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 new CNU tradition of presenting Athena Awards to pioneers who have laid the foundation for New Urbanism will continue at CNU XV in Philadelphia with cast-bronze medals going to Robert A.M. Stern, Denise Scott Brown, and Jonathan Barnett. The...
The 2007 Charter Award winners, listed in the table below and to be presented at CNU in Philadelphia in May, include four designs promoting Gulf-Coast recovery. They include:• Two projects that advance the promise of modest Katrina Cottages in...
“It’s wonderful to see kids in the town center,” town landscape architect Rip Weaver says of the Mt Laurel development in Shelby County, Alabama. Schoolchildren and their parents are among those breathing life into center’s several blocks, which...
The 2007 Downtown Specific Plan of Ventura, California, which calls for reconnecting the downtown to the beach and for managing parking better, won approval March 19 from the City Council. Five years in the making, the plan calls for adding more...
The City of New Orleans is poised to invest at least $1.2 billion in reconstruction, possibly beginning as early as this April, recovery chief Edward Blakely announced March 23. “By September, we want to see cranes on the skyline,” Blakely said. The...
The City of Livermore, California approved Livermore Village, a 5.5-acre mixed-use catalyst project in their downtown. Opticos Design designed the plan and architecture in association with Thomas Dolan Architecture for Anderson Pacific, LLC.
The...
A number of recent books have come out that are of interest to new urbanists, including Till We Have Built Jerusalem: Architecture, Urbanism, and the Sacred, published by ISI Books and authored by Philip Bess, professor and director of graduate...
Redevelopment of Naval center in San Diego is successful as a walkable neighborhood but a media report shows it generates no anticipated profits for the city. Developer cites increased tax revenues.��
Buff Chace and Douglas Storrs have won permission to construct two residential neighborhoods that they have long wanted to build adjoining their Mashpee Commons town center on Cape Cod. Over the next seven years, the developers will build 382 units...
A 54-acre expansion of the downtown of Savannah, Georgia, extends the historic city’s connection to the Savannah River. The plan for Savannah River Landing, initiated by the city, includes a series of squares based on the city’s famous Oglethorpe...
The image to the right accompanied a March book review of Australian New Urbanism, and originally appeared in that book. Contrary to the caption in March, the authors never said the approach at the left is the “Australian ideal,” although it is well...
Jeff Speck will step down in May as director of design at the National Endowment for the Arts and return to private practice as a city planner. “I signed up for two years and ended up staying for four,” Speck said, expressing satisfaction with...