• Jane Jacobs would be fighting to preserve affordable housing

    Note: This article was written as a speech to the first annual Jane Jacobs Award at Met Council Housing. Jane Jacobs wrote 12 wide-ranging, brilliant books. In them she wove together ideas about cities, city life, politics, economics, and social and cultural issues, so it’s hard to succinctly...Read more

  • 2016: CNU Year in Review

    After all the twists and turns and unexpected events of 2016, I’m ending this year the exact same way I started it: full of hope and gratitude.
    After all the twists and turns and unexpected events of 2016, I’m ending this year the exact same way I started it: full of hope and gratitude. The constant work and passion of CNU staff, our amazing members, and the New Urbanist movement continue to inspire me. Today, I want to share some...Read more

  • Streets are social and economic engines, not just car routes

    The transportation engineering toolbox is missing key tools when it comes to traditional cities, towns, and neighborhoods.
    Streets serve vital economic and social functions. Only in the 20th Century did the designers of streets place priority on the movement of motor vehicles—often to the exclusion of economic and social purposes of thoroughfares. Engineers will tell you exactly how many cars and trucks are expected to...Read more

  • Spokane can avoid a big mistake

    There is no compelling reason to build a five-mile freeway through the east side of the city, according to engineer Ian Lockwood. A boulevard would do the job better.
    DOT released its Every Place Counts Design Challenge report yesterday, based on workshops in Spokane, Nashville, Philadelphia, and Minneapolis-St. Paul last summer. CNU helped organize those workshops, set up to explore mitigation of Interstate highways that have historically damaged minority and...Read more