• Urban exodus and new urban reunion

    In the early 1980s, a young architect, Dhiru Thadani, saw a lecture by another young architect, Andres Duany, who was designing a new town called Seaside with his wife and partner, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk. Duany explained how the elements of cities decanted, one at a time, to the suburbs in the...Read more

  • Hierarchy of centers for the 15-minute city

    I recently spoke on a panel discussing the 15-minute city, and the cool graphic above was presented showing a hierarchy of mixed-use centers throughout the City of Portland, Oregon. This kind of analysis would help many cities plan to achieve an urban environment where owning an automobile is...Read more

  • What if the Empire State Building met typical parking requirements?

    Under typical office parking requirements of a conservative 3 spaces per 1,000 square feet of floor area, it would require 56 acres or 15 New York City blocks to serve the Empire State Building if the parking were provided in surface lots. Completed in 1931, in the pre-parking urbanism era, the...Read more

  • Three zoning reforms for compact housing

    A beautifully illustrated article on the Placemakers website offers ideas on compact living, based on case studies of “missing middle” housing types in a village in Wales. Author Susan Henderson, an urban designer and coding expert who is based in New Mexico, relates lessons learned to housing...Read more