The Congress for the New Urbanism has just published a list of the top ten aging elevated highways that are ripe for removal and redesign.  The removal of these highways could lead to revitalization movements in the cities and regions they currently occupy.

A large percentage of these highways are located in the northeast.

CNU, like PPS, advocates for replacing elevated highways with surface streets that connect destinations and promote walkability.

The top ten opportinities listed are:

1. Alaskan Way Viaduct, Seattle, WA
2. Sheridan Expressway, Bronx, NY
3. The Skyway and Route 5, Buffalo, NY
4. Route 34, New Haven, CT
5. Claiborne Expressway, New Orleans, LA
6. Interstate 81, Syracuse, NY
7. Interstate 64, Louisville, KY
8. Route 29, Trenton, NJ
9. Gardiner Expressway, Toronto, ON
10. 11th Street Bridges and the Southeast Freeway, Washington D.C.

More Information:

• Buffalo Waterfront [PPS]
• Freeways Without Futures [Congress for the New Urbanism]
  

The latest in urban planning, placemaking and civic action...

• NYC's Waterfalls public art exhibit bring better-than-anticipated revenue for the city [Craine's New York]
• Educational urban spaces may aid child development [Herald Sun]
• Planners are predicting a future less dependent on cars and more dependent on urban living [Seattle Times]
• Despite the economic climate, grants to bring people back to the Philadelphia waterfront remain a priority [Philly.com]
• Western New Yorkers join forces to improve small-town downtowns [Democrat and Chronicle]
  

The latest news in Placemaking, urban planning and civic action...

• Public spaces are becoming a big sell in the real estate market during difficult economic times [Financial Times] 
• A history of building schools to be great places in NYC [Peace in the Classroom]
• Locals make a point of patronizing farmers markets over big stores to support local economies and for access to the best healthy produce [Lebanon Daily News]
• Community gardens in Baltimore designed for healing and reflection [NY Times]
• Public art and placemaking contribute to best practices in urban design and planning to combine old and new [Realtor]
• In Minneapolis, public art provides interactivity [MinnPost.com]
  

PPS partner Transportation For America is a growing and diverse coalition focused on creating a national transportation program that will take America into the 21st century by building a modernized infrastructure to support healthy communities where people can live, work and play. This effort is centered primarily on influencing Congress' reauthorization of federal transportation legislation in 2009.

On October 15, T4America will stage press events all around the country to coincide with the economic focus of the final Obama-McCain debate.  The coalition will call for the candidates to address the fact that our economy is suffering from falling home values, rising gas prices and economic fallout on Main Street, and that strategic investments in public transportation will immediately create jobs and spur economic development, as well as provide more affordable transportation options.  Like PPS, T4America believes that we need fundamental change in how America builds its communities, and a transportation system that will support and enhance them.

T4America asserts that:

• Our future security, economic success, and personal as well as planetary health require us to reduce our dependence on oil

• Everyone living in America -- whether in its urban centers or rural heartland -- deserves to have ample and affordable options for living and commuting

• Families and individuals want to live in accessible, fair, and environmentally sustainable communities

• Our government -- federal, state and local -- should spend our money in a way that addresses the needs of all citizens

Achievement of these critical goals relates directly to PPS's Building Community through Transportation campaign, which aims to transform transportation policy, practice and design to support Placemaking and the creation of walkable, healthy and sustainable communities.

These press events will outline how new approaches to transportation investment can help build an America that provides us with a sustainable future.  We urge you all to tune into and support these events.

The New York City event will take place at 1pm outside of Grand Central Terminal at Vanderbilt.  Speakers will include Congressman Jerrald Nadler, MTA CEO and Executive Director Lee Sander, NYC DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan and developer Jonathan Rose.

Please view T4A's press release here for more information!

 

Portland's Light Rail system

The latest in placemaking, urban planning and civic action...

