin charges urbanists with being anti-family—but he couldn't be more wrong.

"The public policy environment in Pennsylvania, and in most places in the United States, is absolutely, positively hostile to cities," said Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf. Wolf said, for example, that the costs of water, sewer, and electric networks...

An infographic from City Observatory makes the case for why concentrated poverty impacts more people in US cities.

The Transforming City is the theme of this year’s Congress—and it’s the most inspiring CNU storyline that I can remember.

A comprehensive implementation guide was written to retool the machinery behind Florida's deadly streets.

The inspiration for this iconic drawing was a walk from the beach over the dunes and into the scrub woodlands in the early days of Seaside, Florida. Douglas Duany, landscape architect, explained the natural transect to architect Andres Duany, who...

Housing authority begins construction on phase one of 1,200 residences and 400,000 square feet of retail and replacement of two schools in North Philadelphia.

As growing legions of Americans look for urban places, many will be drawn to more affordable mid-sized cities like Rochester, NY.

CNU recently completed four Legacy Charrettes in advance of CNU 24 in Detroit. On Monday through Thursday we published articles on the fascinating plans by top new urbanists. Two of the charrettes focused on city neighborhoods and other two focused...

Heinrich Kley was a German illustrator active in the early 20th Century who was noted for darkly humorous pen-and-ink drawings. He sometimes focused on the conflicts of new technologies—such as motor vehicles competing for space on city streets with...

CNU Legacy Charrette team boosts confidence in a neighborhood with a languishing commercial corridor.

The Legacy Charrette plan includes both incremental steps to kick-start economic and cultural activity and long-term visions.

Southwest Detroit is the kind of neighborhood that few people talk about outside of the Motor City. The community is not one of those that are vacant and dilapidated—the subject of "ruin porn" photos on the web. It's also not booming with...

A CNU charrette led by Moule & Polyzoides, Architects and Urbanists, focused on how to transform a two-mile stretch of the John R Road that traverses Hazel Park, Michigan. The goal is to promote development of a walkable downtown where none...

PBS explores urban planning and the New Urbanism.

All of a sudden, New York State is the nation’s leader in urban freeway removal, as reported by Streetsblog. Andrew Cuomo is on a bit of a roll when it comes to urban planning and city-based economic development. Cuomo and his administration have...

High vacancy rates and little reason to visit outside of 9 to 5 contrasts with the current success of central business districts. How can office parks be transformed?

I've been a dedicated user of Apple products for 20 years—but Tim Cook's assertion that Apple's new headquarters will be the "greenest building on the planet" is absurd. To get a sense of scale of Apple's new Cupertino campus, Josh Arcurio...

When I posted a list of ten songs for urbanists in February, many people posted alternative suggestions—so many that I nearly had enough for another list. I curated those suggestions and added a few more. Enjoy! Where Do the Children Play? Cat...

Building density that supports walkable urban centers is a key strategy of new urbanists—but this goal is challenging in already built-out suburbs. Existing conditions, space constraints, zoning restrictions, and long approval processes often...

Oak Cliff, Dallas, went through the typical waves of gentrification. The creative types began to move in during the 1990s, followed by middle class families and young professionals, followed by the current wave of developers. Attached is a photo...

In The Humanists Versus the Reactionary Avant Garde, Charles Siegel illuminates the question of what progressive, contemporary architecture truly means.

First built over 200 years ago as a toll road connecting Washington, D.C. to greater Virginia, the Columbia Pike now serves as a direct route to the Pentagon and other capital landmarks. Until recently, this Arlington, Virginia thoroughfare was an...

The redevelopment of a suburban commercial strip area across from UConn has made Mansfield, Connecticut, a better place.

A recent study in the Journal of the American Planning Association estimates there are 18.6 million parking spots in Los Angeles County, which would cover an area 16 miles in diameter if combined in a single 200-square-mile parking lot. Even spread...

A older American Dream, that of town, neighborhood, and city living, was submerged by the suburban American Dream—which controlled the regulations, finance, and investment after World War II.

As revitalization of cities moves forward, urbanists are partway through a multiphase process that is changing America.

Detroit has captivated the nation in its decline, bankruptcy, and booming downtown rebirth, but there is more to urbanism in Southeastern Michigan than the Motor City.

This graph, from the 2016 Bicycling & Walking Benchmarking Report, released two days ago, tells you most of what you need to know about walking in US cities. The best 10 cities identified in this graph, where walking is frequent and safe, all...

CNU is reviving a tradition of intimate discussions with top experts next month in Miami with the Build a Better Burb Sprawl Retrofit Council.

These two suburban houses near Orlando, Florida, are about 60 feet apart, but to borrow a cup of sugar without trespassing requires a 7.1-mile trip by car—or a two-and-a-half-hour trek on foot (five hours round trip). A similar image was originally...

One of the nation's most beautiful historic shopping arcades was restored into affordable micro-lofts and small shops in Providence.

If transportation officials embrace a new approach backed by science, safe and effective mobility no longer need conflict with the multidimensional role of streets as public spaces and with people’s varied modes of travel.

The impact of the neighborhood on many sources of climate emissions is clearly visible in this University of California research.

I offer a personal selection of music on topics that urbanists care about—I hope you enjoy it.

A beloved amusement park closed in Denver, CO—luckily, Highlands Garden Village was built in its place.

Mingling of people and cars at slow speeds is efficient and pedestrian-friendly, according to a University of Connecticut study.

The social village has withered in the US, according to The Vanishing Neighbor: The Transformation of American Community, by Marc Dunkelman. How do we restore it?

Today marks the launch of CNU’s latest effort, an online journal to illuminate and cultivate best practices in urbanism in the US and beyond.

Good news for architects and urbanists.

Influential words from the most influential writer on urban planning in modern times

For one warm fall Sunday afternoon, “the most diverse musical lineup of any festival in Georgia” transformed a neighborhood in Decatur, an inner-ring suburb of Atlanta.

When Hurricane Katrina struck in August 2005, aid for the region arrived in all shapes and sizes from across the US.

How many times have you heard someone say, dismissively, "Oh, that's just aesthetics," or, defensively, "It's not just aesthetics" to signal that a "real" issue is involved, usually economics. Hogwash, says Urban Land Institute scholar Ed McMahon....

A small developer and builders group associated with CNU is gathering momentum and has the potential to fill a gap in the industry. Resources are available for big urban developers and sprawl builders, but few educational materials and support...

Traffic engineers as a group have been much slower to recognize their erroneous techniques and replace them with less damaging practices.

US traffic deaths are rising again—fatalities jumped 8.1 percent in the first half of 2015

The evidence keeps piling up to support reform in street design and traffic engineering. Recent research adds to volumes of studies that say walkable streets will make us safer, healthier, and improve the economy and communities. As BCT reported ...