I started reading Fogelson's Downtown with the intention of learning more about elevated trains, and though I've been slightly disappointed in that regard (more to come on that after I finish and attempt a more comprehensive review), he does include a lot of interesting history. I'm posting this … [Read more...]
Parking lots as tax arbitrage during the Great Depression
I've learned a lot from Fogelson's Downtown, but one thing that I had absolutely no idea about before I read this book was how Depression-era tax policies encouraged downtown landlords to tear down their buildings and replace them with parking lots (emphasis mine): By the mid 1930s the owners of … [Read more...]
New Years link list
Behold, your first link list of 2011! 1. The automobile may officially in decline (very good article!). 2. Interesting parallels between China and its HSR intellectual property disputes and post-WWII Japan and Korea. More here. 3. Fred Barnes writes a stupid article for the Weekly Standard … [Read more...]
The environmental review strikes again: Lake Oswego edition
Lake Oswego, a suburb of Portland where development began over a hundred years ago, has learned the hard way about the strings that come with taking federal money: In the dim light of recent news and numbers, you've probably forgotten that the Lake Oswego streetcar was, once upon a time, a project … [Read more...]
Mohamed Atta as urban planner, and more from the Middle East
The NYT has an interesting article on urban planning developments in Aleppo, Syria (the largest city in the Levant – bigger than Beirut, Tel Aviv, Damascus, and Amman!), which includes this section about the history of planning in the Middle East, with a development-as-preservation lesson at the … [Read more...]
Systemic Failure on HSR
One of many reasons why high-speed rail in America is doomed, from Systemic Failure: When DB or Renfe or even SNCF needs to buy a high-speed train, they simply call up Siemens (or Alstom or Talgo) and order some trains. Simple as that. Customization consists of painting a logo on the outside, and … [Read more...]
Calling your opponents “socialists” and “un-American” is as American as skyscrapers
It's pretty amusing to me that liberals today are still whining about being called "socialists," considering the charge is at least a century old. Here one example from Robert Fogelson's excellent Downtown chapter on height restrictions around the turn of the century: The Post voiced especially … [Read more...]
Vancouver shows how seeking community amenities from developers can go horribly wrong
A lot of time I hear liberal urbanists claiming that trading development rights for community amenities (I'd definitely include affordable housing mandates here) is a win-win situation, but there's a real danger of killing the goose that laid the golden egg, as appears to be happening in … [Read more...]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 25
- 26
- 27
- 28
- 29
- …
- 38
- Next Page »