Category: Planning and Design

Is placemaking a “new environmentalism”?

Kaid Benfield
Kaid Benfield Twitter Instagram Facebook LinkedIn
Can placemaking - in short, the building or strengthening of physical community fabric to create great human habitat - be a “new environmentalism”?  The question is posed by a provocative short essay, which I first discovered in 2011. Written by Ethan Kent of the Project for Public Spaces, the article... Continue Reading
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Parking is a Commodity, Not an Experience

Scott Doyon
Scott Doyon Twitter Instagram Facebook
Yesterday the Atlantic ran a piece on the Great Retail Meltdown of 2017 which, to summarize, tied the present culling of the retail herd to three phenomena: the rise of online shopping; a half century of overbuilding retail space; and the present shift in spending from goods to experiences. In short, with people increasingly... Continue Reading
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Lessons From Savannah

Susan Henderson
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Savannah, Georgia is arguably one of, if not the most, beautiful cities in the United States. Although I lived there for a while 25 years ago, on a recent visit I was struck by the many placemaking lessons we can learn from this lovely city. In anticipation of the 2018 CNU Congress in the city, I started taking some notes... Continue Reading
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Feared Dead, Math’s Back: Planning nerds vindicated

Ben Brown
Ben Brown
Planning for the future tends to be a humiliating exercise. Whatever’s headed our way is both inevitable and unpredictable. Yet because it brings with it the consequences of decisions we made or ducked in the past and now have to manage or endure in the present, we have to take a stab at decisions that are coherent and... Continue Reading
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Small Goes Big: The Katrina Cottage Connection

Ben Brown
Ben Brown
If you’ve been following our work here, you know we have a soft spot for Katrina Cottages and the neighborhood design movement they inspired. And you also know some of us -- okay, me -- have been grumpy about the way Tiny House talk has sucked oxygen out of the discussion of small scale homes in small scale neighborhoods. Continue Reading
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Placemaking: Geek niche or the root of pretty much everything?

Scott Doyon
Scott Doyon Twitter Instagram Facebook
When I first developed my interest in placemaking twenty years ago it was driven by design. I was a brand advertising person which, by necessity, involves the study of behavior. Not just of people but of their context. Where and how people choose to live, I learned, provided a lot of insight into the kinds of things... Continue Reading
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Want to Improve Your City? Start taking pictures

Kaid Benfield
Kaid Benfield Twitter Instagram Facebook LinkedIn
In Chuck Wolfe’s absorbing new book, Seeing the Better City, he encourages readers to think with our eyes and communicate with visual imagery in order to improve our cities. With the proliferation of smartphone cameras and an endless array of easily accessible, web-based platforms on which to display them, virtually... Continue Reading
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Codes Study: Trends in zoning reform

Hazel Borys
Hazel Borys Twitter Facebook LinkedIn
About twelve years ago, I started the Codes Study to analyze cities, towns, and counties taking proactive steps toward zoning to encourage livable places. And by livable, I mean mixed-use, economically vibrant, convivial, walkable, bikeable, and transit-friendly. Many places are using form-based codes to encourage livability,... Continue Reading
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Where Thinking About the End is a Good Place to Begin

Ben Brown
Ben Brown
In this time of increasing uncertainty, of trepidation about what the future holds for ourselves, our families, our communities, wouldn’t it be great if there were something we could absolutely count on? Something we could predict with 100 percent confidence no matter who we are or where we live or what particular challenges... Continue Reading
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The Trifecta: Urbanism, architecture, and nature

Susan Henderson
Susan Henderson Instagram Facebook
We often blog on the benefits of nature integrated into urbanism and wellbeing outcomes of walkability. The real trifecta is when walkable urbanism, human-scale architecture, and nature come together via placemaking. A recent study from the University of Warwick points out that a scenic view delivers equal health benefits... Continue Reading
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