Cities

Family-Friendly Downtown Living
What helps make a downtown family friendly? Safe places to play, safe streets, good schools and attainable housing, writes Jennifer Hill.
Report Finds Surging City Center Job Growth
For half a century, suburbs surpassed city centers in population and job growth. These economic and demographic trends appear to be reversing. America's cities have grown faster than outlying areas and new research that jobs are coming with them.
How Defensive Fortifications Shaped Cities
A post on Gizmodo traces the long and evolving history of defensive fortifications and how they influenced how cities were built and how people lived.

Top Planning Trends – 2014
A deeper look at the traffic data on Planetizen reveals trends from the planning and urban design conversation of 2014.

Is Mismanagement the Cause of Legacy Cities' Decline?
One common argument against attempts to control sprawl near declining cities is that the problem is the fault of mismanaged city government.
The Unique 'Fingerprints' of 131 Cities
An article on big think examines a project to find the unique qualities of urban street grids as an exercise in the potential of Big Data.

Top 10 Books - 2015
Planetizen is pleased to release its list of the ten best books in urban planning, design, and development published in 2014.

Interview: Edward Glaeser Makes the Case for Cities
In a lengthy discussion shared by Marquette University, author and Harvard Economics Professor Ed Glaeser lays out the thinking behind his book "Triumph of the City," as exemplified by cities around the country and the world.
Pew Study: U.S. Cities Still Recovering from Recession
A new Pew Charitable Trusts report discusses the ongoing recovery of American cities from the 2008 Great Recession, more than five years after it officially ended.
Employment Growth in Large, Dense Cities Paces Recovery
A study from the Oregon Office of Economic Analysis finds evidence that large, dense metropolitan areas have experienced the most complete recovery following the Great Recession.
More than 60 Percent of B Corps Located in Cities—What's Their Impact?
B Labs, the nonprofit that oversees and assesses B Corps, reports that, compared to other sustainable businesses, B Corps are 68 percent more likely to donate at least 10 percent of their profits to charity.

A Planner's Guide to Chicago
Pete Saunders, blogger with the Corner Side Yard and professional planning consultant, wrote a post explaining Chicago for the U.K. publication Guardian Cities.
Decline or Dispersal? Standardizing the Size of American Cities
Ben Schulman and Xiaoran Li lead an interesting thought experiment about the populations of cities around the country. That is, what would happen to the population of American cities if all their sizes were standardized?

6 'Epic Architecture Fails'
Jason Fargo follows the announcement that the FBI will soon set up shop outside of the infamous and despised J Edgar Hoover Building in Washington D.C. by listing six buildings that residents of cities "love to hate."

Survey Says: What Makes a City Great?
The results of a survey commissioned by Sasaki Associates reveal key insights into what makes cities great for those who love them, as well as where planners and urban designers should focus their efforts in improving the urban experience.

Transit, Density, and Congestion
The most transit-oriented metro areas often have lower levels of traffic congestion than one might expect based on their size.

Is it a Suburban Exodus Yet?
A new report finds that suburban areas are losing residents to urban areas like New York City and Washington D.C., even well past the point when people would have traditionally made the choice to return to the suburbs.
How Cities Prohibit Annoyances
The 5,000 local ordinances that prohibit “annoyances” often focus on the fraught intersections of the public and private. And it’s probably no surprise that public employees often seek legal protections from annoying (or annoyed) citizens.

Which Cities Segregate Poverty Most Completely?
For the second installment in a five-part series on economic segregation in U.S. metros, Richard Florida examines the cities where poverty stays most hidden from "everyone else."
A Call for Urban Infrastructure Investments
A recent article laments the missed opportunity of President Obama’s recent calls for increased spending on infrastructure: a lack of acknowledgement that cities are the best places to spend those dollars.
Pagination
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.
City of Albany
UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies
Mpact (formerly Rail~Volution)
Chaddick Institute at DePaul University
City of Piedmont, CA
Great Falls Development Authority, Inc.
HUDs Office of Policy Development and Research