Category Archives: Urban Planning

The Too-Smart City (Probably) Won’t Be a Problem. The Too-Privatized City Would Be

Posted on May 31, 2013 by

Recently, The Boston Globe had an interesting article about the rise of the ‘smart city.’ What’s a smart city? This: Cassandras’s scheme is just one step in the march toward what futurists and urban planners call the “smart city”—a wired, … Continue reading →

Posted in Civil Liberties, Urban Planning | 1 Comment

There Was a Time People Thought Interstates Through the Middle of Cities Were a Good Thing

Posted on May 15, 2013 by

Admittedly, that time was 1954: From Inventing the Charles River by Karl Haglund I know a lot of people think the Big Dig was a bad idea, but I see it as a ‘clawback’ for decades of intentional destruction of … Continue reading →

Posted in Boston, Transportation, Urban Planning

Density and Democratic Voters: A Correlation Meets a Possible Cause

Posted on December 2, 2012 by

I’ve never been a big fan of Richard Florida’s work on the ‘creative class’, since I think it underestimates the importance of money in the revitalization of our cities (that is, rent extraction and federal spending have shoveled lots of … Continue reading →

Posted in Democrats, Transportation, Urban Planning

Republicans to Cities: Drop Dead

Posted on July 13, 2012 by

If conservatives who live in fire country want to underfund their fire departments, well, that’s stupid, but one of the joys of a federalist system. But could they please stop fucking with those of us who actually want stuff to … Continue reading →

Posted in Conservatives, Economics, Transportation, Urban Planning | 3 Comments

Urban Density for Humans and the Five Story Rule

Posted on July 10, 2012 by

A while ago, I described how Boston manages to have high residential density without a lot of skyscrapers (boldface added): Here we see that Beacon Hill, parts of Back Bay and the South End, the North End and Bay Village … Continue reading →

Posted in Boston, Housing, Urban Planning | 4 Comments

Hitting Pedestrians Wasn’t Always an ‘Accident’: How Crossing the Street Became a Crime

Posted on May 4, 2012 by

One of the things that makes many,though not all, cities work is that they’re geared towards pedestrians. Unfortunately, our traffic laws along with our attitudes towards automobile-pedestrian collisions haven’t caught up to this reality. Actually, it’s more accurate to say … Continue reading →

Posted in Automobiles, Transportation, Urban Planning

D.C.’s Housing Crisis Isn’t Due to the Absence of Skyscrapers

Posted on May 2, 2012 by

Recently, a Washington Post op-ed argued that D.C. should alter the building height limitation: And while certainly many factors affect the cost of housing in the city (such as demand, crime rates, school quality and proximity to public transportation), it … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Boston, Urban Planning | 1 Comment

Cities Haven’t Figured Out How to Accomodate the Upper-Middle Class (Yet?)

Posted on March 17, 2012 by

I recently discussed yet another person who makes more than most of us would ever think imaginable and who, nonetheless, believes he is in dire straits. What’s interesting is that, based on my anecdotal perusal of these complaints, they seem … Continue reading →

Posted in Education, Urban Planning

The Vanishing of Boston’s West End

Posted on March 4, 2012 by

Well, it’s still there, it’s just ass ugly. In 1959, the West End of Boston, which had been declared a slum, was revitalized. Here’s what it looked like in 1958: (from the West End Museum, Boston) Here, it is, all … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Boston, Museums etc., Urban Planning | 1 Comment

How to Get High Urban Density Without Lots of Skyscrapers

Posted on January 21, 2012 by

I’ve argued before that we can’t be serious about combating global warming until we recognize that population density is key–the key–to reducing energy use. Don’t worry: as Atrios likes to joke, I’m not trying to turn your suburb into mid-town … Continue reading →

Posted in Boston, Urban Planning | 5 Comments