The Ludwig von Mises Institute publishes a podcast performed by Jeff Riggenbach called "The Libertarian Tradition", which discusses significant figures in the libertarian movement. The most recent edition is dedicated to Jane Jacobs, who's ideas are highly regarded by many libertarians, despite the … [Read more...]
Old Urbanist on the failure of Boston’s newest park
Old Urbanist is one of my favorite urbanist blogs (and not just because of the name), and Charlie's got a post up about Boston that I think has a good market urbanist lesson in it. He describes how the formerly elevated Central Artery, buried by the Big Dig, was replaced with a park, with nobody … [Read more...]
Even Jane Jacobs thought Houston doesn’t have zoning
"Houston has no zoning" is a very popular urban planning meme. It has its roots in Houston's lacks one very specific kind of zoning: Euclidean separation of residential, commercial, and industrial uses. Euclidean zoning happens to be the one kind of planning that people easily understand (the whole … [Read more...]
Links, links, links!
1. An bill that would replace New Jersey's court-mandated patchwork of inclusionary zoning programs with a more uniform 10% affordable housing mandate has left advanced through its Assembly committee after passing the NJ Senate, though Chris Christie promised to veto it. 2. Last month I reported … [Read more...]
Correction, Reason.org’s Plug, and Glaeser on Jacobs
In the comments of my most recent post, insightful commenter, OldUrbanism pointed out some items that need attention: The last two factors, legal costs associated with eminent domain and opportunity costs of land, are in fact often included in typical project cost estimates for both public and … [Read more...]
Rothbard the Urbanist Part 5: Diversity and Discrimination
This 5th installment of the Rothbard Series dovetails well with the most recent post on segregation by guest blogger, Stephen Smith, as well as a post back in July over at Austin Contrarian. If you haven’t kept up with our discussion, Murray Rothbard’s classic For A New Liberty can be … [Read more...]
Rothbard the Urbanist Part 2: Safe Streets
The recent post, Public Education’s Role in Sprawl and Exclusion generated some interest and fantastic comments. I recommend reading Murray Rothbard's For a New Liberty in its entirety. It is elegant in its consistently radical application of principles. It is available for free from the Mises … [Read more...]
The Nature of the Living City
Sandy Ikeda posted an abstract for a short essay he is contributing to a Festschrift honoring Jane Jacobs. He quite eloquently describes the nature of the living city: A city is not a man-made thing. Rather, it emerges from the actions of its inhabitants, who interact in … [Read more...]