The Congress for the New Urbanism

The Seaside Institute's prestigious Seaside Prize celebrates individuals who have made significant contributions to the fields of architecture, urban planning, and community development. The 2025 Seaside Prize will recognize Ellen Dunham-Jones and June Williamson. The celebration will take place February 7 through February 9, 2025, with a variety of events and symposia. Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gQfHKWdM

There is ONE WEEK left to submit projects to the #2025CharterAwards. Professional projects, emerging projects and student projects are all strongly encouraged to apply.

Public Square is highlighting top articles from 2024. Walkability plans have tremendous potential to revive downtowns and core neighborhoods through a series of clear and quickly implementable changes to city streets. Walkability expert Jeff Speck outlines these steps, which include installing road diets and protected bike lanes, converting one-way streets to two-way, replacing traffic signals with stops signs, and more. Because 20th Century street changes allocate too much space to motor vehicles, allowing them to move too fast, the walkability plan restores balance to public streets. It may also improve the experience of drivers.

Public Square is highlighting top articles from 2024. States like Texas and Florida are growing rapidly as residents of California and other states move for various reasons including lower cost of living, often bringing their cultural and marketplace preferences along. Based in Dallas-Fort Worth, Wei Liu calls the migration “Texafornia,” and he argues that mixed-use development is critical to avoid the level of sprawl experienced by California metro areas. https://lnkd.in/eET_XCfH

Since 2001, CNU’s annual Charter Awards have been the preeminent award for excellence in urban design. Ring in the New Year with a submission to the 25th annual Charter Awards! https://lnkd.in/eJDa7ejF

Public Square is highlighting top articles from 2024. The small city of Greer, South Carolina, shows the magic that can be worked by improving downtown streets. A design firm studied connectivity, parking, placemaking, and open space, creating a plan that the city implemented to transform the entire downtown.

Public Square is highlighting top articles from 2024. Cottage courts, also called pocket neighborhoods, are small single houses built around a green space. This “missing middle” type is a highly social way to build housing. Residents share a common outdoor living room, which allows residents to get to know and support one another. The cottage court also enables higher density, groups parking together out of the way, and is adaptable to many kinds of urban and suburban locations. Here's a great example in Edmond, Oklahoma:

Public Square is highlighting top articles from 2024. The greatest barrier to building walkable urbanism is traffic engineering. Some might say zoning, but land-use regulations are far easier to change than streets. In the most important land planning book of 2024, Wes Marshall traces the history of traffic engineering, explaining why the profession is a major barrier to healthy, livable cities and towns. Killed by a Traffic Engineer makes the most powerful case ever for reforming traffic engineering and street design.

Public Square is highlighting top articles from 2024. The 15-minute city is a planning concept that has captured attention worldwide. This article puts that idea in the context of the 5-minute neighborhood and argues that suburbs need a 20-minute version that suits their more dispersed geography.

Public Square is highlighting top articles from 2024. The most bang-for-the-buck in land-use regulatory reform is found in the area of parking. A tiny re-write of parking regulations can have a huge impact on a city. Norman, Oklahoma, devised a very efficient way of changing its parking regs. Read about it below: