• Addressing the urban design issues of our time

    Jury chair for the 2026 Charter Awards Eric Kronberg is looking for new urban projects that address issues like attainability, mobility flexibility, climate change, and human flourishing in general.
    Note: I sat down with 2026 Charter Awards Jury Chair Eric Kronberg to discuss his New Urbanist background and experience with CNU’s Charter Awards. The conversation has been edited for clarity. Learn more about the 2026 Charter Awards application here . Eric Kronberg came to New Urbanism slowly and...Read more

  • How art launched New Urbanism, changing planning history

    The Art of the New Urbanism is more than a beautiful book—it tells the story of an urban planning movement through the lens of its drawing skills.
    When the New Urbanism began thirty-some years ago, its practitioners faced a steep uphill battle. Zoning codes across the US made it illegal to build walkable places (more so than today). The real estate finance system was heavily weighted towards single-use, suburban development. Traffic engineers...Read more

  • The power of an imaginative illustration

    Three decades ago, a man with a pen proposed a park in downtown Providence, showing that artists can be powerful planners.
    DPZ CoDesign conducted a charrette in downtown Providence , Rhode Island, in 1992, sponsored by the City and the Coalition for Community Development. The talented artist Charles Barrett, who passed away in 1996, worked for DPZ. As described in the recently published The Art of the New Urbanism (...Read more

  • Leon Krier’s checklist

    The late architect and urban theorist wrote a to-do list for city founders, mayors, administrators, designers, settlers, and landowners.
    Leon Krier, who died last week , had definite ideas about city design and its details, large and small. Reprinted below is Krier’s checklist for community design and implementation, written for the Prince’s Foundation (now the King’s Foundation) in 2020. The publication Walkability and Mixed-Use:...Read more