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 Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, in collaboration with Northern Light Productions, has produced a documentary called Making Sense of Place — Phoenix: The Urban Desert. The 58-minute film explores the tensions caused by rapid growth and economic...
Zoning codes are like the DNA of the built environment – unseen but hugely influential in determining shape and function. As long as conventional, mid-20th century codes remain the law, as they do in most communities in the country, they effectively...
Taking advantage of a lull in development in Silicon Valley, the Greenbelt Alliance sponsored a plan that demonstrates an alternative to proposed sprawl in the 6,800-acre Coyote Valley. The plan, which preserves most of the land as farms and natural...
Fifty-two juniors in the Georgia Tech College of Architecture’s design studio got hands-on experience in new urban community design this semester by developing concepts for the town center of Serenbe, a 900-acre development in Palmetto, GA (New...
New urbanists in New England are hoping the University of Hartford will seize the opportunity to turn its fledgling architecture program into a much-needed center for urban design with a new urbanist bent. “That’s something I’ve been advocating to...
By Bob Regan; photos by Tim Fabian The Local History Company, 2004, 142 pp., paperback $21.95. Clambering over the hills above the Allegheny, Monongahela, and Ohio Rivers, Pittsburgh is one of the most up-and-down cities in North America. To...
Wal-Mart is proposing to build a 40,000 sq. ft. Neighborhood Market in Highlands Garden Village in Denver, the first such store in a new urban community. The proposal has stirred up controversy for developers Charles Perry and Jonathan Rose, who are...
On a 100-by-100-foot lot in Hoboken, New Jersey, stands a parking garage that’s only slightly taller than a four-story rowhouse, yet which holds 324 vehicles — more than three times the number that would fit into a conventional parking ramp of that...
With a $1.1-million, three-year challenge grant in hand, the University of Miami School of Architecture has set its sights on continuing the Knight Program in Community Building for three more years and on gaining new donors to support it. Charles C...
The Conservation Fund has issued a publication, Better Models for Commercial Development, subtitled Ideas for Improving the Design and Siting of Chain Stores and Franchises. The booklet “is designed to show how new commercial development can be made...
On any given day, more than half the non-drivers aged 65 and over stay home because their transportation choices are limited, says a new report from the Surface Transportation Policy Project (STPP). “Aging Americans: Stranded Without Options” warns...
Glenwood Park, the 28-acre new urban infill development of former Internet pioneer Charles Brewer, is scheduled to open in the fall of 2004 in Atlanta, Georgia. The project will include 425 homes, shops, and offices. Parkside Partners recently...