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.
Of all the ways of developing land that prevail today in America, the housing pod is probably the most pervasive. The unintended consequence of a post-World War II policy of mass housing production on “efficient” cleared sites is this: the American...
Thirteen houses in Beall’s Hill in Macon, Georgia, have received facelifts to show developers what the neighborhood, which has an ambitious new urban redevelopment plan, can become. About $600,000 has been allocated for public improvements in the...
Kennecott Land’s Daybreak, in South Jordan, Utah, is off to a strong start. More than 200 houses were sold in its first six months, Kort Utley of Kennecott Land told New Urban News. The 4,200-acre project, planned by Calthorpe Associates, opened in...
Anumber of northern cities are known for weather-enclosed pedestrian bridges that allow people to circulate through downtown without venturing into the bitter cold. But after three decades of developing an extensive downtown “skyway” system, St....
Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co. has settled on a gradation of tree-planting for various parts of the Transect. In rural sectors of the Transect, T1-T3, “the plantings should be informally grouped (clustered), and can include various tree types and...
Andres Duany of Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company was the only new urbanist to make Builder magazine’s list of 50 top industry power brokers. Duany was ranked number five, behind only Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, Fannie Mae Chairman...
An organization called “The Students for the New Urbanism at the University of Miami” (SNU Miami) has been formed, with Juan Muller [should be “Mullerat”] as president. The group expects to produce a publication that will be distributed in January...
The Atlanta Regional Commission has allocated $252 million of mainly federal funds toward establishment of a transit line and a linear park on existing railroad rights-of-way that ring Atlanta’s downtown, Midtown, and intown neighborhoods. The...
Leaders in San Jose, California, have begun what could be a momentous overhaul of development policies governing more than a third of the land in the 926,000-population city. The city’s plans could add 70,000 units of housing and increase the city’s...
Two CNU Task Forces have new co-chairs. Lucy Rowland will co-chair the Educators Task Force, and Kevin Hardman will co-chair the Downtown/Infill Task Force. Head of science collections and research facilities at the University of Georgia Libraries,...
A Leon Krier tower, depicted below, is planned to stand at the center of Seaside, Florida. Significant parts of the town center are being redesigned by architect Daniel Parolek of Opticos Design. Look for an article in the March issue of New Urban...
Attorneys Doris Goldstein of Jacksonville and Dan Slone of Richmond — with David B. Wolfe, an old hand at community association management — are involved in a new initiative aimed at improving the workings of homeowners’ associations (HOAs). “Most...