Public Spaces
Highway Teardowns Benefitting Traffic Flow and City Life
The Infrastructurist offers four case studies of cities that have removed highways. The result: less congestion.
Good Parks Good for Urban Economies
Anne Schwartz compiles recent studies on the economic value of parks, describing how an investment in parks by the city will result in a healthier urban economy.
Public Places More Necessary In Bad Economy
Jay Walljasper argues that the need for accessible, vibrant public space grows along with the bad times.
Designing A Virtual Public Square
When Sony was preparing to build a virtual meeting space for Playstation 3 users, they took the unusual step of hiring a real-world architect, Kenji Ikemoto.
Mumbai After Terrorist Attacks
As Mumbai recovers from the recent terrorist attacks, social worker Katia Savchuk reflects on how cities can be resilient to terrorism.
SF's Election Night Revelation
Relative to those in Chicago's Grant Park or New York's Time Square, post-election celebration turnouts in San Francisco public spaces were sparse. But it's not because of urban design--it's the city's character.
Vancouver Seeks Identity Through Public Square
A contest sponsored by the Vancouver Public Space Network asks the public to find Vancouver's heart, a civic square that best defines the city. Sean Ruthen ponders the city's relationships to the each its primary squares now.
The Homeless in Public Spaces
Robert Sibley comments on the worldwide problem of homeless people in public spaces, and reflects on how Canadians can and should manage them.
Humanizing Spaces
That's how landscape architect Edward L. Daugherty sees his job. “I think if there is a thread in my work, it’s to help people use the space that is available,” he says in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution as a retrospective of his work opens.
Will Praise Mean Anything for Central Park?
New York's Central Park was recently named to the APA's list of the country's 10 best public spaces. Sewell Chan wonders if the designation will really mean anything new for the park.
Forget Everything You've Learned
Bill Thompson of the ASLA reports on a public space in Silver Spring, Maryland that upends everything landscape architects and planners think they know about what makes a successful public space.
U.K. Planners Failing to Account for Women
A new study shows that city planners aren't following the guidelines established in last year's Gender Equality Duty, which requires planners to consider the different ways that women use public space.
Treechitecture
Civic amenities, public spaces, and even housing could one day be formed by living trees. Researchers are looking into this new idea.
Group Says Public Drinking Ban Violates Public Space
Calling it a violation of public spaces, a new report from a civil liberties group in the UK has criticized the banning of public drinking in more than 600 places in England and Wales.
Public Space, Brought To You By Budweiser
A Montreal business group sold sponsorship rights to Budweiser for an outdoor event on a closed street, but restauranteurs setting up outside think the deal goes too far as they are forced to sell the watery beer to their patrons.
New Museum Restores Milwaukee Streets. Oh, and There's Motorcycles.
The new Harley-Davidson Museum recently opened it's doors to the public, and the architecture firm Pentagram designed both the enormous exhibit space and the outdoor public spaces that connect the museum to the grid.
Curbside Dining
In the summer, a handful of New Yorkers like Calvin Tsao remake public space into their own personal dining rooms.
Should Store Owners Be Allowed to Repel Teenagers?
Stores in Vancouver suburbs have installed a device outside their stores called a 'Mosquito' that emits a high-pitched frequency that the average adult can't hear. The device is effective in decreasing vandalism, but at what cost to public space?
Astor Place Slated for Improvement
New York's DOT is proposing a new plan to transform Astor Place from feeling like a freeway median to a pedestrian-friendly public space.
Cuckoo Clock Comes To City Square
A Dallas suburb considers whether to change its sign regulations to allow a massive cuckoo clock in a public space. European cities often have them, but American cities rarely do.
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
