Thursday, I spent the day with Marilyn Higgins at Syracuse University seeing the community work inspired (and pushed hard) by Chancellor Nancy Cantor.  Nancy and Marilyn are both smart, can-do leaders who are working to give downtown Syracuse and its Near West Side neighborhood new energy. 

The Connective Corridor… more

To kick off its Strategy Session 2009 in San Diego, CEOs for Cities spoke via teleconference with Mike Strautmanis, a key aide in the Obama White House who was traveling with the President during his west coast tour last week.  Mike talked about what cities can expect in the first… more

Mayor Michael Nutter has formed a Task Force on Tax Policy and Economic Competitiveness to analyze the City of Philadelphia's tax structure and its impact on business development as well as the cost of real estate development in the city.  CEOs for Cities network partner Paul Levy, CEO… more

Welcome to the Fast Lane.  That is, welcome to Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood's blog.

Today, he is defending high speed rail. (I interviewed Rick Harnish, head of the Midwest High Speed Rail Association today for Smart City.)  But LaHood is pushing hard for livable communities.  Here are excerpts from… more

This is perfect fun for the wonks among us. Take the Philly budget challenge from the Economy League of Greater Philadelphia, and see if you can outsmart Mayor Michael Nutter on where to cut and where to tax.  Here's the link.

I'm seeing more of these kinds of workshops...

This Thursday, I will be hosting another Shop 52 Small Business Seminar.  My Shop 52 seminars provide education and resources to small business owners and individuals interested in opening their own small business.   This one will focus on how small businesses can… more

NYT today documents stimulus money to states being used to encourage sprawl with shovel ready road projects.  Although President Obama's Administration opposes sprawl (and he has so stated as recently as last month), "quite a few" states are using their stimulus money "to build new and wider roads that… more

A paean to American cities circa 1956.  Scenes from a film called 'American Engineer.'

CEOs for Cities Strategy Session was blogged live from San Diego.  You can read the feed here:

Strategy Session Live from San Diego

Read the feed from the Q&A with Mayors Penalosa and Daley here:

Q&A with Mayors Daley and Penalosa

And from Maureen McAvey's (ULI)presentation on The… more

We'll be blogging live from our Strategy Session 2009 in San Diego on Thursday starting at 10 a.m. central.  You can follow along in real time on the CEOs for Cities home page at www.ceosforcities.org.  Bloggers will include Carol Coletta, Kip Bergstrom and Sheila Redick.  You may also tweet your… more

As I arrived in San Diego for our CEOs for Cities meeting, I received this from our very much missed colleague Joe Cortright who is in Florence.

Hope you are doing well at the national meeting in San Diego.  If I were anywhere but here, I'd have definitely… more

House Appropriations Committee

Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Subcommittee hearing on "Livable Communities, Transit Oriented Development, and Incorporating Green Building Practices into Federal Housing and Transportation Policy." (Part One)
Witnesses: Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan
Location: 2359 Rayburn… more

We will be LiveBlogging from San Diego Wednesday through Friday at the CEOs for Cities Strategy Summit.  I'll be with ULI San Diego members tomorrow night, and I look forward to blogging what's on their minds.  Then we'll gather for the Creative Cities meeting Wednesday afternoon for our final phase… more

Amsterdam is going green fast, and Business Week has the story.  Amsterdam will complete its first-round of green infrastructure investments by 2012, making it one of the first and most ambitious adopters of the smart city concept.

How cool is this?  Using cell-phone and taxi GPS data, Sense Networks can produce heat maps that show activity at hot spots across a city. Currently, the service, called Citysense, only works in San Francisco, but it will launch in New York in the next few… more

A couple of times a week (or more) I am on the road talking about our work at CEOs for Cities.  Since talent is fundamental to the successs of cities, it is one of the big themes of my speeches.  As I talk about the need to increase the number… more

We'll be Live Blogging on this page from the CEOs for Cities Strategy Summit in San Diego next Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.  Check here for live updates, photos and speaker notes.  We also have a tv crew taping the entire meeting for later broadcast.  I look forward to the conversations.

USA Today finally picked up the story we blogged last week on new EPA research that shows a substantial amount of housing built this decade has shifted from open fields on the edges of suburbia to dense central cities and their nearby suburbs, a change that suggests that the… more

A release from Hilton Hotels on its new Denizen Hotels brands  indicates a new fascination with local.

Born modern, with global appeal and a local accent*

Denizen Hotels will become a cultural epicentre at each of its destinations, cultivating community within… more

Head over to Economix to find out why Ed Glaeser says we should all live in tall buildings. 

I'll be joining city managers and planners from the world’s leading cities including Seoul, Lyon, Paris, Mumbai, Beijing, Jeddah, Riyadh and San Francisco in Abu Dhabi next month to debate and determine the blueprint for successful urban living over the next 10 to 100 years.

Global City 2009 will be… more

This story is a must-read.  Detroit's cheap housing is attracting (at least three) artists and dreamers who are then attracting friends.  "But the city offers a much greater attraction for artists than $100 houses. Detroit right now is just this vast, enormous canvas where anything imaginable can be accomplished."

In just a few minutes, I'm leaving to talk about the next generation of great American cities and the challenges they face.

I am asking the people listening to do the following...

"I want you to send me an email in the next 24 hours and tell me what you… more

As we consider the shovel ready road and bridge projects of the stimulus package, consider this important analysis by our colleague Joe Cortright of the impact modest declines in auto travel have on congestion.  And how that could save us big, big money...

Last year, the US made more… more

A new report out from SPUR is urging more office development in downtown San Francisco. Quoting from the report...

Downtown San Francisco is the only employment node in the region where most people travel to work without bringing their own car. Downtown San Francisco is the node with… more