No doubt we can find whimsical people everywhere we go, but a established urban neighborhood, regardless of the socioeconomics, isn’t particularly likely to offer one of these: Somewhere, amidst the directional arrows for Key West, Cape May, and Bourbon Street, there seems to be a mailbox. And just down the street, there’s another oddity:Yes, the
Ever since it opened in late 2017, Washington DC’s mixed-use waterfront development known as The District Wharf (“The Wharf”) has become a premier attraction for locals and visitors who are in the know. Unlike so many riverfront investments in recent years, it doesn’t look like a single developer conceived it, even though it owes most
My first blog post in San Francisco is atypical (if anything about this blog topic could ever be considered typical), but it’s probably a significant one given the socioeconomic context. The wealthy core to one of the richest regions in the country—probably among the wealthiest in the world—San Francisco is also the only city I’m
Maybe your first thought, when you see the words in the photo below, is from the hirsute, late-80s metal band. Maybe it’s from the frequent references in the Roger Corman movie and subsequent off-Broadway musical Little Shop of Horrors. And maybe it’s the reference to the neighborhood just southeast of the heart of downtown Los
It’s not hard at all to see how housing has evolved over the last century, especially when we visit the residential areas right next to a city center and compare them to the ones a few miles further out in the suburbs. Far more difficult is the distinction between homes from the 1980s and those
Several months ago, a humdrum article of mine about a dead mall surprised me because of the response it received. But then, the joke is once again on me: my articles on dead malls nearly always enjoy disproportionate views, hits, and comments. In this case, I honed in on the Sears at Landmark Mall in
Most of us who have spent any time in a city have come across at least one of these before, even if it didn’t necessarily stand out. It’s a building (or cluster of buildings) with an aged façade, concealing a much more contemporary structure behind that wafer-like sheath. The preferred label (morphologically incorrect though it
In the immediate years following the housing market’s catastrophic implosion, it was common to find half-finished suburban developments, where a handful of homes splayed out across a tangle of curvilinear streets. In most of these zombie subdivisions, the developer had already installed water/sewer, at least some of the paved roads, streetlights, road signs, maybe even
My latest just went up at Urban Indy. I’ve covered the proposal multiple times in the past. A developer in a downtown Indianapolis neighborhood called Chatham Arch wants to repurpose the site of a long-underutilized old elementary school, occupying an entire block. It currently looks like this: He wants to transform it to this: A mix
Capitol Hill in Washington DC touts itself as one of the nation’s largest and most intact historic districts. Parts of it rest under the shadow of the dome of the U.S. Capitol (at least when the sun is setting), and the entirety of the neighborhood is a quick walk or subway ride to the National
No doubt we can find whimsical people everywhere we go, but a established urban neighborhood, regardless of the socioeconomics, isn’t particularly likely to offer one of these: Somewhere, amidst the directional arrows for
Ever since it opened in late 2017, Washington DC’s mixed-use waterfront development known as The District Wharf (“The Wharf”) has become a premier attraction for locals and visitors who are in the know.
My first blog post in San Francisco is atypical (if anything about this blog topic could ever be considered typical), but it’s probably a significant one given the socioeconomic context. The wealthy core
Maybe your first thought, when you see the words in the photo below, is from the hirsute, late-80s metal band. Maybe it’s from the frequent references in the Roger Corman movie and subsequent
It’s not hard at all to see how housing has evolved over the last century, especially when we visit the residential areas right next to a city center and compare them to the
Several months ago, a humdrum article of mine about a dead mall surprised me because of the response it received. But then, the joke is once again on me: my articles on dead
Most of us who have spent any time in a city have come across at least one of these before, even if it didn’t necessarily stand out. It’s a building (or cluster of
In the immediate years following the housing market’s catastrophic implosion, it was common to find half-finished suburban developments, where a handful of homes splayed out across a tangle of curvilinear streets. In most
My latest just went up at Urban Indy. I’ve covered the proposal multiple times in the past. A developer in a downtown Indianapolis neighborhood called Chatham Arch wants to repurpose the site of a
Capitol Hill in Washington DC touts itself as one of the nation’s largest and most intact historic districts. Parts of it rest under the shadow of the dome of the U.S. Capitol (at