• Retrofitting the suburbs of DC [Switchboard] 
• Long-term planning in the Middle East will mean better cities, streets, transportation and parks [The National]
• APA names best streets, neighborhoods and public spaces [American Planning Association]
• Kansas City program helps train immigrant women to sell ethnic produce at farmers markets [KansasCity.com] 
• Maine focuses on "Quality of Place" to boost tourism [The Times Record]
  

 

The NYC Food and Fitness Partnership is running some interesting bus tours of community gardens, parks, playgrounds, trails, and greenways In Harlem, the South Bronx and Brooklyn on Saturday, October 18. There’ll be a tasty meal at the end on Randall’s Island and the whole thing is free! RSVP at www.nycfoodandfitness.org.

The latest news in placemaking, urban planning and citizen action.

• Duluth looks to waterfront revitalization to boost local economy [Duluth News Tribune] 
• New public spaces in Asia offer creativity and a variety of activities [The Age] 
• DC's southwest waterfront will be home to a new mixed-use development that will include more than 2 million square feet of public parks and plazas [Washington Business Journal]
  

• The Future of Urban Waterfronts Conference to be held in Toronto [Strategy Institute]
• Attention turns to waterfront revitalization in Poland [Warsaw Business Journal]
• Campuses turn to Placemaking for expanding and improving campuses [Chronicle for Higher Education]
• What would public spaces look like if they were designed with women in mind? [Taipei Times]
  

• Guerilla Gardening takes off in New Orleans [The Times Picayune]
• The Olympic and Paralympic Games in Bejing have increased public space access to those with disabilities [China View]
• Buskers add value to farmers markets in Tacoma [The News Tribune]
• Old trams become new public parks in Portugal [Oeiras and Environs Daily Photo] 
• A Ventura City Manager reflects on the concept of Placemaking [City of Ventura]
• The Billboard industry calls for tree-cutting, while some in Florida provide small resistance [On the Commons]

Park(ing) Day is an international event that reclaims over 200 parking spots in 50 cities around the world and transforms them into engaging public spaces for one day a year.  In NYC, this event creates small, temporary public spaces that provide a breath of relief from the auto-clogged reality of the city. For more info on the event, visit http://parkingdaynyc.org/

The PPS Parking Day Spot this year will be on Broadway and Great Jones St, one block from the PPS offices!  We should be up and running by 10am and plan to stay until around 4pm.  The theme of our spot is Mini Bryant Park; we will be providing reading material, movable seating, games, and lemonade.  Please stop by anytime and bring your friends! 

 

• A Ventura City Manager reflects on the concept of Placemaking [City of Ventura]
• The Billboard industry calls for tree-cutting, while some in Florida provide small resistance [On the Commons]
  

• Urban agriculture is a growing industry [The Star]
• Ethisphere predicts the most sustainable cities in the year 2020 [Ethisphere]
• Londoners lobby for the use of Segways in public spaces [County Times]
• A new focus on reviving the US's urban waterfronts [Kitsap Sun]
• Park(ing) Day - September 19, 2008 - allows activists the chance to create temporary public spaces in metered parking spots [PARKing Day]
• Abu Dhabi plans for new rail system to meet projected population growth [Khaleej Times]
• Technology could increase efficiency of public and shared transportation [Planetizen]

PPS's Gary Toth participates in PARKing Day 2007

PPS Founder and President Fred Kent spoke to a group of Upper East Siders Tuesday evening, engaging the uptown community to evaluate their own neighborhood.  After a presentation on bold moves in pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly policies around the world, attendees split up into groups to brainstorm simple ways to improve the streets in their neighborhood.  Ideas including traffic circles, closing main streets to traffic and enhancing the area's waterfront amenities were among those generated.

Streetsblog offers a full report.

• In the UK, a giant mechanical elephant prepares to thrill the streets of Liverpool [Guardian]
• Bus bans at malls in Illinois are a reminder that true public space is precious and scarce [Illinoize]
• An astro-turf-covered square becomes a busy impromptu park in Maryland, despite a designed park nearby! [The Dirt]
• Don't live near a farmers market?  Start your own! [Tips from the University of Florida, via Ecollo] 
• Cities and towns are turning abandoned big box stores into community centers, charter schools and senior centers [USA Today]
  

• Will NYC's new zoning rules actually increase traffic in NYC? [Gotham Gazette]
• New Hampshire farmers have their best season ever, thanks to interest in farmers markets and eating locally [Fox 44]
  
• In Beijing, sanctioned Olympic "protest parks" sit empty after the Chinese government ignores the 77 protest permit requests filed. Two elderly citizens, filing to protest eminent domain, were arrested and threatened with work camps. [Canada.com]
• Canada's Spacing Toronto magazine announces its "thinkTORONTO" streetscape planning competition for young architects, planners, designers and students [Spacing Toronto]
  
• Food stamp acceptance at farmers markets increases, providing access to fresh, healthy produce [AM NY]
• New public sculpture entices crowds, encouraging interactivity and enhancing public space [NY Times]

(The Bean, Chicago.  Photo by the New York Times.) 

