How to Build the Perfect City

While urban planning can sound boring, how we choose to live is as fundamental a question as exists.

Top Story 2Chris ArnadeJune 27, 2025National Gathering, urban planning, community, asia, social trust

Eric Higbee: How to Master the Art of Community Engagement

Eric Higbee is a landscape architect who teaches university courses on community engagement and works on community design and planning projects through his award-winning landscape architecture practice.

Student Journalist Goes "All Out" to Spotlight Car Dependency and Spark Change

Student journalist William Donofrio is part of a growing group of changemakers who are noticing, documenting, and sharing the struggles their places face.

When Parents Are Charged but the Stroad Is the Culprit

There is nothing radical or reckless about letting your child cross the street. So why are parents across the country facing criminal charges for doing just that?

Top Story 2Tony HarrisJune 26, 2025safe and productive streets, children, walkability, Street Design, stroad

How To Turn a Deadly Stroad Into a Safe Street: The Broad Street Project

How did one of the most dangerous streets in Rhode Island turn into a safe and comfortable place for people to walk, bike, and shop? It’s all about community and local context.

Healing a Neighborhood with Paint and Possibility

Harrisonburg skipped the renderings and went straight to the street—using a live demo to calm traffic and earn back trust.

Bottom-Up Shorts: How To Encourage Smart, Financially Strong Development

Mayor Kevin McDonnell and Dave Alden, co-leader of Petaluma Urban Chat, join us from Petaluma, California. They discuss the Know Before You Grow initiative, a community-driven effort that's helped encourage housing development in the city's downtown.

Five Crashes in 16 Months: One Denver Family’s Breaking Point

The house is beautiful. The neighborhood is charming. The street? Designed like a drag strip—and it's launched multiple cars into one family's living room.

Top StoryAsia MieleszkoJune 24, 2025car crash, Street Design, safe and productive streets, speeding, colorado

Using Radical Common Sense To Build Great Places, With Steve Nygren

Chuck sits down with Steve Nygren, the founder of a unique community just outside of Atlanta called Serenbe. They discuss the process of creating Serenbe, which features walkable, mixed-use “hamlets” surrounded by nature.

Podcast, Top StoryStrong TownsJune 23, 2025podcast, georgia, development, environment, walkability

The Light Still Shines

It’s easy to get angry or check out when faced with your place’s continued decline. That doesn’t mean you should stop fighting for it.

MarohnCharles MarohnJune 23, 2025minnesota, advocacy, localism, taking action

A Tribute to Leon Krier: The Thinker Who Changed My Path

Leon Krier leaves behind a generation of designers, planners, and urbanists who see the world differently because of him. I owe him more than I can put into words.

Maryland’s Quick-Build Projects Are a Model for Every State DOT

How do you make streets safer when your tools made them unsafe in the first place? If you’re the Maryland Department of Transportation, you start building a new toolbox.

Why Social Interaction Should Influence City Planning, With Dr. Patricia Tice

Dr. Patricia Tice is a transportation engineer, planner, researcher and self-proclaimed geek. She talks about her research into human behavior, as well as the role of human interaction and LEGO in urban design. (Transcript included.)

Housing Is Not a Numbers Problem—It’s a Systems Problem

When we recognize the housing crisis as a systems and strategy problem, we realize that there is no shortage of things cities can do right now to address it.