Archives
Welcome to the archives of Better Cities & Towns, a publication founded by Robert Steuteville as New Urban News in 1996. This archive holds two decades of the best news and analysis on compact, mixed-use growth and development, from 1996 to 2015.
The redevelopment of an Old Sawmill District into a neighborhood has received approval from the City of Missoula, Montana. The 46-acre site will provide housing, common areas, commercial uses, and access to the existing riverfront trail and park...
A New York Times article of February 27 comments on the revival of Downcity Providence, Rhode Island, in the last decade. The article gives substantial credit to new urbanist Buff Chace, a developer who has restored eight buildings at a cost of $80...
Tax subsidies that would help General Growth Properties redevelop the obsolete Cottonwood Mall in Holladay, Utah, into a 57-acre town center won endorsements recently from the local and county governments and school district. The Salt Lake Tribune...
The current woes of the housing market and subprime mortgages are only the beginning of troubles for suburbia, according to an article in The Atlantic by Christopher Leinberger, a developer, visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution, and...
The federal Joint Housing Solutions Group announced in late February that it will evaluate “Gulf Coast-type cottages with front porches” for possible use as disaster housing. Ann Daigle, a new urbanist planner who has been involved in housing...
By late this summer, residents will move into the first of 317 apartments in Voorhees Town Center in southern New Jersey. By next January, the first of 108 condominium units should come onto the market. Accompanying the housing will be 195,000...
Developer Robert Shaw, the former CEO of Columbus Realty Trust who was instrumental in the Uptown District renaissance in Dallas, now plans to build 800 units in Frisco Square in Frisco, Texas. Frisco Square is a 140-acre new urban town center...
After a 17-year struggle, development is underway in New Amherst in Cobourg, Ontario. The new urban community was designed by Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company and is under development by Max LeMarchant and partners. The long saga is recounted by...
Evening Rose Town Center broke ground in Talahassee in February, combining new urban design with sustainable building practices. The 120,000-square-foot Town Center is being building adjacent to the 132-unit Evening Rose residential community, both...
Taking place in Austin, Texas, during the first week in April, the Congress offers the best in planning and development of walkable neighborhoods.
As conventional development models falter — their stripped-down, single-use formulas proving...
Smart Growth BC, based in British Columbia, is developing a walkability index that the organization hopes municipalities throughout Canada will be interested in using. Cheeying Ho, executive director of Smart Growth BC, said the walkability index...
Torti Gallas tells how it incorporated sustainability traits into its projects.“Is New Urbanism inherently sustainable? Only partly,” says Tom Gallas, partner and chief business strategist at Torti Gallas and Partners. That’s why the Silver Spring,...