Streetsblog USA

There’s nothing worse than buying bags and bags of Halloween candy and then no one comes trick-or-treating at your door. (Hmm, scratch that -- there are definitely worse things.) But anyway. You know your neighborhood leaves something to be desired if you don’t have little ghosts and princesses banging on your door tonight.

“This is a money and power grab.”

Houston-based architecture firm SWA Group has heads spinning today: Is their proposal to build a bikeway next to the Keystone Pipeline pure satire or a serious attempt to "bike-wash" the most reviled fossil fuel distribution project of our day?

Why raise desperately needed transportation funds for a broke region when you could let people drive for free? In Georgia, the state has made up its mind: The DOT will pay $4.5 million to tear down tolls on GA 400 -- and forfeit the $21 million a year the tolls brought in.

When selecting a parking lot along the Kansas City streetcar line as the site for a 50-unit, five-story apartment building, Boulder-based developer Linden Street Partners was clear: “The streetcar is the big thing that drew us, absolutely,” the company's Scott Richardson told the Kansas City Star. “We like the demographics and the economic trends. I walked the area and liked the site.”

The group that brought you the Urban Bikeway Design Guide and the Urban Street Design Guide is expanding.

When researchers look at the reasons behind the downward trend in driving rates in the U.S., they look at several demographics: young people who prefer urban living and are getting into biking, or baby boomers who have picked a more vibrant place to spend their retirement.

The suburbs are changing. As cities grow in population and the poverty once associated with urban areas becomes more widely dispersed, even the meaning of "the suburbs" is evolving in the popular consciousness.