1. Systemic Failure calls out the Bay Area for giving an award to a textbook example of greenwashing in urbanism: Ironically, this project was recently promoted on the SF-Streetsblog website by “New Urbanist” developer Peter Calthrope for its “highest level” of green technology. What does it say … [Read more...]
The roots of anti-density sentiment
Matt Yglesias, Kevin Drum, and Ryan Avent have been discussing the political economy of anti-density regulations, and I have a lot of comments, but I'm not sure I have the time (or, really, the patience) to air all of them. So, we'll see how long this post gets.First of all, I think all this … [Read more...]
The origin of user fees?
I just started reading Paving the Way: New York Road Building and the American State, 1880-1956by Michael R. Fein, and though I don't have time to talk as much about it as I'd like, I will say that I'm only a couple pages in and I can already tell it's going to be great. Its thesis is essentially … [Read more...]
The problem with “public” transportation
The blog 2nd Ave. Sagas has written something that I think sums up pretty well transit advocates' poor knowledge of private mass transit history: Of course, public transit is vital to the city’s well being. Because Manhattan is an island, it can’t handle the traffic. It’s a commercial hub … [Read more...]
This is how gentrification happens: Northwest DC and the height restriction
Lydia DePillis wrote the Washington City Paper's cover story on the case for Congress overturning DC's height limit, which should be very familiar to readers of this blog. It's got some interesting history in it (DC's height limit was apparently influenced by George Washington's personal aesthetics, … [Read more...]
The Great American Streetcar Myth
by Stephen SmithAmong liberals in the planning profession today, the story of the Great American Streetcar Conspiracy is widely known. There are more nuanced variants, but it goes something like this: Streetcars were once plentiful and efficient, but then along came a bunch of car and oil … [Read more...]
Exporting (sub)urbanism: Kuala Lumpur and the communist world
by Stephen SmithAdam Martin at William Easterly's development blog Aid Watch has a post up warning about the tendency among developing nations to adopt Western styles wholesale, even if such styles are not even efficient in their countries of origin. He posits this as a sort of developmental … [Read more...]
Zoning as a Tool of Class Exclusion
In regards to zoning, Discovering Urbanism has a nice post up about early 20th century urban planner Charles Mulford Robinson and his planning textbook. It includes the following corrective to the notion that zoning originated as a way to separate polluting industry from places of residence and … [Read more...]