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At Notre Dame, Coming of Age For Young New Urbanists

by Keith SchneiderOctober 11, 2007October 11, 20074

Â I visited South Bend earlier this month to join a group of students from Notre Dame and several more of the nation’s best universities who held the first Congress of the Students for New Urbanism. TheÂ University of Notre DameÂ School of Architecture,Â it turns out, was an apt choice for the gathering. Notre Dame reframed its architectural curriculum several decades ago to concentrate on traditional neighborhood and urban design, one of the few architectural schools to …

Green Neighborhood Grant Act in Illinois

by Keith SchneiderJuly 2, 2007October 31, 20073

Illinois, our neighbor to the west, has been doing a lot of things right of late for its residents, environment, and economy. It makes a Michigan resident a bit jealous.Â The Center for Neighborhood Technology and Bethel New Life, for example, convinced the Chicago Transit Authority to rebuild rather than tear down the elevated Green Line in the 1990s,Â helping to promote the revival of the city’s West Side. Chicago Mayor Richard Daley turned a tree-planting campaign …

The Michigan Crisis: Ideology Not Intelligence

by Keith SchneiderJune 3, 2007June 4, 20072

Â Late on the Friday night before the Memorial Day weekend, Republican and Democratic lawmakers in Michigan reached agreement with Democratic Governor Jennifer M. Granholm on a very temporary fix to close an $800 million state budget deficit. The deficit, for those who might be unfamiliar, is what happens whenÂ what the state earns in tax revenue doesn’t keep up with what itÂ spends on programs.Â Next fall theÂ crisis worsens when lawmakers look down the raw throat of …

Cities Punch Above Their Weight Economically

by Keith SchneiderMay 23, 2007May 30, 20071

Â Here areÂ two more reasonsÂ why Michigan and the American Midwest are slipping to backwater status in the United States, and whyÂ we can’t give up on the capacity of our governor and state lawmakers toÂ helpÂ work Michigan out of its economic mess.Â Fact one, according to a new analysis by the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution:Â Six of theÂ 80 old industrial cities lagging far behind in economic performance, population growth, job creation, and business development are …

Laura Dunn Directs The Unforeseen

by Keith SchneiderMay 10, 2007May 10, 20075

Laura Dunn, a young Yale-educated directorÂ (see pix) whoÂ lives in Austin, Texas, is creating aÂ stir at some of the country’s important film festivals, includingÂ Sundance,Â with The Unforeseen, a feature-length documentary about the consequences of runaway development and sprawl. Writer Dennis Conroy, who saw The Unforeseen at the San Francisco Film Festival last month, offered this assessment: “A modest real estate developer, [Gary] Bradley had big ideas. His concept was the 4,000-acre Circle C Ranch, an upscale subdivisionâ€”a …

The Proximate Principle: Open Space is Sound Fiscal Policy

by Keith SchneiderMay 7, 2007May 7, 20073

Â People adore parks.Â Most people also love open space. That applies even to the three Grand Traverse (MI) County commissioners who last month suggested that global climate change was a leftist conspiracy ginned up by Al Gore, and suggested that emailing the sun was a useful antidote.Â A comprehensive study by the San Francisco-based Trust For Public Land, published in early March,Â Â found sound economic evidence forÂ why regions thatÂ embrace an aggressiveÂ program of park development and open …

Email the Sun

by Keith SchneiderApril 25, 2007April 25, 20075

Â New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, one of a select number of Republican leaders in the United States who makes any sense, turned up at the American Museum of Natural History on Sunday to deliver an Earth Day plan for his city that should be the basic text for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in the United States. A full account of the 127 steps the mayor proposed is here. The big pieces …

Build High Speed Rail in the Midwest

by Keith SchneiderApril 23, 2007April 25, 200722

Â Since 1996, nine states in the American Midwest have been gradually inching forward on a proposal to establish a 3,000-mileÂ high speed train network linking 100 of theÂ region’s big and small cities.Â Chicago would serve as the hub of the The Midwest Regional Rail System. Spokes would include Detroit, Indianapolis, Minneapolis, St. Louis, Columbus, Des Moines, and many other large cities served by trains capable of traveling 110 mph, which would make the travel time and …

Thinking Big in Knoxville, Tulsa, Salt Lake City

by Keith SchneiderApril 10, 2007April 12, 20070

KNOXVILLE — From his office on the fifth floor of the Knoxville City County building, Dave Hill looks across the Tennessee River toÂ 350 acres and more than two miles of riverfront. None ofÂ it is enchanting. Yet all of itÂ essentialÂ to this mid-size southern city’s plan to be a green, clean, energy efficient, and lovely statement about America’s capacity to build the century’s new world class urban centers. As my Manhattan mother might say: “Knoxville? Where’sÂ Knoxville?” …

Smart Growth and Gentrification

by Keith SchneiderApril 5, 20070

For as long as I’ve been involved in understanding the dimensions of urban disinvestment, as well as the solutions, one more civic concern has always lurked in the shadows. That’s gentrification, the process by which wealthier people interested in moving back into a city use buying power and sway to push the poor out of their homes. As a journalist, public policy specialist, and citizen of America I’ve personally experienced almost every side of this …