Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) are a quintessentially Strong Towns approach to urban growth and affordability issues: bottom-up, decentralized, incremental, scalable and adaptable. Unfortunately, a litany of restrictions often makes them an unappealing option even where allowed.
Read MoreMyth busting time: that infuriating thing you saw a bicyclist do the other day? They were probably doing it for a reason, that reason probably had to do with safety, and it might not have been against the law after all.
Read MoreIn the latest episode of the Strong Towns podcast, Chuck talks with Lynn Richards, President and CEO of the Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU). The two discuss how CNU has evolved, and what its future might look like as an organization, event, and movement.
Read MoreYou can’t build stroads, subsidize big box stores and accept endless edge development, and have that work out for you just because you threw a block party, painted a mural and put in a temporary bike lane.
Read MoreThis week, we explored why even wealthy cities need to worry about their infrastructure costs, what “incremental development” really means and looks like, whether crony capitalism means the same thing when the capitalist is a local, tactical urbanism for dockless scooters, some real talk about the dangers of cycling, and more.
Read MoreWe’re honored to celebrate Muskegon’s selection as the 2018 Strongest Town.
Read MoreMeet several of the presenters who will be at our North Texas Regional Gathering next month, and learn about the work they’re doing to move their Texas communities away from business as usual and toward fiscally sustainable development.
Read MoreIn the latest episode of the Strong Towns podcast, we share a conversation Chuck had at CNU 2018 with three of the geoanalytics wizards from Urban3. Hear the latest on their efforts to spread the message about where your city’s wealth is really coming from.
Read MoreSometimes our community leaders don’t do what we think they should. Here are some suggestions for getting their attention and influencing the agenda in your town or city.
Read MoreIncremental approaches are often cheaper, faster, or have less risk than sudden approaches. Let’s explore different types of incrementalism.
Read MoreEverything has a beginning, a middle, and an end. Our current institutions are in the process of failing and are unlikely to be reformed. Once the dust settles, we’ll create new institutions and a fresh cultural consensus that respond to pressing needs on the ground.
Read MoreIf your growth strategy only works as long as wealthy people live in your town, your growth strategy is deeply fragile.
Read MoreA tactical urbanism success in Cincinnati demonstrates the ability to solve problems on our streets—in this case, parking for dockless scooters—by rapidly prototyping solutions in low-cost, low-risk ways.
Read MoreIn working to create better places, keep the stakes low, so even skeptics are more willing to indulge some risk. Take a little step. Root the conversation in reality. Then adjust and press on to those big plans.
Read MoreIf we want to fix crony capitalism, what we really need is to localize capital.
Read MoreThis week, we dug into the gap between perception and reality when it comes to urban growth, spoke to business owners in a St. Louis suburb’s “Chinatown” on the verge of being evicted for tax-subsidized big box retail, reported on new research on who attends public meetings, dug into the many reasons a building might be vacant, and more.
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