 

Photo: www.chattanooga-charm.com

Chattanooga, Tennessee has taken a PPS recommendation to heart! Inspired by a speech by PPS Founder and President Fred Kent, the Chattanooga Department of Parks and Recreation announced that it will be installing multicolored steel tables and chairs in several of its waterfront parks. The project is called the Park Animation Project, and it intends to increase social interaction in parks and to create a sense of ownership among park users.

            Initially, the 130 tables and 21 chairs were to be placed on the waterfront in Coolidge Park this month, but the installation has been delayed based on reports that the existing furniture was too unstable for Coolidge Park’s uneven terrain. Picnic tables with umbrellas will still be added to the portion of the waterfront by Ross’s Landing.

            PPS has long been an advocate for free-standing, movable furniture because they help to create “minidestinations” and allow people to customize spaces so they can have a range of different experiences. Coolidge Park is one of the best places to employ this concept as it already contains a notable amenity: according to Fred Kent, the fountain in Coolidge Park is one of the top five in the world.

 

A recent New York Times article highlighted the resurgence of the street car in cities across America.  While extremely popular at the turn of the last century, many streetcar systems were dismantled in favor of the automobile.  Today, streetcars are being used to revitalize cities and recreate important connections between neighborhoods and services.

In Cincinnati, a new streetcar system will link several of the city's vital destinations: its waterfront, stadiums, residential uptown and business district, including stops for the University of Cincinnati and six hospitals. Based on private and public funding, a street car fare is expected to be extremely reasonable at $1 or less.

The Times article states that more than 40 cities are currently looking into streetcar programs, while a handful of cities are making improvements to existing systems.

As evidenced in San Francisco, streetcar systems can act as a major tourist draw and help in creating sense of place in a city. Locals, visitors, young and old all flock to the city's wonderfully preserved historic public transportation, making the streetcar an iconic symbol of the city. 

New public transportation also encourages economic growth. After implementing a brand-new streetcar system, Portland, OR, has seen more than $3 billion invested in land within two blocks from the new lines.

(photo by the New York Times)

Streetcars are also useful in reconnecting parts of a city that have been physically separated by highways.  In the Red Hook neighborhood of Brooklyn, cut off from the rest of the borough by the Brooklyn-Queens expressway, neighborhood activists have been working for years toward rehabbing and reopening the local trolley service that served the waterfront until the 1950s. Forgotten New York has some wonderful information on the trolley line's history and project's current state.

Public transportation that links vital destinations in cities and reduces reliance on the automobile builds stronger, more vibrant communities!  Streetcars, which offer local character and affordable fares, are becoming a wonderful solution to traffic congestion and rising gas prices.

• For the first time in more than 100 years, a market reopens on the location of Australia's first public market [Parrametta Sun]
• Connecticut yearns for car-free streets and neighbor interaction in public spaces [The Herald]
• In London, Ontario, Nestle Water is protesting a ban on the sale of bottled water in government buildings, and promoting recycling education in public spaces [CNW Group]
• Los Angeles must reopen its alleyways for public use [blogdowntown]
  
• London's 100 Public Spaces Project, aiming at creating and improving 100 public spaces in the city, will be completed for the 2012 Olympic Games.  The program hopes to highlight the benefits of great public spaces, and illustrate that they can be created and maintained easily and affordably. [Mayor of London]
  

This week's most intriguing stories about urban planning, public spaces and citizen action.

