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.
Evanston’s experience with downtown revitalization highlights a question that often arises in reviving commercial areas: Do chain retailers detract from local character?
Often local people erroneously think chain stores outnumber independent...
Leading architects discussed challenges to urbanism in Europe, and their solution, at the EuroCouncil’s inaugural meeting in Belgium.
“It’s time to move forward quickly to
change the world!” was Andres Duany’s proclamation at the April...
Congress for the New Urbanism celebrates exemplary urbanism.
Whether it’s a new block of Berlin, Germany, a regional plan for the San Francisco Bay Area, or a freeway demolition in Milwaukee, this year’s Charter Award winners have something in...
Mid-May saw the opening of a two-level, 80,000 sq.ft. urban-format Home Depot store in Chicago, among speculation that the Atlanta-based retailer is poised to introduce similar outlets in other cities, including two locations in Manhattan: 23rd...
The suburban community of Ladysmith, Virginia, has a newly adopted master plan designed by Duany Plater-Zyberk. The plan for the 550-acre property includes 150,000 square feet of commercial space and four neighborhoods totaling 2,850 units including...
An article in the April issue of the Washington Monthly challenged the conventional wisdom that suburbs are safer than cities. Author Philip J. Longman cited a University of Virginia study that confirmed the higher risk of homicide at the hands of a...
Correa Valle Valle (CVV), a new Urbanist firm in Coral Gables, Florida, won the First Government Land Development Competition for the Jing Wei Garden site in Shanghai, China. The 737-acre site is planned to be developed in the form of high density (...
The Saratoga Springs, New York, City Council unanimously adopted a zoning package May 20 that includes new gateway design overlay districts’ for prominent entrances to the city, and T-4, T-5, and T-6 zones, based on Andres Duany’s concept of the...
When Washington National Insurance vacated its home office in downtown Evanston in 1992, the city responded by establishing a tax-increment-finance (TIF) district to demolish its seven-story building and build the infrastructure for a new use. The...
Possible move of headquarters and proposed “democratization” of the organization stir debate.
The new executive director of the Congress for New Urbanism will probably be announced during the organization’s next annual conference, CNU XI, which...
The first “re-charrette” in New Urbanism’s 11-year history will take place just before CNU XI. Though it is not officially part of the CNU program, organizers with Duany Plater-Zyberk and Company assure us that all Congress participants are welcome...
Fairfax County government is wrestling with whether a proposed 60-acre development at Tysons Corner will transform that northern Virginia edge city into a human-scale center or just exacerbate its automobile dependence. Lerner Enterprises has...