Formerly home to an abandoned factory, the site’s contaminated soil was remediated and recycled, as was existing concrete. Each house in the neighborhood has a high energy-efficiency rating and priority was given to non-toxic, locally sourced materials during construction. The competitively priced homes are connected by pedestrian-friendly streets and shared public spaces, though they also have private gardens, terraces, and roof gardens.

Source: TreeHugger.

Nordahl has a raft of suggestions, many based on real-world efforts of transit officials and planners to lure people out of their cars. Some are whimsical (like slides in train stations, something they’ve actually tried in the Netherlands, or fruit-shaped bus shelters, which have popped up in Japan). Some are more substantive, such as making transit stations into great civic spaces, as in the case of the Transbay Transit Center, scheduled to open in San Francisco in 2017

Source: The Atlantic Cities.

Most of the Kickstarter projects under the Design tab congregate around the themes of bikes, cheese, typography and iAnything, yet there is now a subset of urban interventions. A plastic tent for a livability conference in Prague. Uni, a portable open-air reading room for New York. A rooftop farm in Mumbai. The filtration system for +Pool.

What do these projects have in common? First, they are in famous cities. Second, they access hot-button urban topics: rooftop farms, reclaimed railroads, (self-reflexively) urban conversation itself. And third, they are gizmos. Critic Reyner Banham, in the oft-quoted essay “The Great Gizmo” posited that it wasn’t massive infrastructure projects that changed our world, but devices. Urbanism would lose out to industrial design. And that’s just what’s happening on Kickstarter. You wouldn’t Kickstart a replacement bus line for Brooklyn, but you might Kickstart an app to tell you when the bus on another, less convenient line might come. You can’t Kickstart affordable housing, but the really cool tent for the discussion thereof. Gizmo is close to gimmick, and worthy goals have to be dressed up in complex geometries for Kickstarter.

Source: Design Observer.

Via: McFarlin Law

The center, designed by Renzo Piano and Peter Walker, was considered so appealing that a 42-story condominium called Museum Tower sprouted across the street. But the glass skin of the condo tower, still under construction, now reflects so much light that it is threatening artworks in the galleries, burning the plants in the center’s garden and blinding visitors with its glare.

Source: NYTimes.

An unfortunate problem that the museum’s architect can do nothing about but this is a mess than the city officials created. That’s why you need a holistic planning approach when you’re revitalizing a block.

Paralyzed five years ago, the renowned architect and designer talks about his favorite medical devices, having a wheelchair flat at LAX, and designing his own line of medical equipment.

Source: Interview with Michael Graves.

Not exactly urban planning but design should be everywhere and Michael Graves gets it.

A really cool and innovative design to combine a wheelchair access ramp and the stairs. This way, all people share access and the disabled aren’t relegated to a distant hidden access way.

Source: Reddit.

There are feelings you get when you enter an Ikea store. The vertiginous experience of getting lost in their craftily designed labyrinth. The surprise of wandering into something you hadn’t intended to buy. The discomfiting almost-warmth of a fake apartment. The faintly reassuring sense that your children and your car are in someone else’s hands. Then the odd realization that you’re really inside a high-security structure on the distant edge of town.

Source: The Globe and Mail.

Google celebrates Mies van der Rohe’s 126th birthday.

Purchasing a home is cheaper than renting in 98 out of the 100 largest U.S. metropolitan areas, a survey by real estate site Trulia showed.

Source: San Francisco Chronicle.