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.
Fourteen states have enacted visitability legislation, and at least 24 cities have modified their building codes to make new houses accessible to disabled visitors, the American Planning Association newsletter Zoning Practice reported in an April...
Keith Covington has launched Third Coast Design Studio, a Nashville-based planning, urban design, and architecture practice. Covington formerly directed the Nashville Planning Department’s Design Studio.
New urbanists are working to establish a design and development center in Mississippi that would help the state’s Gulf Coast communities rebuild wisely.
The center’s focus would be on “helping communities work with the development industry to...
Dhiru Thadani, a Washington, DC, architect and member of the CNU board, will lead the planning for what is probably the biggest educational project on the planet — the building of a brand-new university in India for 100,000 students. Thadani, a...
Well over 200 homes are built or under construction in Norton Commons, a traditional neighborhood development outside of Louisville, Kentucky. The town center for the project is also under construction, with four live-work units, and three mixed-use...
Well-executed new urban projects often spawn other projects nearby, and a new example of this tendency is in Birmingham, Alabama. Chimney Rock, a town designed in July and on a fast track for development, is located down the road from Mt Laurel, a...
A mixed-use infill project broke ground in Providence, Rhode Island, designed by new urbanist Donald Powers. Two buildings on a vacant lot on Douglas Avenue will include a total of 13 residential units above 5,500 square feet of retail. The...
Fairfax County, Virginia, has issued a request for proposals for redesigning one of the nation’s most famous, or notorious, edge cities — Tysons Corner. The consultant selected by the county would help a business-civic group known as the Tysons Task...
Brent Toderian, who has worked with new urbanist projects as a planner for the City of Calgary, has moved to Vancouver to take the Director of Planning position. As the Vancouver Globe and Mail reports, he will be taking over from the city’s “...
Proposals for planting rows of trees along the roads — a traditional technique for shaping pleasing public spaces — are often opposed by transportation engineers, who contend that a wide travel corridor, free of obstacles, is needed to protect the...
Public workshops lead toward a statewide vision of the future, while 15 teams work on planning New Orleans.
Andres Duany hopes to help revive the art of village-building in Scotland. Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co. has been commissioned by Moray Estates Development Company to help plan a new Highland community containing about 5,000 houses, along with shops...