• Montreal vendors resist mandated Bud Light sales after business association forms exclusive partnership.  PPS Senior Vice President Steve Davies comments! [Globe and Mail]
• The Committee for Citizen Involvement in Oregon "is a process-oriented committee, providing resources and opportunities for citizens to participate effectively in Clackamas County's land use planning and decision-making process." If you live in the area, check out one of the upcoming meetings! [Clackamas Review]
• A local blogger in Windsor, Ontario applied PPS's Power of 10 waterfront design guidelines to evaluate why his local waterfront remains largely unused by the public [scaledown]
• Urban planners believe that high gas prices will finally curb sprawl [Urban Energy]
• Unique, modern New Urbanist communities spring up and thrive in and around Denver [Next American City]
• Rotating public art encourages civic engagement and discussion in Clearwater [Creative Loafing]
• The New Republic defines urban revival as "demographic inversion," rather than "gentrification" [The New Republic]
• In Buffalo, one market thrives while another suffers [Buffalo News]
  

(Lexington Food Co-op, Buffalo, NY, photo by Artvoice)

Most of us here at PPS live, work and play in New York City.  Here are a few tidbits from our corner of the world!

• Art in Odd Places, an annual event dedicated to exploring the city's public spaces using performance and installation art, will take place in October.  This year's location -- 14th Street -- represents the city's "Great Divide."
  
• The dangerous, confusing and inefficient Astor Place will finally be redesigned!  The plans call for more pedestrian space.
  
• As summer heats up in NYC, residents have been taking to the street, holding dinner parties outdoors in public spaces -- street corners, the Brooklyn Bridge, etc. (photo by the New York Times)

This week's most intriguing stories about urban planning, public spaces and citizen action.

•  Creating public spaces for "invited art" may successfully reduce unwanted graffiti [Grits for Breakfast]

• Groundbreaking Urban Waterfront Revitalization Conference to be held in Washington State [Market Watch]
• Activists around the world are turning to "guerrilla gardening" as a way to beautify abandoned public spaces [Green Me]
• Permanent Breakfast, a project started in 1996 by artist Friedemann Derschmidt, organizes people to gather for breakfast in unlikely public spaces (medians, for example) to illicit public response [Urban Palimpsest]
  
• The good and the bad of "instant downtowns" outside of Toronto [Spacing Toronto]
  
• Suburban residents are lobbying for mixed-use and walkability in Arizona [Mercato Libero News]
  

 

This week's most intriguing stories about urban planning, public spaces and citizen action.

• "Form Based Code" planning is being implemented in New England.  Is it all that different from Lifestyle Centers? [seacostonline.com]
• Will the country's mortgage crisis derail urban renewal? [Planetizen]
• Farmer's Market Champion brings healthy food to children and adults [insidebayarea.com]
• Locating and utilizing POPOS: Pushing the limits in San Francisco [New American City]
  
• The Blue Ridge AIA is holding a design competition in the City of Roanoke to better utilize public spaces and create sustainable conditions [Roanoke Urban Effect]
• NY's Governor Patterson signs brownfield legislation into effect, helping upstate New York cities redevelop responsibly  [SSG]
• Washington State designates Farmers Market Week [Tacoma Daily]
• Food Stamp acceptance at farmers markets leads to increase in crowds [Hollister Free Lance]
• If you ask developers for nothing in terms of public space, that's what you'll get! [Rebuilding Place in the Urban Space]
• "Protest Zones" designated for Beijing Olympics [Oread Daily]
• Public art policies in Ontario promote civic involvement [Sudbury Star]
• Atlanta program promotes access and authentic child play in public parks [Helping Hands Georgia]
  

                                                  Photo Source: NYC DOT

      The NYC Department of Transportation (DOT) launched a program recently that will transform underused New York City streets into lively and social public plazas. The program calls for non-profit organizations to partner with the DOT to develop and maintain the plazas. The program is part of Mayor Bloomberg's initiative to ensure that all New York City residents have a livable open space within a 10-minute walk from their home.

    The program is meant to improve quality of life for New York City residents by making walking spaces pleasant and attractive and by turning spaces that people now hurry to pass through into attractive destinations. The plazas will include features such as movable chairs, temporary art installations and event programming. They are also intended to give communities a say in the development of their neighborhoods and to revitalize businesses in the area.

