Exclusives

BLOG POST

<p> Working for a small municipality - regardless of its location - has all the isolating properties of a far-away fiefdom.  So it has been with great consternation that, despite being nary a narrow river&#39;s width from that island, I have been yet so far removed from the industry-insider privileges of working on transportation projects in Manhattan.  I am, admittedly, all but entirely absorbed by work in the New York City satellite of Hoboken, NJ, and while aware of progress as reported by the media, have nonetheless lost granular touch with the revolutionary day-to-day goings-on in my career&#39;s former epicenter.  From this side of the Hudson I read the broad <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/06/nyregion/06sadik-khan.html?pagewanted=1&amp;_r=1&amp;adxnnlx=1299299134-EbMLr

March 5 - Ian Sacs

BLOG POST

<p> Census data is already in for a couple of dozen states, and already blogs are starting to speculate about their lessons for American cities.  Some commentators look at the continued decline of Rust Belt cities like Chicago and St. Louis, and suggest that suburban sprawl continues (and will forever continue) unabated.  But reality is not quite so simple. </p>

March 3 - Michael Lewyn

BLOG POST

<p>Most trends are fleeting, some of them mercifully so. Some last no longer than a Lady Gaga wardrobe change. But urbanism is still, by and large, a leisurely exercise, so it&#39;s no wonder that planners still embrace fashions on a nearly generational basis. It often takes that long just to see if something works. Or not.  <br /><br />So, while Gaga would inspire us to attach telephones to our heads and light our bustiers on fire, planners who ascribe to the principles of smart growth are still rhetorically swaddling cities in the urban equivalent of flannel. For better or worse, this age may finally be coming to a close. Don&#39;t cry, Monster.</p>

March 2 - Josh Stephens

BLOG POST

<p class="MsoNormal"><span>Recently, a number of students have asked me questions about a similar topic—managing time. In graduate school there are deadlines. Some required tasks are not things you would choose to do unless forced—just like the world of work. At the same time one has a relatively large amount of flexibility as to how one organizes time to get it done. The tips below aim to help you figure out an approach to this difficult issue. They draw on my own observations. However, my able researchassistant Amanda Wilson provided some additional comments and I quote her fromtime to time! Errors are of course mine.</span></p>

March 1 - Ann Forsyth

FEATURE

Portland is known today as one of the nation's top bicycling cities, but it wasn't always thus. Mia Birk, the city's bicycle coordinator in the early 90s, explains how the city changed course to create an enviable bicycle infrastructure.

February 28 - Mia Birk

FEATURE

Planners' activities in a community have a direct impact on its character, says Edward Jepson, and can be pivotal in creating sustainability.

February 24 - Edward J. Jepson Jr.

BLOG POST

<p>While it is still in the early stages, it&#39;s nonetheless exciting to post that Hoboken and Jersey City are collaborating with Hudson County Transportation Management Association (TMA) to explore ways to bring a full-fledged bike sharing program to the west coast of the Hudson.  The full details are posted in a Request for Expressions of Interest (RFEOI) here:</p><p><a href="http://www.hudsontma.org/index.php?option=com_content&amp;task=view&amp;id=227&amp;cat_id=21&amp;Itemid=61">http://www.hudsontma.org/index.php?option=com_content&amp;task=view&amp;id=227&amp;cat_id=21&amp;Itemid=61</a> </p>

February 19 - Ian Sacs

BLOG POST

<p> Urban planning is an inherently knowledge-intensive activity. Even the most prosaic zoning change or development proposal can generate reams of memos, transcripts, minutes and notes. Planners routinely manage statistical and geographic data for research and analysis. In fact, this material proves so voluminous there is <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Planners-Use-Information-Hemalata-Dandekar/dp/1884829724/ref=tmm_pap_title_0">even a book</a> on how planners can collect, manage, and share information effectively. </p> <p> A comment I heard recently reminded me how often these systems can go awry. After calling a government agency to track down information about a program, my wife was told &quot;the person who knows about it&quot; wasn&#39;t in so she would have to call back. Is this common situation inevitable? The field of knowledge management argues it can be avoided through deliberate organizational strategies. Without them, individual employees hoard critical information and managers fear the impact of retirements or departures. For the disorganized organization, hiring new employees can also require a lengthy orientation process. When it comes to government organizations, these problems are not merely about organizational inefficiency. Disorganization can result in costly mistakes, legal trouble, and effect the ability for the public to access information in a timely way. </p> <p>

February 14 - Robert Goodspeed

FEATURE

What, as a society, do we share? Natural resources? Internet access? Public space? Jay Walljasper and the nonprofit On the Commons cross political boundaries to advocate for the common good and all that we share.

