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.
Organization news
CNU members recently received a new publication in their mailboxes, the New Urban Post. This publication is being produced and paid for by The Town Paper, based in Gaithersburg, Maryland. The Post compiles e-mail discussions on...
The first townhouses and detached homes are now nearing completion in Coffee Creek Center, a 640-acre new urbanist project in Chesterton, Indiana. Also under construction are a 192-unit apartment building, a 120-room hotel, and a 50,000 sq.ft....
The City of Charlotte, North Carolina, and Mecklenburg County are entering into negotiations with the Palladium Company with regard to the firm’s proposal for a mixed-use development in Charlotte’s First Ward district. The plan by Elkus-Manfredi...
Urban designer suggests eight principles for revitalizing an urban port.
Building on the successful reinvigoration of its downtown riverfront, the City of Providence, Rhode Island, is pursuing a redevelopment of Narragansett Landing, a 650-acre...
Editor’s note. This is the first in a series of articles that will explore the economic realities behind new urbanist development projects.
West Bend Village in Bend,Oregon, was the first attempt at New Urbanism for developer Mike Tennant. The 22...
Alexander Cooper of Cooper Robertson & Partners, a New York firm that has designed many new urbanist (NU) communities, was hired by the World Trade Center leaseholder to plan reconstruction of the site.
Cooper was hired along with David Childs...
Hometown Neighborhoods, led by developer Joel Embry, is coordinating efforts to bring several new urbanist neighborhoods to Tallahassee, Florida. Embry represents the owners of a 7,000-acre tract of former plantation land within the city limits. The...
CNU’s street guidebook for California suggests steps toward better highways.
Across the United States, activists and engineers have been figuring out how to turn urban stretches of state highways into civic amenities. CNU is joining the discussion...
The Dallas branch of RTKL Associates has designed a mixed-use town center for The Woodlands, a 27,000-acre planned conventional community outside Houston. Since its establishment in the early 1970s, the Woodlands has grown to approximately 40,000...
A mixed-use, infill development is now under construction in the historic Viewmont neighborhood in Hickory, North Carolina. Viewmont Square will feature 36 Charleston-style townhouses and a retail building topped by two floors of condominiums. Other...
I. Past and Future
Category: public open space. Subcategory: plazas and squares.
Within a traditional urban fabric, public space has an identity; it exists as more than mere residue after the construction of buildings and roads....
Architect and town planner Leon Krier, the foremost European influence on the New Urbanism, weighs in on the future of growth in England.
Krier suggests that England needs to loosen its restrictive planning laws and should release several...