    Compared to other major cities, New York has a relatively small amount green space per person. In New York, an area with 2.5 acres of park space per thousand people is considered well served by park space. Many New Yorkers, however, have access to as little as .09 acres per thousand people. The DOT Plaza Program will improve this ratio, and will give preference to communities in need of open space.

    The DOT encourages all types of non-profits with an interest in the program to apply for partnerships (applications can be found here).

• Want a New Public Plaza in Your Neighborhood? Apply Now. [Streetsblog]
  

  

 

 

Photo: Design by Field Operations and Diller Scofidio + Renfro. Courtesy of the City of New York.
 

Final designs for New York's High Line park were released on Wednesday. The park, which will run from Gansevoort Street to 34th street along the Hudson River on 1.45 miles of elevated rail tracks, is comprised of three phases. The first, which runs from Gansevoort Street to 20th Street is scheduled to be finished by the end of this year, and the second, which runs from 20th Street to 30th Street, should be finished by the end of 2009.

    The new designs show details on the first phase of the park, including the "slow stairs" that allow for access at the southern end of the park, pathways comprised of concrete planks that allow for natural plant growth around the edges, a two-level sun deck, and an art installation space.

    The designs carefully incorporate the existing elements of the site, including the elevation, the wild plants that grew while the tracks were abandoned, as well as its narrow width and its relation to the street. One of the design highlights is an area in which glass windows replace steel barriers, allowing High Line visitors a view of 10th Avenue, and pedestrians a view of the park.

Photo: Design by Field Operations and Diller Scofidio + Renfro. Courtesy of the City of New York.

    When completed, the park should be a prime example of a public space which is both highly designed and user-friendly. The opening of the High Line park has not been scheduled, as the third phase is still in planning.

• In Winds of Winter, Midair Park Takes Shape [www.nytimes.com]
  
• High Line Design [Friend of the High Line]
  

Following the lead of innovative cities such as Bogota, El Paso, Ottowa, Guadalajara and Paris, New York City is shifting its focus from cars to people on its streets.  Through its Summer Streets program, the city will close down a 6.9-mile stretch of road to cars on three consecutive Saturdays between the Brooklyn Bridge and East 72nd Street, creating an opportunity for safe cycling, walking and exploring.

The program is modeled off of Ciclovia, a similar initiative in Bogota, Colombia, that provides 70 miles worth of car-free streets each weekend to pedestrians and cyclists.  Now in its 32nd year, Ciclovia is considered to be an enormous success.

The road closure isn't favored by all.  Taxi drivers and business owners alike are concerned about the financial impact of their livelihoods.

The Summer Streets route will include stretches of Centre Street, Lafayette, Fourth Avenue and Park Avenue and will take place on August 9, 16 and 23 from 7am until 1pm.

Further Reading:

• Car-Free Streets, a Colombian Import, Inspire Debate [NY Times]
• City to Experiment with Car-Free Streets [CityRoom] 

In the June 2008 article, "Revolution in the Stacks," Governing magazine discusses the creative methods being embraced by libraries around the country in order to retain users and woo a younger generation.  Innovations include computer rooms that allow users to make and record music, play video games, and use digital photography and video equipment.  Some libraries have even eliminated the Dewey Decimal System, organizing books by category like they would be in a book store.

Movements towards services such as these position the modern library as a "Third Place" -- not home and not office, but a place where people like to spend a lot of their time. 

Governing interviewed PPS Vice President Cynthia Nikitin for the article!

Related information: 

• Libraries That Matter [PPS] 

East-1 Zhongshan Road in Shanghai's landmark Bund area is about to get a serious road diet. Decades ago, it was a tree-lined boulevard that served as a gateway to the region's financial and global trade core. Today, it looks more like a moat full of vehicle traffic that separates the waterfront from the majestic buildings facing the harbor and the vibrant city life further inland.

Ten lanes of traffic will be reduced down to four to create more pedestrian space, parks, shops and better linkages to surrounding areas, such as the Nanking Road shopping corridor - one of the busiest in the world. Most of the traffic will be redirected underground to a new tunnel, which will let through traffic vehicles bypass East-1 Zhongshan Road.

