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September 15, 2009Gabriel Metcalf Shares Thoughts on SPUR's History, Nonprofit Management and Social Change BY JULIE KIM Maureen Futtner of the San Francisco Examiner asks SPUR Executive Director Gabriel Metcalf about the trajectory of his career (from SPUR intern to Executive Director), the role of optimisim in affecting social change and his thoughts on what makes a great city leader.
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September 8, 2009Earthquake Resilience, One Building at a Time BY DAVID BONOWITZ Twenty years after Loma Prieta, are we better prepared for our next big earthquake? A new website takes a grassroots approach to the question. The site lets anyone post photos and descriptions of retrofitted buildings on a Google-based map. It launched in mid-August with an eye on the October anniversary. Results from the first two weeks are compelling: hundreds of structures, everything from houses to high-rises, posted by owners, engineers, contractors--and even local governments...
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August 13, 2009Moving Cooler BY LAURA TAM, SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT POLICY DIRECTOR Transportation-related greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are the fastest growing source of emissions in the U.S., and are currently responsible for almost 30% of the nation's total GHG output. A new ULI report, Moving Cooler, presents different strategies for making our transportation systems more sustainable. It proposes nine categories for improvement, including pricing/taxes, land use and smart growth, transit improvements, ridesharing, intelligent systems, and more. Going beyond...
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July 13, 2009Norwegian Highway Art BY MARY Should you be driving on the highway in rural northwest Norway keep your eyes peeled for more than just the natural beauty. The Norwegian national road agency is in the midst of a $1.6 billion project that attempts to lure tourists to this often over-looked area by highlighting the landscape with architecture--in the shape of viewpoints, rest stops, benches, winding foot bridges and stairs leading you to the sea. It has already hired more than 45 architects, landscape architects and...
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July 1, 2009A Guide to California's SB 375 BY LAURA TAM, SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT POLICY DIRECTOR NRDC has just released a guide to SB 375, the nation's first legislation to link transportation and land use planning with global warming. The goal of this legislation is to foster development patterns that reduce the need to drive. Household transportation is the single largest and fastest-growing source of global warming pollution in California. SB 375 will also help save money for households and taxpayers (through reduced infrastructure costs), reduce air pollution, conserve water...
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June 30, 2009A Primer on Federal Climate Policy BY LAURA TAM, SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT POLICY DIRECTOR Our friends at the Sightline Institute in Cascadia have put together a primer on the federal climate bill, aka the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES), aka Waxman-Markey, that passed the U.S. House of Representatives late last week. Cap and Trade 101 features what you need to know about cap and trade, pollution auctioning, offsets, and why national climate legislation is good for families. For one slightly technical analysis of the bill, also check out Sightline's blog...
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June 25, 2009Relax in Times Square BY MARY Times Square has under gone a transformation lately, with lounge chairs replacing traffic and conversations replacing honking taxis. This coned-off chunk off Broadway is one of a number of experiments with public space happening around the city. New York City's Department of Transportation is trying out various spots to see where roads currently set aside for traffic could be turned over to pedestrian and bikes without serious disruption. Like the project in Times Square, the first...
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June 23, 2009Raising the Bar, and the Park BY MARY Earlier this month, after ten years of advocacy from neighbors, activists and artists alike, the first of three sections of New York's High Line park opened for visitors. The 1.45 mile-long park is situated on a defunct 19th century elevated train track that used to carry cattle into the Meatpacking District, but had been left standing since 1980, when nature adopted it, and turned it wild with grasses and wildflowers--a magical place for those who knew about it. James Corner,...
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June 17, 2009A better, or at least higher, use of open space - posted by Laura We spend much of our days with a roof over our heads, but rarely think of how roof exteriors could be so much more than just a weather shield. The growing urban rooftop farming movement just may change that. An article in today's New York Times describes how the green roof movement and the healthy food movement are converging. City policies can play a role in acclerating plantings - Chicago and New York provide tax incentives - though the urban farmers surveyed in the article admit rooftop...
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June 16, 2009One Way to Manage Shrinking Cities BY LAURA TAM, SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT POLICY DIRECTOR The UK Guardian recently reported from beleaguered Flint, Mich., on a new plan to shrink the city by actually bulldozing unused buildings and neighborhoods. The idea is to concentrate the dwindling population and city services into a smaller area, or as Detroit has envisioned, many smaller urban centers separated by "forests and meadows". This proposal is apparently attracting the attention of the Obama administration. Is this is a budget-wise coping strategy, a plan...
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