Cleveland Park in Washington DC is, by almost all metrics, a superlatively walkable neighborhood. Just 2.5 miles northwest of the National Mall and DC’s vast downtown, the neighborhood features finely wrought detached, semi-detached, and multifamily housing, all surrounding a commercial node at the intersection of Connecticut Avenue NW and Ordway Avenue NW. It is one
Unlike most cities in the eastern half of the US, the major metros of the West routinely offer suburbs that exceed 100,000 people—sometimes double or triple that amount. (A few of the suburbs of Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Houston, Dallas, and even Denver are bigger than the core cities of Cincinnati, Buffalo, St. Louis, or
It’s not my custom to feature two articles in a row with a short video, but what can I say? With these two, I can think of no better way to capture a scenario defined by motion. And, far removed from the desert metropolis of my previous animated article, this one teleports the reader to
I’ve professed my love for mid-century signage multiple times on this blog. Whether it’s understated modernism, lingering neon, or the overt space-age wonderland of Googie, it all evokes the dawn of the motor era—that point in time, shortly after World War II, when almost every household either owned a vehicle or had easy access to
At this point in the winter, most property owners have either taken down all their Christmas decorations, or, at the very least, they downplay them by keeping the lights off or the inflatable blowers powered down. The liturgical among us can certainly make a case for retaining the Christmas spirit through the Feast of the
I usually visit the south-side suburb of Greenwood annually, upon returning to my hometown of Indianapolis over the holidays. It’s the next town over. Unsurprisingly, I cover it every year or two through an article, devoting considerable attention to the small but mostly intact Old Town neighborhood, where West Main Street intersects Madison Avenue. I’ve
In some respects, it’s a tale of two streets. But since it’s actually one y-axis on the grid that comprises downtown Columbia, South Carolina, it’s not so much two main streets as an age-old distinction between north and south: two sides of Main Street. The north side of Main protrudes from one direction of the
Many municipalities in northern Appalachia—which I consider to include Western Pennsylvania, much of Upstate New York, Western Maryland, Western Virginia, Eastern Kentucky, and pretty much all of West Virginia—look bigger than they are. If one drives past them on a freeway, the density of buildings that form a skyline makes them look quite large, but,
The historic, eponymous main street of Columbia, South Carolina offers an abundance of smartly preserved three-story buildings, some of which no doubt reflect an effort to preserve the character and details from their post-Civil War time of construction. Most of them look great, and vacancy rates, while far from perfect, are certainly better than a
Vienna, an incorporated town in northern Virginia, doesn’t have much in the way of a conspicuous downtown—or at least it didn’t until recently. Little by little, it’s getting one, through higher-density infill development. Until recently, the main drag, Maple Avenue (State Route 123), consisted of a mix of small strip malls, repurposed auto-oriented outparcel buildings,
Cleveland Park in Washington DC is, by almost all metrics, a superlatively walkable neighborhood. Just 2.5 miles northwest of the National Mall and DC’s vast downtown, the neighborhood features finely wrought detached, semi-detached,
Unlike most cities in the eastern half of the US, the major metros of the West routinely offer suburbs that exceed 100,000 people—sometimes double or triple that amount. (A few of the suburbs
It’s not my custom to feature two articles in a row with a short video, but what can I say? With these two, I can think of no better way to capture a
I’ve professed my love for mid-century signage multiple times on this blog. Whether it’s understated modernism, lingering neon, or the overt space-age wonderland of Googie, it all evokes the dawn of the motor
At this point in the winter, most property owners have either taken down all their Christmas decorations, or, at the very least, they downplay them by keeping the lights off or the inflatable
I usually visit the south-side suburb of Greenwood annually, upon returning to my hometown of Indianapolis over the holidays. It’s the next town over. Unsurprisingly, I cover it every year or two through
In some respects, it’s a tale of two streets. But since it’s actually one y-axis on the grid that comprises downtown Columbia, South Carolina, it’s not so much two main streets as an
Many municipalities in northern Appalachia—which I consider to include Western Pennsylvania, much of Upstate New York, Western Maryland, Western Virginia, Eastern Kentucky, and pretty much all of West Virginia—look bigger than they are.
The historic, eponymous main street of Columbia, South Carolina offers an abundance of smartly preserved three-story buildings, some of which no doubt reflect an effort to preserve the character and details from their
Vienna, an incorporated town in northern Virginia, doesn’t have much in the way of a conspicuous downtown—or at least it didn’t until recently. Little by little, it’s getting one, through higher-density infill development.