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No Complete Streets Measure in House Bill

February 1, 2012 by Stefanie Seskin
with 82 views
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With no Complete Streets provision, the just-released House Transportation bill ignores millions of Americans nationwide who want their transportation system to provide safe and convenient choices, such as walking, riding a bike, and catching a bus or train. [read more]

California’s Population Problem?

January 31, 2012 by Patrick Lydon
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Is reducing the population really the solution to solving the California's multiple crises? Patrick Lydon takes a look. [read more]

How a rain garden cleans industrial pollution

January 25, 2012 by Kaid Benfield
with 206 views
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  (Note: Today’s post was conceived and largely authored by my friend and frequent collaborator, Lee Epstein.  Lee is an attorney, land use planner, and sustainability advocate working in the mid-Atlantic region.) As NRDC’s water program rightfully emphasizes, one of the most vexing conundrums in highly urban areas is how to... [read more]

How Bicycling and Walking Directly Impacts Health

January 24, 2012 by TheCityFix - produced by EMBARQ
with 937 views
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Pedestrian and bicycle projects receive less than 2 percent of federal transportation dollars in the U.S. Photo by Eric Allix Rogers. While obesity levels increased by 156 percent between 1960 and 2009, bicycling and walking levels fell by 66 percent. These are statistics from a new report by the Alliance for Biking and Walking. The... [read more]

End Comes for Many California Redevelopment Agencies

January 24, 2012 by Next American City
with 28 views
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How many jobs will be lost following the Alhambra agency’s dissolution? Credit: Wikipedia user Jey0hThis piece originally ran in the Alhambra Source. It concerns an example of how a recent California state law dissolving redevelopment agencies affects local communities. The Alhambra Redevelopment Agency will cease to exist as of February... [read more]

Flipping the Smart Grid Switch in Vermont

January 24, 2012 by Adam Christensen
with 58 views
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To get an idea of the promise and possibility of the “smart grid,” look no further than what’s happening in the small New England state of Vermont. With multiple energy sources and a clear focus on the environment spanning many years, Vermont continues to lead the path for other states looking to become “smarter.” Since creating the... [read more]

Reconciling cities with water scarcity

January 23, 2012 by Kaid Benfield
with 166 views
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    When you look at the official US drought monitor map, you immediately see that many American cities may be in the wrong places for long-term water sustainability.  In particullar, note the presence of “long-term,” severe-to-extreme drought conditions across most of Georgia, Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and... [read more]

Place And Economic Development

January 20, 2012 by Jim Russell
with 172 views
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Is "cool" an economic development strategy? A few of my blog posts are syndicated at Sustainable Cities Collective. (ed. note: here!) Sometimes the title gets tweaked in a way that highlights a controversy. Such is the value of a good editor. That was the case with my most recent work about Pittsburgh versus Portland. The larger issue of... [read more]

How Design Activists Hope to Turn Around Detroit

January 20, 2012 by the polis blog
with 140 views
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The Detroit Collaborative Design Center (DCDC) is not content with the status quo when it comes to built environment professionals — especially architects. Based at the University of Detroit Mercy School of Architecture since 1994, it sees the production of architecture as a political act, one that supports or disrupts the actions... [read more]

South Korea Uses Architecture to Reignite its Publishing Industry

January 19, 2012 by This Big City
with 56 views
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In 1989, construction began on a development 30 kilometres (19 miles) from the South Korean capital of Seoul, aiming to create an urban region which specialised in print and publishing. And what better place to embark on a project like this than South Korea – an area of the world which saw the invention of print some 200 years... [read more]

Preparing Cities for Seniors

January 18, 2012 by Victor Negrete
with 228 views
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An ageing population requires that cities reevaluate what good urbanism is. What are the trends in this sector and what needs of the senior population will cities have to start thinking about in order to adjust to this boom? Is walkable urbanism among them? [read more]

Is Waste-to-Energy the future of energy in New York?

January 18, 2012 by Next American City
with 214 views
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Coverage of Mayor Bloomberg’s state of the city address focused, as the speech did, on the mayor’s raft of education proposals, with some additional attention to his mentions of police corruption and the minimum wage. But the mayor’s reference to a once-controversial notion—“the possibility of cleanly converting trash into renewable energy”—passed all but unnoticed. [read more]