Currently, views of the Huangpu harbor from East-1 Zhongshan Road are blocked by raised levees and an elevated promenade. Visitors mostly come to the promenade to see the new skyline shaping up in the Pudong district across the Huangpu River.

The hope is to bring people to the area for many more activities than currently exist. The proposed design promises to improve the physical and visual connection to the water. 

Related Articles:
A New Look for the Bund [Shanghaiist]
Shanghai Waterfront Redesigned [Architecture Magazine] 

Photo Source: Monica Almeida/The New York Times

Related links:
Rethinking Bus Stops [Critical Planning, Spring 1999]
Transit Friendly Streets [PPS Website]
Benches [PPS Website]

Photo: Woonerf in Copenhagen, Denmark

The New York Times reports on ten progressive street designs that are challenging the traditional "street-curb-sidewalk motif," which has defined so many streets in NYC and around the world by giving priority to automobiles. The ten designs are:

1. Woonerfs
2. Play Streets 
3. Bicycle Boulevards  
4. Pavement Hierarchy 
5. Green Grid 
6. Mental Speed Bumps
7. Swaled Streets
8. Lanescapes 
9. Gentle Congestion 
10. Urban Acupuncture

Ethan Kent, PPS Vice President, who has been involved with the NYC Streets Renaissance Campaign, remarks:

"Let's go to the next level to create great streets that really draw the life of the communities they are meant to serve."

Some of the transportation reforms, like the conversion of a parking lot to a public plaza in DUMBO, have been met with overwhelming community support, while other proposals stir mixed reactions.   

More On Great Streets:
APA Great Streets in America
Book by Alan Jacobs
Greatstreets.org

 

Montreal is a city with an interesting mix of old colonial squares and new corporate plazas. A new approach to creating vibrant public places seems to be brewing. The focus is on simple and flexible designs that facilitate human activity rather than merely display great architectural achievements.

Gavin Affleck, a partner in the Montreal-based firm Affleck + de la Riva Architects and contributing editor for the monthly magazine Canadian Architect, writes:

"What public space is about is human activity; what it is not about is architectural objects. The great urban spaces of European cities are precisely that: spaces. What fills them is the ebb and flow of life–events, experiences, activities.

Rather than aesthetic, formal or visual concerns, the measure of success of a public space is the degree of vitality it achieves as a support for human activity." 

Despite the large number of Americans now living in cities, urban issues have been astonishingly absent from the U.S. presidential debates. PPS did a spoof article for Faking Places, the annual April Fool's Newsletter, in which Hillary, McCain and Obama make promises for more livable neighborhoods. The glaring omission of urban issues from the national discourse is actually no laughing matter.

The Philadelphia Inquirer reports:

"There are three times as many urbanites in America as country folk, yet you wouldn't know it listening to the three main presidential candidates, or perusing their Web sites. Instead, you might come away thinking the United States is a collection of Norman Rockwell small towns surrounded by picture-book farms."

Related Stories: 
The Candidates and the City [Gotham Gazette]
Urban Issues Get Short Shrift [Politico]
Candidates Largely Ignore Urban Issues [City Mayors]

 

The ambitious bicycle sharing program in Paris is a model for smart transportation policy. It is revolutionizing the city's street culture while also tackling rising energy costs and global climate change.

Renting stations are quickly becoming places to meet friends and strangers. Jay Walljasper, PPS  Senior Fellow and blogger for National Geographic's The Ecopolitan, writes:

"Borrowing a bright idea from Lyon, France, the city is developing what amounts to a two-wheeled version of the metro. You can pick up a bike at one of 1500 Velib (roughly, "free bike") stations around the city and ride it where you need to go for free or a nominal fee. Since last summer 15,000 bikes have been put on the streets, with another 5,000 to be added by the end of the year. The next step is adding more bike lanes and other improvements that make it easier and more fun to cycle around Paris."

