The most important thing for a local government is to avoid ruin.
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Cobb County, Georgia, has long been all-in on debt-fueled, unsustainable growth, and faces a tough road ahead as poverty grows and its ability to provide services declines. What are some rational responses to this predicament?
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Typically, the thought of converting an old subway tunnel into parking would send shivers down the spines of urbanists. But this project may be a surprisingly beneficial way to catalyze redevelopment in Rochester, New York’s recovering downtown.
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It is the experiences of real people that should guide our planning efforts. Their actions are the data we should be collecting, not their stated preferences.
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Simple adjustments to neighborhood design could make these places far more walkable. But continuing to design with only cars in mind will remove what little walkability there is.
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In Austin, MN an old K-Mart was transformed into a popular museum—a big box reuse success! Or was it?
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How to build a successful innovation district where start-ups, schools, and residents flourish.
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In this week's featured member post, Mike Williams highlights the success of an incentive program that has led to a stunning rebirth of Fargo's downtown.
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Let’s say you want to organize a social get-together for you and your neighbors. What do you do? How do you make it a success? Let me share what I’ve learned over the years about organizing neighbor events. It's easy!
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Thinking about blogging? Check out our webinar for tips and our member blogroll for inspiration.
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Tips and tricks for understanding zoning codes and starting out as a small scale developer.
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There are no universal answers to the complex problems America’s cities, towns, and neighborhoods face. There is no playbook.
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A Strong Town is a resilient or antifragile town: one that can weather unforeseen disruptions to its economy, society, and environment. Building Strong Towns means creating the conditions for experimentation and being comfortable with the lack of a road map for what the future will look like.
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How can Strong Towns grow into a movement which brings about transformative change, not tinkering around the edges?
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Cities like to form on water. It follows that there are thousands of cities out there struggling with their own version of North Side, South Side. The phenomenon reminds me of Jane Jacobs on border vacuums.
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If someone lives in a place dominated by state/fed money where progress is continually are thwarted by state/federal mandates, it is not hard to imagine where the healthy skepticism of government would originate.
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When the media imposes a narrative on your narrative.
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What would our neighborhoods look like if we voluntarily reduced the amount of infrastructure? This isn’t a purely academic question. As municipal, state, and federal budgets get squeezed there’s going to be a point at which we have no choice but to stop building new roads and even reduce the amount of maintenance on the roads we already have. We could approach this situation with dread and a sense of loss, or we could embrace it as an opportunity to get a better quality of life for a whole lot less money.
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What is sad is that these guys are so good at communication in general but so BAD at communicating to the masses of people who need to be on board to make this kind of thing happen.
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There are some people who see solutions where others see only problems. I love those people. Watch this and visualize the untapped potential in the United States, all the places we've built and aren't making very productive use of.
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