• How a Manhattan park pioneered Main Street placemaking

    Learning from Bryant Park: Revitalizing Cities, Towns, and Public Spaces, is an entertaining and important book for urbanists across America.
    It may be hard to believe now, but several decades ago Bryant Park in Midtown Manhattan was a dangerous place. It was dubbed “needle park” for the drug dealers and their customers who occupied it. Surrounding office towers were plagued by vacancy. After a four-year renovation by the Bryant Park...Read more

  • Former high school becomes entrepreneurial center

    Bok converted an abandoned vocational high school into a beehive of affordable workspace and community activity in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The project won a 2020 CNU Charter Award in the Block, Street, and Building category for Scout LTD.
    The magnificent art deco Bok, where Philadelphia high-school students learned a wide variety of trades for nearly eight decades, was a “maker-space” of its time. The former citywide vocational high school was closed in 2013 and sat vacant for two years until Scout LTD purchased the property with a...Read more

  • Shelter-at-home may transform office parks, downtowns, commutes, and cultures

    A shift to at-home/remote office work might reduce demand for office space—and simultaneously cut commuting and carbon emissions and promote mixed-use urban places.
    Traffic has reduced dramatically during the shelter-at-home period, resulting in reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. Streets in local neighborhoods are alive with people walking, running, and biking to get fit—and merely to travel short distances within their neighborhoods now that they have...Read more

  • Millions of small businesses at risk from COVID-19 crisis

    A shocking number of American small businesses, employing tens of millions of people, are at imminent risk of permanent closure if the crisis continues much longer, according to a survey of Main Street America.
    Nearly 7.5 million American small businesses are at risk of closing permanently if the coronavirus crisis lasts for five months, and 3.5 million are at risk of closure in 1-2 months, according to a nationwide survey of Main Street America (MSA). More than 5,850 small business owners responded to...Read more