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.
Speed humps are beginning to face resistance from motorists, The Christian Science Monitor reports. The flat-topped traffic-calming devices, less abrupt than speed bumps, generally succeed in forcing drivers to slow down – at least briefly. Four...
III. The court and courtyard
Category: semipublic space
The passage and the forecourt, discussed in earlier issues of the Technical Page, are movement spaces linking the public realm of the street with the semipublic realm of an interior entry...
Vehicular accidents overall declined 39 percent. Accidents resulting in injuries fell 76 percent. Accidents resulting in death or incapacitating injury plunged 90 percent.
The first 20 homes are under construction in The Preserve, a TND in Birmingham, Alabama. Located in a heavily developed suburban area within walking distance of two public schools, the 300-acre project is being developed by US Steel, one of the...
Future development patterns and standards in downtown Coral Gables, Florida, were the subject of a recent week-long charrette led by Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk and students of the University of Miami School of Architecture.
Following a $5.9-million renovation of a 1914 high school, residents are moving into The Lofts at Albuquerque High in New Mexico’s largest city. (see July/August 2001). Developed by Rob Dickson’s Paradigm & Company, The Lofts include 70 rental...
Bethesda Row, Federal Realty Investment Trust’s pedestrian-friendly redevelopment of part of downtown Bethesda, Maryland, continues to get rave reviews. “Delightful” was design critic Roger K. Lewis’s word for it recently in the Washington Post. The...
II. The forecourt Category: Semi-Public Space Subcategory: Courts The varieties of semi-public spaces must be differentiated from the family of wholly public spaces that includes the square (in its various sub-species), the plaza, and the...
Much of the current TOD is poorly designed; a report recommends a series of steps to meet smart growth goals.
The good news is that we’re mov-ing beyond the auto-oriented paradigm of the last half of the 20th Century, when commuter rail stations...
Gentlemen, start your jackhammers — the time for demolishing urban freeways is arriving.
On the last week in June, crews began breaking up pavement on the Park East Freeway just north of downtown Milwaukee — one of a number of North American urban...
Soon US pedestrians will have to share their limited sidewalk space with the Segway scooter. The Washington Post reports that four months after the much ballyhooed scooter was unveiled, 20 states have passed laws allowing its use on sidewalks....
A vote in the Dallas City Council has paved the way for the start of Victory, a $600-million, 20-acre, mixed-use development adjacent to the city’s central business district. The council agreed to reimburse the developers $43 million for the...