Built Environment
Gainesville Turns Abandoned Industrial Hub Into Innovative Park
Gainesville turns contaminated land into a contemporary public greenspace to serve as the city's “Central Park."
When Architects Design Video Games
Not long ago, Deanna Van Buren was offered the position of lead architect on an unusual project—a video game called "The Witness."
A Missing Conversation: Medical Centers and the Built Environment
Hospitals, medical research centers, and the like are supposed to represent health, but are often an unappealing and monolithic presence in the urban landscape. How can the form of health centers fall in line with their function?
How Cities Are Responding to Rising Commercial Rents
A new report examines how high rents are shuttering businesses and stunting entrepreneurship, exploring six strategies used by cities to create an affordable built environment, where local businesses can thrive.
On the 50-Year Legacy of the New York City Landmarks Law
This past April, the Landmarks Law turned 50. Its legacy and impact has been inconsequential for shaping the urban environment.
A Critique of the Built Environment: How We Built Unhappiness
One writer's view of the modern city goes negative. If our environment affects our happiness, surely we're all suffering from depression.
How the Internet of Things Helps to Bridge the Digital Divide
Internet access and digital skills unlock the Internet of Things (IoT). Applications such as telecommuting, virtual meetings, app-enabled public transport, smart cars, and smart logistics can curb emissions and create sustainable growth.
Landscape Architecture Unites Impact and Design
In a field that seems divided between aesthetes and the activists, landscape architects may be closest to reconciling the two trends.
Why We're Not Meant to Live in Boring Cities
Features like blank street facades literally turn us off, decreasing mental stimulation and bringing on restlessness and stress. Research points to worrying consequences for people who find their city, well, boring.
Why Architects and Planners Need to Become Better Politicians
Well designed environments assist our economy, wellbeing and happiness, says Sarah Wigglesworth. Yet money equals power in controlling the shape of built environment. She asserts that designers must act as leaders rather than slaves to their clients.
Architecture on the Brain
Emily Badger examines the intersection of neuroscience and architecture, an emerging area of study that promises to produce environments that support and enhance our brain function.
The Glass Godzilla in the City
The Museum Tower in Dallas, a giant glass condominium, rears its ugly head as it reflects glaring light onto the site it was named after.
The Paradox of the Motor City
Spencer Fleury looks into the contradictory nature of his hometown Detroit; as the city commonly praised for its car culture is now being crushed by it.
Infrastructure Investment is the Answer to Recovery
New report out of Dartmouth College says America needs to build, to boost recovery and improve global competitiveness.
Walkability Makes You Healthier and Wealthier
Conrad deFiebre sums up the benefits of living in a walkable neighborhood, from improved health to improved wealth, both via higher property values and less of hard-earned dollars paid out to oil and car companies.
The Future, Interactive Built Environment
Filmmaker Keiichi Matsuda imagines a future where augmented reality is everywhere, blanketing the built environment with advertising and interactive elements.
Fighting Obesity With Traffic Calming
The latest news in the impact of the built environment on health: A new study says that children who live within 150 meters of congested roads have higher body mass indexes than kids that do not.
Building a City of Healthy People
This piece from Next American City looks at health in New York City, and why the city's new health commissioner is looking at elevators, escalators and other subtleties of the built environment.
Cities in Constant Flux
While cities may seem permanent, a group called Architecture 2030 claims that a majority of the buildings in cities today will be rebuilt by the year 2035.
Change the Built Environment, Make the World Better
This essay from Places offers five simple ways to make the world a better place -- and they're all related to the built environment.
Urban Design for Planners 1: Software Tools
This six-course series explores essential urban design concepts using open source software and equips planners with the tools they need to participate fully in the urban design process.
Planning for Universal Design
Learn the tools for implementing Universal Design in planning regulations.
Caltrans
Smith Gee Studio
Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS)
City of Grandview
Harvard GSD Executive Education
Toledo-Lucas County Plan Commissions
Salt Lake City
NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service