Related Articles:
Paris Wins the ITDP Sustainable Transport Award [Streetsblog]
Paris Joins 2-Wheel Trend In Europe [New York Times]
European-style Bike Sharing Programs Head to US [AFP]

 

The Western Distributor in Sydney wouldn't be the first urban freeway to be dismantled so a community could access the waterfront. The Embarcadero Freeway in SF was demolished after an earthquake in 1989. The Miller Freeway in NYC has become a successful waterfront park and recreation area. And, tearing down the Central Artery in Boston created the possibility of reconnecting the rest of the city center to Rowe's Wharf, which now boasts unobstructed views of the Boston Harbor.

From the Press Release:
"Imagine a new green space almost the size of Hyde Park at Darling Harbour and the Western Distributor buried so the city is reconnected to our harbour.

This is just one of the visionary project ideas put forward as part of the City of Sydney's Sustainable Sydney 2030 vision."

David Engwicht is a livable streets philosopher and author. Creator of the Walking School Bus, Mental Speed Bumps and many other innovative ways of taming traffic and increasing pedestrian safety, he has taken on "the challenge of a lifetime" to revitalize the downtown district of Wodonga, a small city in Australia often referred to as "Struggle Town" in comparison to its sister city Albury just across the Murray River.

"Urban planner and lecturer at the University of Technology, Earl Bailey, says the chaos being created by vendors on the streets could be lessened if market areas were designed with pedestrian traffic more in mind, rather than motor vehicular.

'The reason why street vending is such a bad thing is because we are planning for motor vehicles rather than planning for people and their activities,' he argues."

Progressive Urban Management Associates (P.U.M.A.), along with several Denver-based collaborators, determines the top 10 global trends changing downtowns across the U.S. 

"The first decade of the new millennium is ushering in an era of unprecedented economic, social and political change. Changing demographics, lifestyles and global competition portend to have profound affects on our daily lives. How global changes will translate into challenges and opportunities in our downtown districts is difficult to foresee, particularly when we are preoccupied by managing local issues, politics and personalities."

"Public space is central to the political and social life of a city. Streets and squares are marketplaces for trade, places for discussion and demonstrations, for formal and informal meetings. Public spaces are democratic in essence: in them citizens have rights, defined only by national laws. They are places in which cities define their character, display their generosity, and show off. Erosion of public space undermines the very fabric of society."

"For four decades, activists for greener, safer NYC streets have scrounged at the margins of this automobilized streetscape. A few feet of traffic lanes converted to bike lanes, the occasional sidewalk extended to relieve a dangerous intersection — all important changes, but all within the context of streets that serve cars, first and foremost. But what would our streets look like if they were redesigned, building-to-building, to first accommodate walkers, bicyclists, the disabled and surface transit? The days of living at the margins are over: the Complete Streets revolution has begun.

The Complete Streets movement represents a newer, bolder approach to making streets safe, accessible and multi-modal. Advocates have shifted their tactics: Instead of improving streets one block or intersection at time, they are working towards new design standards that can be implemented on a grand scale as streets come up for reconstruction or resurfacing. In much the same way that the motor-vehicle lobby irrevocably altered streetscapes in the early 20th century, Complete Streets advocates are creating the blueprints for 21st century streets."

Orange County's oldest and arguably most urban cities – Anaheim and Santa Ana – outpace every other town in the O.C. when it comes to being a good place to take a walk, according to a new study published in Prevention magazine.

Anaheim and Santa Ana made it among the Top 10 walkable cities in California, based on an evaluation of more than 500 U.S. cities undertaken by Prevention and the American Podiatric Medical Association.

All around the country residents of communities large and small are complaining about haphazard development, ugly sprawl and the loss of a “sense of community” that makes the place they live special.

Passengers commuting to and from the North Shore aboard the SeaBus last Friday found themselves surrounded by a horde of pirates who congregated for an ocean-faring party in the middle of Burrard Inlet.

Over 300 people dressed as a variety of pirates stormed the Waterfront terminal in front of chuckling commuters and TransLink employees. The flash mob was organized almost entirely through the social networking site Facebook, which become essential for spontaneous guerilla pillow fights, art installations, and theme parties across the city.

Participants in the event, dubbed Pirates of the SeaBus, gathered at Waterfront Station and boarded two consecutive SeaBuses departing for Lonsdale Quay in North Vancouver. Upon arrival, they spilled out onto the docks and began dancing to old seafaring songs. Two live bands, the Creaki