• Watertown plans main square transformation

    A proposal could add thousands of housing units to the City center, while making it more walkable and sociable.
    The heart of Watertown, Massachusetts, located between Boston and the car-oriented suburbs, has long been blighted by cut-through traffic. The historic public space of Watertown Square, near the Charles River, is bounded by five lanes of heavily trafficked asphalt on two sides. Consequently, the...Read more

  • Learning from tradition in Charleston

    The room filled with the murmur of nervous conversations and new friendships forming. Seventeen students, strangers only minutes before, gathered for our first Summer Studio. To begin, we asked each student to stand along a line across the room marking where they grew up, from "rural community" to...Read more

  • Addressing the urban design issues of our time

    Jury chair for the 2026 Charter Awards Eric Kronberg is looking for new urban projects that address issues like attainability, mobility flexibility, climate change, and human flourishing in general.
    Note: I sat down with 2026 Charter Awards Jury Chair Eric Kronberg to discuss his New Urbanist background and experience with CNU’s Charter Awards. The conversation has been edited for clarity. Learn more about the 2026 Charter Awards application here . Eric Kronberg came to New Urbanism slowly and...Read more

  • How art launched New Urbanism, changing planning history

    The Art of the New Urbanism is more than a beautiful book—it tells the story of an urban planning movement through the lens of its drawing skills.
    When the New Urbanism began thirty-some years ago, its practitioners faced a steep uphill battle. Zoning codes across the US made it illegal to build walkable places (more so than today). The real estate finance system was heavily weighted towards single-use, suburban development. Traffic engineers...Read more