Making the Case for Compact Development
From the people at Smart Growth America comes word of a new book, Growing Cooler: The Evidence on Urban Development and Climate Change, just out from the Urban Land Institute. In the book, researchers argue that more compact development (such as Atlantic Station, a mixed-use complex in Atlanta built on reclaimed industrial land, shown at right) must play a key role if this country is to reduce emissions:
September 21, 2007
Seeing Myrtle Avenue With Fresh Eyes
The folks over at the Myrtle Avenue Brooklyn Partnership have unveiled the results
of a collaboration with the Project for Public Spaces (PPS) undertaken
over the last couple of years. Two public workshops were held to get
community input on the plans, which address four different areas of
Myrtle Avenue, one of the main commercial streets for Fort Greene and Clinton Hill.
September 18, 2007
Casino-Jamming in the Catskills
Way back in February Gov. Eliot Spitzer declared his support for a plan to build a $600 million casino in the Catskills. Now opponents of the St. Regis Mohawk tribe project, which would be located at the Monticello Racetrack in Sullivan County, have launched a public-relations campaign highlighting the traffic congestion and sprawl they say would result.
August 29, 2007
What a Difference a Bench Makes
Good magazine reports on how, with remarkable simplicity, this menacing, marginal streetscape in downtown LA was turned into a welcoming public space (click here for the after photo):
August 27, 2007
Bike & Ped Improvements Slated for Manhattan Bridge Approach
DOT plans to build a physically-separated two-way bike lane on this one block stretch of Canal Street at the foot of the Manhattan Bridge. The project also includes pedestrian safety fixes.
August 27, 2007
Pay Phones May Be a Bad Call for City
An article in today's New York Times looks at the city's most prominent -- and profitable -- form of street furniture, the pay telephone:
August 17, 2007
London Reaps Pricing Benefits
From the newsletter of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign comes an inspiring summation of the effects of congestion pricing in London since the program's inception in 2003, gleaned from Transport for London's annual report:
August 16, 2007
Kids Demand Respect in the Streets of Brooklyn
A rendering of a mural proposed for Butler St. and Third Ave., one block from the Brooklyn intersection where a 4-year-old boy was killed by the driver of a Hummer in February.
July 20, 2007
Mayor Speaks at Times Square Pricing Rally
Supporters of congestion pricing rallied yesterday in Times Square, urging state lawmakers to act by July 16 on Mayor Bloomberg's initiative or risk losing $500 million in federal funds. "The time is now," said the mayor, according to the New York Post. "We cannot walk away from this opportunity."
July 6, 2007
Times Says: We Must Pay More for Fossil Fuels
The New York Times published an editorial today about "an unpleasant and inescapable truth: any serious effort to fight [global] warming will require everyone to pay more for energy."
July 6, 2007