The Daily Source of Urban Planning News

Despite the dark cloud that the policies of new Mayor Rob Ford have brought to several of Toronto's promising transportation and redevelopment initiatives, Christopher Hume gives us 10 reasons to feel optimistic about the future of the city.

January 10 - Toronto Star

Energy efficiency has become as compelling as "the new granite countertop" for home sales and rentals.

January 10 - Urban Land

If California doesn't start work on high speed rail by September, 2011, it will lose $3 billion in funding. If California does start work without securing future funding, it could end up with a $6 billion track to nowhere.

January 10 - The Washington Post

Following highly publicized urban highway removal success stories like Boston's Big Dig and San Francisco's Embarcadero, Anthony Flint asks whether similar successes will be easy to duplicate.

January 10 - The Atlantic Cities

BLOG POST

<p> <span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Courier">Across the world, city-builders who understand the complex relationship between land-use, car infrastructure and road congestion, struggle to communicate it in a simple way that resonates with the public. It&#39;s now well-demonstrated in transportation demand management (TDM) research and practice that you can&#39;t build your way out of traffic congestion by building roads, and in fact the opposite is true - the more free-ways and car lanes you build, the more people drive and the more congestion and other negative results there are.

January 10 - Brent Toderian

Jerry Brown has proposed a huge governmental streamlining to make the state more efficient. But in the process he is proposing separating transportation and housing -- now housed in one agency -- and putting them in separate agencies.

January 10 - California Planning & Development Report

Architect Peter Calthorpe lays out a forceful argument for the lower costs and higher benefits of constructing high speed rail versus expanded highways to serve the state's growing population and economic development.

January 10 - San Francisco Chronicle

Writing on the topic of Los Angeles Times Architecture Critic Christopher Hawthorne's year-long series exploring the city through its literature, Nate Berg talks to the author about his critical touchstones and common themes.

January 10 - The Atlantic Cities

The Philadelphia Inquirer's architecture critic sets out to find the outer edge of the Philadelphia suburbs, and finds a "zombie subdivision."

January 9 - The Philadelphia Inquirer

A group of high technology firms, led by IBM and Cisco, are plunging into the city management business to offer super-efficient new-generation computerized information and control systems.

January 9 - Citistates Group

Indonesia's economy is growing but the crumbling infrastructure is costing residents.

January 9 - NPR

The Environmental Protection Agency is crowdsourcing a massive photo project to update a 40-year old agency project known as 'Documerica', which includes images of American environmental problems and everyday life.

January 9 - Network World

SF Park is an outstanding success when measured by 'ticket anxiety'; i.e. the new program allows motorists to reduce the likelihood of being ticketed by making payment easier and allowing for longer parking stays, thus avoiding a $55-65 citation.

January 9 - San Francisco Chronicle

FEATURE

January 9 - John I. Gilderbloom

Researchers look at the largely suburban South Bay area of Los Angeles to offer ways to retrofit auto-oriented suburbs for more pedestrian travel.

January 9 - Access

Cities and redevelopment agencies are pushing for legislation that give them a stay of execution. Meanwhile, cities are evaluating which projects will be impacted.

January 9 - California Planning & Development Report

Citigroup is being sued for knowingly overstating ridership and advertising revenue projections for the Las Vegas monorail while soliciting investors for the system.

January 9 - Nevada Journal

Because of the relative motions of Earth and Mars, the pioneering astronauts who touch down on the Red Planet will remain there for a year and a half. For this reason, NASA has already started experimenting with a habitat fit for life on Mars.

January 9 - Txchnologist

A new technology enables pedestrian behavior and flow to be monitored continuously using mobile phone technology. Its use in US and UK shopping centers has consumer rights activists worried.

January 9 - The Guardian

The year 2011 may be remembered by some as the year planners began fielding objections about smart growth from Tea Party supporters. Nathan Norris offers his four-step process for responding.

January 9 - PlaceShakers