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 land use plan for Curtis Park West, one of the first new urbanist neighborhoods proposed on a “brownfield,” inner city site, was presented to the Sacramento Planning Commission in November. The first session for the project’s Environmental...
Madison, Georgia, recently adopted a zoning ordinance creating a Traditional Neighborhood District. It requires compact, mixed-use, pedestrian-oriented streets that must be interconnected, with blocks at least 300 feet but no more than 600 feet in...
Brylen Homes is building houses with innovative windows in Amelia Park, a traditional neighborhood development (TND) in Fernandina Beach, Florida. Using a technique that makes aluminum windows appear similar to traditional wood windows, Brylen...
A recent survey shows an unexpected population boom in downtowns across the country. The Brookings Institution Center on Urban and Metropolitan Policy and the Fannie Mae Foundation surveyed 24 major U.S. cities and found that all predict an increase...
Dean Brennan and Al Zelinka, two community planners who are writing a book on design for safety and crime reduction, report that the New Urbanism “clearly plays an important role in eliminating fear of crime and the perception of crime.”
The...
Professional Builder magazine published a recent article highlighting the high sales of several new urbanist projects, citing the appeal of a functioning community and the role of publicity in sales rates. The charrette has proved a key to...
Communities of the Twenty-first Century likely will take the form of compact, pedestrian-oriented villages wired with high-tech communications, according to a recent Los Angeles Times article. Writer David Bloom makes the link between the New...
A 270-acre development proposal in Lake Park, Florida, may be the first new urbanist extension of a neighborhood designed by the Olmstead Brothers, great town planners of the early Twentieth Century. The plan, designed by the Treasure Coast Regional...
A new partnership has been established between TND Advisors LLC, an affiliate of the Traditional Neighborhood Development (TND) Fund, and Hillman Properties Inc., a subsidiary of The Hillman Company, of Pittsburgh, to provide equity capital for TNDs...
Some of the nation’s largest retailers, including Home Depot, Wal-mart, and Sears, are opening small, compact stores on selected main street locations. Recent surveys, like one by Kurt Salmon Associates, show a significant (21 percent) increase in...
David Peterson, Managing Director of PricewaterhouseCoopers, coined the phrase “mix, mass, and mesh” to describe characteristics of the “24-hour city” that constitute safe and affordable places to work, play, and reside. The top U.S. real estate...
A charrette was held in September, 1998, to design a new urbanist downtown for Macomb Township, the fastest growing community in the Detroit metropolitan region. The plan, by Gibbs Planning Group, features a township hall, a district court, possibly...