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.
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...
Supervisors in Fairfax County, Virginia, approved changes in the master plan to allow higher density development around proposed commuter rail stations along a proposed Metro line to Dulles Airport, according to the Washington Post.
Plans for revitalization of the District of Columbia’s Anacostia River waterfront are now on their way to being implemented. Lead consultants Hamilton, Rabinovitz & Alschuler and Wallace, Roberts & Todd will collaborate with seven other...
President Bush has nominated Emil Frankel for the position of Assistant Secretary of Transportation for Transportation Policy. Frankel currently serves on the board of directors of the Surface Transportation Policy Project (STPP) and is an advisor...
A new urbanist plan unites public officials, citizens, and developers over a contentious transit-oriented project in the San Francisco Bay area.
The extensive surface parking around the transit station in Pleasant Hill, California, has been the...
The nation’s fastest-growing suburban centers also provide opportunities for new urbanist development.
The populations of Irving and Plano, both suburbs of Dallas, have grown by 7,211 percent and 5,909 percent respectively since census figures...
A bipartisan group of US Representatives from New York and Massachusetts have introduced the Brownfield Redevelopment Incentives Act in the House. The Act would fund site assessment and cleanup on abandoned industrial sites.
Partners for a Livable Western New York, based in Buffalo, has about 60 members, including many who belong to the Congress for the New Urbanism. The group consists mainly of professionals — i.e., architects, planners, traffic engineers, attorneys,...
A four-screen theater in the town center of Southern Village is running movies every Friday and Saturday night on the town green. Moviegoers bring blankets and chairs and are charged three dollars. The event has been very popular and adds energy to...
Narrow streets are not only safer and more pedestrian-friendly, they also cost less. According to recent calculations by a Utah consultant, the cost of resurfacing a 24 ft. road with two inches of asphalt is $45,619 per linear mile. The cost...
The US Department of Energy has developed a “New Tools for Community Design and Decision Making” website based on a presentation by Peter Katz. Contains ideas, tools, and resources from professionals in the field. See www.sustainable. doe.gov/...