Susan Henderson

We are excited to see the high level of understanding in the Surgeon General’s Step It Up call to action last week, to promote walking and walkable communities. The Surgeon General noted, “Improving walkability means that communities are created or enhanced to make it safe and easy to walk and that pedestrian activity... Continue Reading

Recent trips to Spain and Germany have me appreciating the nuances of three plazas I had the pleasure of experiencing. Each plaza was a different character and scale from the other, which if I had to sum up simply, I’d call Salamanca’s Plaza Mayor: A City Plaza, Berlin’s Gendarmenmarkt: A Civic Plaza, and Zafra’s... Continue Reading

Like many European cities, Berlin teaches us myriad lessons in building successful shopfronts. While the exclusive international shops along Kurfürstendamm and Friedrichstrasse are elegant and effective, the more creative successes are found in neighborhoods and courtyards. Kaid Benfield’s People Habitat describes in... Continue Reading

Steve Mouzon’s much anticipated new book, New Media for Designers + Builders, releases today. This groovy user-intensive e-book is a road map for revising the marketing efforts of the design and construction community. The premise: Tired marketing budgets are antiquated and out of step with a post-recession world where... Continue Reading

A couple of weeks ago we discussed the various audiences you must connect with when addressing zoning reform. As we noted, zoning reform is an extremely political, and often-fractious process because it affects the property values of landowners, the business plans of developers, and the legacy of the elected officials. There... Continue Reading

Changing a city or county zoning ordinance is more than just a change in code. It's a change in paradigm for the development community. It's a change in options and opportunities. It's a change to the look and feel of the places everyday people call home. But more than anything, it's just change. And that can create... Continue Reading

A number of recent conversations with Stefanos Polyzoides, Howard Blackson, and Matt Lambert regarding density and residential types has me thinking about building typology as one solution to visualizing and embracing density. (more…) Continue Reading

It's that time of year here in central New Mexico when I start eating lunch in my courtyard so I can watch the tomatoes turn red. I’m reminded while sitting here of a visit from Steve Mouzon of the Original Green who was lecturing at the University of New Mexico. (more…) Continue Reading

The townhouse, or rowhouse, is a traditional urban approach to density that, somewhat ironically, has been embraced by suburban builders. Over time, this once simple and elegant species has evolved (some might say devolved) to reflect its newfound environment, becoming “squeezed” in its appearance, with little bits... Continue Reading

Talk about geek love! When I wrote recently about having cooked up an iPhone app for collecting the physical metrics behind form-based codes, my intentions were pretty modest. First, I was just kind of giddy over how it was coming together and wanted to talk about it. But second, and more importantly, I wanted to get... Continue Reading