Weekend Viewing

Courtesy of The Good City, this speech by Andres Duany should be required viewing. The speech looks like it happened in the early 1990’s, back when the idea of community planning (instead of traffic engineering) was completely revolutionary. My favorite picture is the tract housing adjacent to the strip mall that is separated by a …

Bio-Town USA Still Waiting for Boom

This article in the Star updates the Bio-Town USA project in Reynolds, Indiana. It is unfortunate that the state has chosen to go down the path of corn ethanol. It has the double whammy of raising food prices, as well as being a net energy loser. Out of all of the sources with the potential …

Proposal to Require Sidewalks

The Star has posted an editorial about a proposal to require sidewalks in Indianapolis. This is a good first step, even if it is sadly belated. However, I hope the city will look to go even further with our antiquated zoning laws. Sidewalks are at their best when they actually interact with buildings instead of …

A few new links:

I’ve added a few new links over the past month or so. I hope the readers of this blog will take advantage of them. Edibles: I can not find a proper link to Edibles in Irvington, but I have heard some good things about this marketplace. CIBA: How could I have not included CIBA?Post-Oil Survival …

Sometimes, It’s the Little Things

You would be forgiven if you missed this little blurb in the Indianapolis Business Journal on Monday. The blurb is 4 sentences long, but I believe it may say quite a bit about where we are headed. It mentions the rising price of asphalt, which is manufactured from oil. Counties are now looking at the …

Is a Sustainable Indianapolis possible?

I started this blog about a year ago. It started, like many blogs, as a therapeutic exercise. I needed an outlet. Now, I feel it is time to think about the central mission of this blog. It’s written right under the banner:”Dedicated to a sustainable Indianapolis.” With gas prices continuing to rise, it is starting …

New Rendering of Mass Ave project

The proposal at the east end of Mass Ave has a new rendering up on Property Lines. There are many things to like about this project as it sits, although I believe the Urbanophile has some legitimate criticism in the comments of the earlier post. However, it fits in well with my mantras: density, mixed-use, …

A couple of links for a slow period.

Gotta love Indiana weather. Nothing like getting teased by a Spring-like weekend day, then to be snapped right back into Winter with wind, ice and snow. Cruel. This article in the Project for Public Spaces is basically a reprint of the one posted on Streetsblog a year ago, but it’s always nice to see our …

Painted Bike Lanes: More harm than good?

DPW is scheduling a public meeting to discuss the implementations of bike lanes on New York and Michigan Streets. This seems like a good thing, but are painted bike lanes safe, or do they just give bikers the illusion of safety? Frequently linked Streetsblog seems to thing the latter. Their solution is physically separated bike …