February 14 - Tim Halbur

BLOG POST

<p> My sense is that most new urbanists and smart growth advocates were happy to see Barack Obama elected President two years ago.  While John McCain opposed Amtrak and had not been overly supportive of local public transit, Obama created an Administration full of advocates for transit and urbanism, and high-speed rail is one of his Administration&#39;s signature programs.  So the Obama Administration will slow sprawl, and will make our cities more transit-oriented, prosperous and walkable.   Right?  </p>

February 13 - Michael Lewyn

FEATURE

Athens, Greece has all the elements of good urbanism - density, diversity, destinations, distance (to transit) and design. So is Athens a poster child for good urbanism? Fanis Grammenos takes an in-depth look.

February 10 - Fanis Grammenos

BLOG POST

<span style="border-collapse: separate; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; font-size: medium; font-family: Times; color: #000000" class="Apple-style-span"> <div style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 10px; background-color: #ffffff"> <p> To hear my mother tell it, I gave Joe Biden the idea for high-speed rail. Charitable and glowing, yes, but isn’t that what mothers are for?  </p> <p> All the same, I can’t help but glow a bit anyway when I think about how far we’ve come as a country in embracing high-speed rail.  </p>

February 9 - Jeffrey Barg

BLOG POST

<p> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Having read articles lately on Planetizen and elsewhere on how the &quot;fresh new concept” of Intelligent Cities is replacing the stale old term &quot;smart growth&quot;, I was moved to <a href="/node/47982" target="_blank">write a comment regarding the latest such article</a> </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'">which compared smart growth to urban renewal in terms of its stale-dated coolness, and suggested that smart growth may be passé because of its successful take-over of main-stream thought and practice.

February 8 - Brent Toderian

FEATURE

February 7 - Emily Laetz

BLOG POST

<p> In this lavishly produced, beautifully illustrated but somewhat self-edifying book, His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales argues that most of our global crises -- from climate change to poverty to our soulless built environments -- are owed to our disconnection from Nature (which he capitalizes).

February 3 - Michael Dudley

FEATURE

The Tea Party has it all wrong, writes Joel Mills. Urban planning is not a radical, elitist agenda, but the best example of local democracy available today.

January 31 - Joel Mills

FEATURE

Was Jane Jacobs a NIMBY? Did she despise density? These sort of reevaluations of Jacobs' legacy are hot at the moment. Roberta Brandes Gratz explains why the naysayers are off base.

January 24 - Roberta Brandes Gratz

FEATURE

In an excerpt from his new book, Bill Fulton suggests that it's time for America's cities to focus on prosperity, not population.

January 20 - Bill Fulton

BLOG POST

<p style="margin-top: 6pt" class="MsoNormal">I spent last week at the <a href="http://www.adb.org/">Asian Development Bank</a> (ADB) headquarters in Manila, in the Philippines, where we are starting on an exciting but humbling project: developing a more comprehensive framework for transport project evaluation. Among other factors, this project will develop better methods for incorporating <a href="http://www.vtpi.org/equity.pdf">social equity</a> impacts into transport planning. This is important in any community, and particularly in developing countries where many people are extremely poor. What transport policies and planning practices respond to their needs?</p>

January 17 - Todd Litman

BLOG POST

<p><span><span style="font-size: small"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">The internet has great potential as a means of professional marketing for many soon-to-be and recent graduates. Not everyone in planning, however, uses it well. The following tips aim to help you realize its potential and avoid its pitfalls.</span></span></span><span><span style="font-size: small; font-family: 'Times New Roman'"> </span></span> </p>

January 17 - Ann Forsyth