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.
Did the places I once enjoyed change? No, just me. Because I foolishly learned, from a design perspective, how bad they actually were.
Years ago with the threat of a super box store our suburb placed a limit on the size of large retail stores.
Jan Gehl's book offers ideas for how to make cities and the world immeasurably better.
Fruitvale Village installs professional and community services in some ground-floor spaces, filling empty retail spots.
This year, the Congress for the New Urbanism will award the Athena Medal to Michael Dennis and Fred Koetter, along with a posthumous medal to Colin Rowe.
The current threshold for commercial space for Fannie/Freddie is 25 percent. NAHB will encourage them to raise that to 45 percent, which makes a broad swath of mixed-use and Main Street buildings eligible for financing.
The $4 million in grants to 17 cities build on the HOPE VI program. Finalists for larger implementation grants were also announced.
Form-based codes based on the SmartCode are moving forward in Tarpon Spings, Florida, and San Marcos, California, according to news reports. Both codes deal with downtown areas.
New Urban Network has created a new page that features recent urban design projects at any scale, anywhere in the world.
Triumph of the City is less a coherent urban vision than a collection of bombs and barbs tossed at historic preservationists, environmentalists, labor unions, government regulators, mass transit enthusiasts, and other seemingly benighted souls.
This year’s theme is “Growing Local,” and the event will take place June 1-4 in Madison, Wisconsin.