• CNU should engage with European urbanists

    For all its beautiful urbanism and high-quality transit, which America should emulate, Europe is behind the US in the understanding of charrettes, developers-as-town-founders, form-based coding, the Transect, and other new urban ideas.
    Members of the Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU) look to traditional European towns and cities for inspiration, enticed by their exemplary public spaces, and walkable mixed-use neighborhoods. The iconic drawing by Léon Krier, Res Publica / Res Economica , is legendary for its direct explanation...Read more

  • 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