Land Use

Photo by jennifer yin licensed under Creative Commons

Greater Greater Washington writes about where we live, work, and play, why we make the location choices we do, and what forces shape these places.

Many people would like to live in safe, diverse, walkable neighborhoods with access to transit, stores, parks, good schools, and other amenities. While our region has more walkable urban places than most, the demand still exceeds available housing, making these places more expensive (and prices keep rising rapidly).

We must ensure that there are enough housing choices so everyone who wants to live in such a neighborhood can choose to do so. We should ensure that housing in desirable areas is available to people at many points along the income spectrum, and take action to fight segregation. And we can improve the vitality of all neighborhoods by encouraging new retail and amenities to improve the quality of life for all residents.

  • Restoring Penn Station: Possible?

    In the 1960s, the beautiful Penn Station was torn down and replaced by the hideous Madison Square Garden, relegating America’s busiest train station to a cramped basement.  Now, New York is poised to build a new grand Moynihan Station on the west side of 8th Avenue, in the old Farley Post Office building that happens to have been designed by the same architects.  No…  Keep reading…

  • Which is better?

    Which street would you prefer?  Keep reading…

  • Three visions of the city

    As Boozy so entertainingly informed us, Le Corbusier’s vision for a city was the Radiant City, of rows of identical buildings and skyscrapers separated by parkland.  Robert Moses’ vision for the city included wide expressways (which eventually became choked with traffic) cutting across boulevards of urban renewal style projects.  And Jane Jacobs famously…  Keep reading…

  • Freeways that never were

    In the 1950s and 60s, urban planners were busy constructing freeways across America, through plains and mountains where they were needed, and into the centers of cities where they bulldozed vibrant communities and hastened sprawl and urban decay.  Keep reading…

  • More than a thousand words

    None but the most corrupt of politicians would think that moving Yankee Stadium over to a public park, farther from the highway, replacing that park with some space on top of garages and other parkland crammed up against the river far away from the neighborhood, and having the city kick in $70 million for this, could possibly be a good idea.  Keep reading…

  • Thin layer of ice found in hell

    Smart growth, transit-oriented development - there are many names for the idea of building mixed-use, walkable communities.  Whatever you call it, it’s starting to catch on in suburban communities from San Mateo to Silver Spring.  But most are areas with existing transit, near to already walkable cities.  What about America’s great bastions of…  Keep reading…

  • Westwood Station

    In Westwood, MA is the Route 128 rail station, a stop on Amtrak’s Acela and Regional trains between Boston and the rest of the Northeast Corridor cities to the south.  It is also a stop on the MBTA’s commuter rail, and immediately off Massachusetts’ Route 128, (in that area at least) better know to the rest of the country as I-95.  Keep reading…

  • Economists for sprawl?

    A Harvard economist, Edward Glaeser, got some press recently for a report he has written about the connection between land-use rules in Massachusetts towns and housing prices.  It’s really not much of a surprise that many towns, like Lincoln and Weston (among the richest towns in the Commonwealth) use land restrictions to keep their towns small and expensive.  Keep reading…

  • A backbone for people and bicycles

    I first read about this idea in the RPA’s analysis of congestion pricing, but now that traffic reduction ideas are a talked-about topic, another more radical idea has hit the blogs: closing Broadway to traffic.  Paul White of TA brings up the idea in a Gothamist interview, and MemeFirst follows up with some more detailed detailed thoughts.  Keep reading…

  • A conservative take on the importance of public spaces

    Consider two groups of people, both of whom call themselves “conservatives.”  One is the Republicans of Bush, Frist, DeLay, Enron, and the oil companies.  They believe that unregulated business and low taxes are the cures for all ills.  They also claim to believe in small government, but they really believe in big government that gives subsidies,…  Keep reading…

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