Category: real estate
More Encouraging Economic News
OK, the signs are still modest, but at least they’re headed in the right direction. Reuters reports that recent REIS data shows that office vacancy rates are declining in the nation’s technology centers: During the first quarter, the average New York office rent rose 1.4 percent to $47.22 per square foot. Over the past 12 [...]
Local Land-Use Policies Hurt US Innovation
That seems to be the implication of 3 books on the role of cities in economic development in the 21st Century reviewed by Ezra Klein over at the Washington Post‘s Wonkblog, Ezra Klein reviews . In “Triumph of the City,”’ Harvard economist Ed Glaeser details how cities all over the world have supercharged human development [...]
Symptoms of Urban Land Use Problems
Over at the Global Urbanist (via Planetizen), Ann Deslandes has a post on informal users of urban space that can range from so-called (and widely celebrated) “pop-up shops” of “do-it-yourself” (DIY) urbanists to the homeless population. She makes the interesting argument that they are positive and negative symptoms of the same urban land use problem: [...]
Re-inventing Downtown Vegas as an Innovation Hub?
Sometimes an American oligarch comes up with an interesting idea that may help a community. BusinessWeek reports on one of the latest: Tony Hsieh, the soft-spoken chief executive officer of shoe and apparel site Zappos.com (a division of Amazon.com) (AMZN) wants to turn the often overlooked and economically depressed downtown area into a dense urban [...]
Good news: Downtowns are Winning!
Do you remember when it seemed inevitable that shopping malls were going to completely destroy downtown shopping districts? Well, it looks like the malls have lost: For more than 50 years, retailers favored the rows of boxy single-story shops opening onto a common parking lot facing major roadways bringing commuters driving between their suburban homes [...]
Interesting Video on Innovative Planning Techniques
This video summarizes the latest smart growth techniques–from 1959. The film describes many of the same situations we are facing today, and highlights “cutting edge” planning tools that are still being promoted in the planning profession to this day. Hmmmm. . . .is this good news or bad news? Via Planetizen.
