• The beauty of small towns

    Galena, Illinois, is often pictured when urbanists want to show the ideal American main street. It was also listed as number 35 in a recent Architectural Digest report on 50 Most Beautiful Small Towns in America . While this list is subjective, it does highlight the treasure of America’s small...Read more

  • Why new urbanists generated great ideas

    A multidisciplinary group with potential influence on and understanding of the built environment, new urbanists were uniquely positioned to push back effectively against the status quo.
    The late urban planner Hank Dittmar writes that he “perceived a dissonance between what [he] saw and liked in cities and landscape and what was being taught in school.” Everything that Dittmar loved about cities—mixed-use, walkability, fine-grain diversity of buildings, the network of small blocks...Read more

  • How Pink Zones can help small-scale projects

    A Pink Zone, an idea of the Project for Lean Urbanism, is an area of lightened red tape for small-scale projects. Pink Zones are designed to allow individuals with little capital to take action.
    The modern regulatory system shuts people out who don’t have the capital to hire development attorneys, engineers, and/or architects to navigate the difficult processes, according to Brian Falk, who directs the Project for Lean Urbanism . One answer is Pink Zones, areas of lightened red tape for...Read more

  • Opportunity for urbanists to help cities and towns

    Opportunity Zones, a massive new nationwide community development program, will benefit from the work of urban planning thought leaders.
    Urbanists should pay close attention to the recently created Opportunity Zones, which the Rockefeller Foundation says "have the potential to become the largest community development program in our nation’s history." Governing magazine says they represent a "breakthrough approach to community...Read more