Promoting bicycle ridership has become a widespread mission across many regions, ranging from small towns to large cities. In California’s East Bay, the East Bay Bicycle Coalition (EBBC) has grown to be the primary advocacy group to make bicycling more feasible and safer on a large scale. The organization’s “guiding principles” include the following: Make [...]
The Trust for Public Land Park Score index ranked the “City of Lakes” Minneapolis, Minnesota as the #1 Park System in the Nation, with New York, NY coming in second. The city’s park system scored high in every category, which includes the size of the parks, the amount of money spent on them, and their [...]
After raising the question of how to achieve social equity and inclusiveness in urban planning, within our previous post, Global Site Plans’ The Grid and the Center for Social Inclusion turned to Twitter and #thegrid for a thought-provoking conversation on the topic. From this fast-paced one hour chat, four emerging trends appeared: 1. Access to [...]
Charles (Chuck) Marohne, Strong Towns Chuck Marohne, Executive Director of Strong Towns, said that the mechanisms of growth we have become accustomed to are waning. Local governments are forced to absorb the costs of new standards and requirements set by the powers that be. He argued that the current pattern of development is not sustainable [...]
Though ranked among the least bike-friendly cities in the country, Miami is improving. With a Bicycle Master Plan, education initiatives, greenways and bike lanes installations, and Bike/Walk city events, improvements are enhancing some of the country’s most dangerous areas for riders and walkers. While these physical upgrades are important, the unity and adjustment of road [...]
James Alfandre, Kentlands Initiative James Alfandre, Executive Director at the Kentlands Initiative, opened the session by defining crowdsourcing. He thinks of crowdsourcing as an “open call to an undefined group of people.” It’s essentially Wikipedia’s open source model applied to urban revitalization and development. Alfandre said that there are two major steps to creating the [...]
Hands down, I live in biking Mecca. From taking in the scenic overlooks from the view of my road bike, to getting lost in nature on all the different mountain bike trails that the area has to offer, Tahoe is truly a dream for a bicycle enthusiast. In the Sierra Region cycling of all sorts, [...]
The Camlica Mosque, or Çamlıca Camii in Turkish, is located at Istanbul, Turkey’s Çamlıca Hill. Upon completion, the project will have a 110,000 square meter (1,184,030 square feet) footprint, serving 29,700 people from the surrounding Kisikli Mahallesi. While there has been a great number of individuals who support, and oppose this project, we would like to hear your [...]
Who’s afraid of the Buenos Aires’ new popular habitat act? The answer: everyone. The recently enacted law of the Buenos Aires province proposes a compact, dense, diverse, and accessible city, aiming to reorient the urban land market. This law is shaking the fundamentals of planning in a metropolitan area that to a great extent still [...]
This is a very appropriate week for me to be writing a blog post about bicycle theft in Montréal. Last week, someone took my bell and my lights right off of my bike in the middle of downtown. I am an avid cyclist; I bike to work, to run errands, and to go out to [...]
Rob Spanier, LiveWorkLearnPlay Rob Spanier, Partner and Principal of LiveWorkLearnPlay, began with the analogy that planning is the hardware, and activation is the software. He said that there are ways to activate a community in ways that don’t need to rely upon huge capital investment. So why farmers’ and public markets? Spanier said that markets [...]
Çamlıca Camii Projesi İstanbul’da Çamlıca Tepesi için düşünülen, tamamlandığında 110.000 metrekare alan büyüklüğüne sahip olacak ve 29.700 nüfuslu Kısıklı Mahallesi’nde bulunacak bir projedir. Hâlihazırda kamuoyundan çok sayıda olumlu ve olumsuz eleştiriler alan proje hakkında sizlerin de görüşlerini almak istedik. Aşağıda yer alan video, görsel ve metinleri inceleyebilir, anonim olarak İngilizce ya da Türkçe yanıtlayabileceğiniz dort [...]
Dan Solomon, Mithun | Solomon Dan Solomon, CNU co-founder, author, and Principal at Mithun | Solomon, opened the session by saying that in the context of new urbanism concepts being introduced to developing countries, “We can’t exactly declare victory, but we’ve made our presence strong.” Overall, he explained the urban planning struggles in China. He [...]
The University of Cincinnati campus has grown significantly in recent years – earning national distinction for its campus transformation – achieved through successful visioning and leadership in the last decade. This growth, which has elevated the rankings and reputation of the university 17 points (to the top tier of national universities in 2011), has likewise [...]
Growing up in a city your whole life, you definitely gain perspective on how it has grown and expanded throughout the years. I have been able to see the city of Lincoln, Nebraska develop and grow immensely in my time here, and not until my time at Global Site Plans did l really stop and [...]
Jennifer Griffin, a Visiting Assistant Research Professor of Notre Dame, opened the session by discussing the “workshop neighborhood.” She argued that various light- and medium-industrial uses also have a place in neighborhoods- that those uses, too, deserve to be walkable and part of mixed use neighborhoods. She said that urban industry has economic, social, and [...]
Astana, Kazakhstan. Astana’s extensive greenery contrasts sharply with its backdrop, the Kazakh steppe, an expansive plain characterized by whipping winds and extreme seasonal temperature fluctuations. In the winter, temperatures plummet to -45, while in summer, temperatures rise to 99 degrees Fahrenheit! Astana’s parks and recreational spaces, landscaped institutional and civic commons, and tree-lined thoroughfares are practical [...]
After reading articles about residents growing vegetables in their backyards and seeing community gardens sprouting (pun intended) up in dense cities, I have become intrigued by this idea of growing your own produce instead of purchasing it at your local market. Is there a real future for this contemporary practice or will it continue to [...]
Sarah Susanka has written nine books for her best-selling “Not So Big” series. During her plenary presentation, she emphasized the individual’s need to be the change they wish to see in the world. She agreed to design a showhouse for John McLinden of StreetScape, in the SchoolStreet development of Libertyville, IL in 2011. His development [...]
As a foreigner making her home in Istanbul, Turkey, I feel honored to hear the noise in the streets, the sounds of banging pots and traditional Turkish coffee carafes, honking horns, and chants; Turkish solidarity. And while I don’t have the Turkish cultural, political, historical or religious worldviews that a native would, what I see [...]
