Berkeley resident Sharon Hudson has proposed an urban bill of rights for the city as a reaction to what she sees as excessive development and a "race to the bottom." She bills it as "The NIMBY Manifesto, which is enough to make most urban leaders quake.

(The irony of NIMBYs is… more

Louisiana Speaks brought together stakeholders from across the Louisiana coast for six workshops in July and August, 2006. During day-long sessions, participants provided critical and creative input for shaping policy on coastal restoration and storm protection; community growth and transportation infrastructure; and economic development and equity.

Participants collaborate… more

Prior to Katrina, New Urbanism founder Andres Duany had assembled his colleagues to consider alternatives to the existing pre-fab housing industry. His primary target was trailers. They are generally unattractive and definitely subject to severe weather.

The deployment of thousands of trailers to Katrina's victims simply made the issue more urgent.

Today's… more

Dave Wetzel is Vice-Chair of Transport for London and Chair of The Labour Land Campaign. He delivered the following remarks at a recent conference in Barcelona on innovative means of financing public transportation.

The income from fares is usually insufficient to pay for both the capital cost and running expenses of… more

City leaders everywhere are wringing their hands about how to attract and retain talent. The focus is generally on college-educated young adults.

But Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin is wisely starting her quest to increase the city's talent pool before they even leave high school.

Next Step ... The Atlanta Promise… more

Metro Atlanta has launched a comprehensive online site to promote local arts and entertainment for the whole family. It's called AtalntaPlanIt. A free membership, available by filling out a form online, gets you weekly ticket discounts. Check it out here.

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper has launched Hot DAM: Arts at Altitude, a six-month collaborative initiative to promote regional arts activities supporting the opening of the Denver Art Museum’s new Frederic C. Hamilton Building. Accompanied by Lewis Sharp, Director of the Denver Art Museum, and Richard Scharf, President\CEO of the Denver… more

Los Angeles, home of the original bling, is looking at limits on McMansions. City Councilman Tom LaBonge has asked the planning department to draw up guidelines to keep houses to a reasonable size that will preserve the character of neighborhoods, mature trees and privacy.

But many buyers want bigger homes. According… more

From BBC News: Cows moo in West Country accent

A claim by Somerset dairy farmers their cows moo with a West Country accent is being backed by experts who confirm different herds make different sounds.

Dr Jeanine Treffers-Daller, reader in linguistics at the University of the West of England in… more

According to Springwise, it's a cross between pop-up retail, being spaces and brand spaces.

It is Starbucks Salon, a temporary arts and performance coffee house headed for New York this fall. Tentative plans also anticipate salons in San Francisco, London, Beijing, and Boston.

"The concept builds on coffee houses'… more

The Wall Street Journal reports on a developer, Stephen M. Ross, whose low- to moderate-income government subsidized housing developments have given him an edge in developing up-scale, market-rate properties. That's because he's "mastered the complex business of tax credits that help finance the nation's low-income housing."

This consistent stream of income… more

Writes Jeffrey Zaslow in The Wall Street Journal..."THIS IS A LOVE STORY about tens of thousands of people who don't yet realize they're in love. They live all over the world, but their hearts belong to the place where they grew up: Buffalo, N.Y.

"For decades, residents of this often-maligned Rust… more

New York Times columnist David Brooks writes today about the new book from Lawrence E. Harrison, "The Central Liberal Truth," that has Harrison contemplating the power of culture in shaping behavior. He concludes that cultural differences mostly explain why some nations develop quickly while others do not.

Although Harrison… more

Surprise! Gen Xer's are the fastest-growing segment of RV buyers, according to a story in today's LA Times.

Athough Boomers continue to make up half of all RV owners, the number of young buyers has risen from just 2 percent of all owners in 1984 to 15 percent today.

"Sales of RVs,… more

Participants in the Global Leadership Forum told story after story of urban regeneration based on a fusion of art, science, and technology in a single location.

Some of the most interesting arts places discussed included:

Factory 798 in Beijing in the Danshanzi Art District

Federation Square in Melbourne (run by… more

Mayor Gavin Newsom and San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) General Manager Susan Leal today announced a new initiative to partner with Lennar BVHP to create San Francisco’s first neighborhood powered entirely by clean, renewable energy. The new “Green Power Community” would be on a 93-acre parcel at a site… more

College newspapers are one sector of the newspaper industry defying the trend of declining readership, according to the Wall Street Journal. "Hip, local, relevant and generated by students," college newspapers are holding on to readers.

Despite conventional wisdom, 71 percent of college students report that they read at least one… more

Millions of men between the ages of 30 and 55 have dropped out of regular work, according to a recent story in the New York Times. "About 13 percent of American men in this age group are not working, up from 5 percent in the late 1960s." That means 4… more

Fifteen cities from across the globe using some version of a creative cities strategy to pursue their transnational ambitions met earlier this week in San Jose, capital of Silicon Valley.

CEOs for Cities board member and San Jose assistant director of economic and community development Kim Walesh brought them together… more

I returned to Chicago today from three days at San Jose's Global Leadership Forum (more on that in the next post). My husband, who is the program director for green buildings for Chicago's Public Building Commission, works every day to change old habits and familiar ways. When he met me… more

Mayor Gavin Newsom signed legislation that would make San Francisco the first city in the country to offer health care to its estimated 82,000 uninsured residents. The program will cost about $200 million annually, and will be paid for through a combination of sources, including tax dollars, local business contributions… more

The headline of Money magazine's sidebar on the Best Big Cities to Live was almost embarrassing. It read "Big Cities Are Nice, Too." It wasn't enough to eliminate from consideration of Best Places to Live all cities with more than 300,000 people. They actually picked a list of 10 larger… more

Detroit News reports that "Milwaukee is suddenly a magnet for twentysomethings looking for fun."

"Borrowing from the sparkle of Chicago and Minneapolis, Milwaukee is fast transforming itself from stolid German Midwest backwater to a hip city. Cranes are everywhere, building up the riverfront and lakefront and modernizing the freeways.… more

USA Today reports on new security barricades finally making their appearance in cities across the nation that are designed to blend with the appearance of streets and buildings. Low wall seating now protects the John Hancock Building in Chicago, a large lily pond forms a moat at Seattle's new… more