Houses of worship are experiencing a great emptying, becoming disconnected from their communities as congregations shrink. Jane Jacobs had some ideas that could help churches and their cities thrive.
Some center cities are coming back from the pandemic, with residential populations increasing even as many continue to work from home. While restaurants and retail are still suffering, it seems fair to speculate that something meaningful is happening.
Our regions may be entering a new era in which they simply try to maintain what they have, or manage their decline. It’s going be harder for urban and suburban leaders to rise to the top by attracting new major corporate tenants.
With its residents upset by crime, homelessness and high taxes, it’s become a depressed and discouraging place. Can it once again be a shining exemplar of modern urbanist success?
Over the past couple of decades, coffeehouses became centers of sociability and community life. In the wake of the virus, many of them are switching to a grab-and-go model. Can anything replace these vital “third places”?
People love to be close to a lake, a river or an ocean, and waterfronts can be a major urban achievement. Why have so many cities done a poor job of cultivating this amenity?
You can make the case that it is, and not just in size. Every city is distinctive in some way, but nothing comes close to New York in the breadth and depth of its demographics, neighborhoods and culture.
The old buildings that housed multiple sellers under a single roof were more than just places to shop. They were community-making institutions.
A term that once referred only to housing now encompasses everything from politics to economic life to the disappearance of community. But the center is still out there somewhere.
No one disputes that we need more housing. But the YIMBY movement has a broader set of goals that would threaten the tradition of local land use decisions in America.
They have a long history, and they have been our "public living room." Some cities and towns that have lost their central gathering places are trying to re-create them.
It seems logical that we would be rushing to turn vacant office buildings into apartments and condos. So far it’s not happening on a large scale, but there are reasons to think it’s in our urban future.
Without both, a new book argues, a community can’t achieve its highest purpose. Some cities and suburbs have managed to combine them. Most are finding it difficult.
America’s third-largest city has a plenitude of problems. But it has great advantages as well.
Neighborhood change is unsettling. Whose fault is that? Maybe nobody’s.
Corporate investment can be an economic boon to low-income communities. It can also be a cultural threat.
