• Dealing with a donkey's view of climate change

    Urbanists can contribute mightily to solving the climate problem—got any plans for the next few decades?
    The Congress for the New Urbanism held a Climate Summit in Alexandria, Virginia, early this month to brainstorm on solutions to climate change. The recent catastrophic hurricanes in Puerto Rico, Texas, and Florida—some link the heightened storm activity to climate change—makes the topic especially...Read more

  • What's right for the site: Analyzing the missing middle

    The options for missing middle housing on a small redevelopment site are many, so here's a process to decide what choices make sense. Part 1.
    Over the past several years, many clients have come to us wanting to explore Missing Middle Housing on two- to five-acre sites, which seem to be a “sweet spot” for Missing Middle application, especially for smaller developer/builders and for developers of sites within larger master plans. This...Read more
  • Seaside FL Town Center

    Time is urbanism

    Authentic urbanism, unlike large-scale architecture, is built out over time. Architectural critics make the mistake of assessing an urban project in its early years.
    Editor's note: This piece responds to Daniel Solomon’s essay , The Thirty Years’ War: New Urbanism and the Academy , published September 27, which critiques the concept of fabric and monument buildings that helps to organize the design of new urban neighborhoods like Seaside, Florida. The essay is...Read more

  • The death of New Urbanism is greatly exaggerated

    Restoring the human-scale to the modern built environment is a long-term task, key to human health and welfare, that has barely begun.
    A recent Governing Magazine piece was provocatively titled, "The 'New Urbanism' Movement Might be Dead." Taking that clickbait leads to a piece by respected urban planning essayist William Fulton that is mostly about the success of the New Urbanism. Thirty years ago, the idea of a return to city...Read more