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.
By Robert W. Burchell, Anthony Downs, Barbara McCann, and Sahan MukherjiDevelopment Island Press, 2005, 197 pp., paperback $24.95.The newest authoritative study of the costs of sprawl is quite circumspect.
he Neopolis Group LLC won approval in December to build a $325 million town center on approximately 140 acres in Flowood, Mississippi, and the company now is looking to construct a 110-acre traditional neighborhood development (TND) on adjacent land...
A Dec. 9 New York Times article, “Seaside at 25: Troubles in Paradise,” reported that the famous Florida development is trying to repair its eroded beachfront. Some of the protective dunes were washed away, along with the beaches’ white sand, by...
Madison, Wisconsin, appears to be on the verge of adopting a comprehensive plan that reverses the trend toward sprawl and instead encourages denser development. Some future projects would fill parking lots or replace single-story shopping centers....
Nora Beck joined the staff of CNU in December 2005 to lend executive support to John Norquist and assistance to CNU’s planning, policy, and design initiatives. While completing her graduate degree in urban planning at the University of Michigan (MUP...
The Orton Family Foundation has launched Scenarios, a semi-annual e-journal that will focus on “local place.” Each issue will highlight a planning theme or idea related to place. The journal is on the web at www.orton.org/scenarios.
The Centre City Development Corporation of San Diego recently hired Nancy Graham, developer and former mayor of West Palm Beach, Florida, as president and chief operating officer. Graham won acclaim for the revitalization of West Palm Beach she...
Two large-scale traditional neighbor-
hood developments (TNDs) are moving forward near the Gulf Coast in Mississippi, taking advantage of a high demand for housing in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The first of their kind in the region, the TNDs...
The Trust for Sustainable Development has started con-
structing an 8,000-acre resort community in Baja California that features advanced environmental techniques and New Urbanism. Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co. planned the Mexican development,...
The huge Mesa del Sol development in Albuquerque may soon start its first building project, a 90,000 sq. ft. light industrial and office building for the photovoltaic cell manufacturer Advent Solar, which hopes to employ 1,000 people there by 2010....
A new Sierra Club report, “Building Better: A Guide to America’s Best New Development Projects,” profiles a dozen projects across the country, most of them featuring many traits associated with New Urbanism. Among them are the Southside neighborhood...
Leyland Alliance, a Warwick, New York-based developer, has established an affiliate organization called Live Work Learn Play LLP, which will focus on establishing shopping, dining, hospitality, and other commercial components in neighborhood and...