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 next phase in CNU’s ongoing study of the nation’s obsolete shopping malls will help communities determine if local malls are ripe for revitalization and will propose policies for making redevelopment easier.
Amid growing national attention to...
The New Urbanism could reach Maine in the coming years. When Richard Remsen and Richard Aroneau proposed a new urbanist project in West Rockport 10 years ago, the recession shut down their plans. They now plan to revive Ingraham Corner, a 120-acre...
Los Angeles commuters can now see the first 750 apartment rise in the controversial Playa Vista project, but recent headlines have focused on developer Rob Maguire’s announcement that he has commissioned architect Frank Gehry to design at least four...
After the city has spurned several conventional project proposals, developers are now breaking ground on the first mixed-use development in the future town center.
The seeds were sown back in 1996, when the newly incorporated City of Wildwood,...
Among the developments that broke ground in 2001 are several high-density urban projects with the potential to become regional, in some cases national, models. In Midtown Atlanta, for example, new streets and other infrastructure are going in on the...
After World War II, the US launched massive housing and public works
programs to keep the nation’s economy from slipping back into a depression. Economically, the programs were a success. Urbanistically, they were a disaster.
Thousands of acres...
Partners for Livable Communities released The Livable City: Revitalizing Urban Communities. The report includes facts, profiles and best practices. Contact: www.livable.com.
The Planetizen website (www. planetizen.com) has named the all-time top 20 books on urban planning. The list is topped by The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs, followed by Lewis Mumford’s The City in History. Among the most...
Research at the University of Southern California finds that demographics and social change are brewing up tremendous demand for "dense, walkable neighborhoods."
Researchers at the University of Southern California have released a study that...
Coastal Living Magazine’s 2001 Idea House has opened in Habersham, a TND in Beaufort County, South Carolina.
Streetcars have returned to downtown Portland, Oregon, after an absence of 51 years. The line runs for 2.4 miles through some of the city’s densest neighborhoods. Developers have covered part of the $57 million cost of the streetcar in return for...
Suburbia is denser out West than it is in other parts of the country, according to a study by the Brookings Institution. Rolf Pendall, assistant professor at Cornell University and one of the study authors, reports that smaller lot sizes, larger...