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.
An eminent book on architectural detailing, C. Howard Walker’s Theory of Mouldings, which first appeared in 1926, is being republished by W.W. Norton with a new foreword by architect Richard Sammons. The 160-page hardcover, available for $25, “looks...
The Planning and Zoning Commission of Mansfield, Connecticut, approved the plan for Storrs Center, a mixed-use town center being developed by LeylandAlliance in cooperation with Mansfield Downtown Partnership, a public entity. A special zoning...
The South Main development in Buena Vista, Colorado, is the first new urbanist project in the Rocky Mountains — and perhaps in the entire western US — to start selling Katrina Cottages. In August, South Main Development Inc. began offering four...
Nearly 35 percent of American children live within a mile of their school, but only half of those students regularly get to school on foot or on a bicycle, says a report in the July issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. The...
The transportation and land-use policies of Portland, Oregon, offer residents a “green dividend” of lower commute times and costs, according to Joe Cortright, an economist with Impresa Inc. and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Average...
After years of deliberations among representatives of CNU, the United States Green Building Council and the Natural Resources Defense Council, the LEED for Neighborhood Pilot has enrolled 238 projects – one of the strongest launches in the nearly 10...
Todd W. Mansfield, who oversaw the planning and initial development of Celebration, Florida, while president of the Walt Disney Company’s Celebration Company, has been named chairman of the Urban Land Institute (ULI).
Our coverage of transit-oriented development in the July-August issue contained an inaccurate figure on ridership of the Metro commuter rail system. Average daily ridership, including Saturday and Sunday, was 569,609 for the system, which serves the...
Vedanta, the largest new university in the world, will have a plan that draws from Indian spiritual traditions. On an expanse of flat rural land near the Bay of Bengal, earth-moving is to get under way this fall for an extraordinary institution....
Gulfport, Mississippi — a city with a new urban plan for redevelopment to recover from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina — is moving to hire Memphis developer Henry Turley “as the city’s design consultant to guide citywide rebuilding in an effort...
Lenexa City Center, a 203-acre new urban center of a suburban community near Kansas City in Kansas, is making tremendous progress — despite the slowdown in the real estate market. Building permits have been issued for two mixed-use buildings...
The US Green Building Council launched its Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for Neighborhood Development (LEED-ND) pilot program, created with CNU and the Natural Resources Defense Council, in July. Approximately 250 projects registered...