Category: planning
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The Incredible Shrinking City
In response to a recent post on Detroit, David Jurca from the Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative (CUDC) directed me to the very cool Shrinking Cities Institute at Kent State University which “…seeks to examine more sustainable approaches to development and explore the idea of planned shrinkage as an alternative to the quest for continuous growth.”…
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Detroit: Urbanist Opportunity
An interesting post via the Sustainable Cities Collective from Kaid Benfield asks the provocative question “Is Detroit (the city) a lost cause environmentally? Altogether?” and again makes me wonder why it is that Detroit seems to always get framed in thoughts of negativity, versus thinking of it as a potential opportunity to redefine the way…
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Cause & Effect
Early in my career, I had the great opportunity to work at a firm that specialized in park and recreation planning, which not only gave a fabulous perspective on municipal planning (and reinforced my love of both the large ad the small scale) as well as the inventive use of mapping to illustrate particular schema.…
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DailyLand: Flowing Garden
Flowing Garden: Xi’an World Horticultural ExpoPlasma Studio> more at Arch Daily, Bustler, SpaceInvading, Inhabitat :: images via Arch Daily Some description: “Although the buildings are experienced as individual elements, they are connected through the relationship they each have with the landscape. The buildings are specifically situated into the site at certain points to illustrate specific…
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Peril of the Forgotten
One of the most amazing and sad sights from my trip last year to Detroit was a swing ’round the disheveled and crumbling Michigan Central Depot, a massive train station built by the same architects responsible for NYC’s iconic Grand Central Station. With it’s monumental scale and litany of busted out windows, our group was…
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Alt/Urbs
A kind commenter directed me to the site Alt/Urbs. An online journal billed as ‘an electronic potlatch’, the site is open for submissions of unpublished work related to ‘alternative urbanization, design, and radical urban geography’. It’s an interesting usage of the term ‘potlach‘ to describe the process – but overall the idea is good… and…
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Pringle Creek + the Gravel Verge
Building on some recent posts on the SEA streets in Seattle, and Crown Street in Vancouver, BC, a few images of Pringle Creek – the uber sustainable community in Salem, Oregon. A significant feature is the use of the gravel verges – popularized by Patrick Condon these curbless sections allow infiltration on the edges of…
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Illustrating the Urban Condition
From a representational point-of-view, it is interesting to see some of the ways in which representation plays a vital role in communication. I’ll inevitably revisit this some more, as it’s a topic worth exploring, but these examples span the photographic to the planimetric, while encapsulating a wide range of messages. To begin, it’s always interesting…
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Urban Typologies – Freeway Field Guide
This was one of those posts you immediately fall in love with as someone with a penchant for infrastructure and urbanism. We love naming typologies and objets d’urbanity, so when poignantly topical blog The Infrastructurist offered this two-part series on ‘A Field Guide to Freeway Interchanges’ I decided to devour it, then share some of…
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Wilderness, Continued…
Book Review continued from Part I: Reading List: Wilderness and the American MindAldo Leopold’s ideas of a ‘land ethic’ and ‘ecological conscience’ offered a touchstone for a new movement – giving birth to the idea of instilling Americans with a love and respect for their land. While mostly known for the amazing work ‘A Sand…