After inadvertently stumbling across some vintage footage of shopping culture from yesteryear, I couldn’t help but ask myself: Is it reasonable, at this point, to compare the revolution in how we consume goods with the old cliché of a boiling frog? How much longer before we the frogs feel the temperature climbing? Using any vintage
I hate to keep revisiting this subject, but gosh darn it, the first time I did, it became one of my most popular articles. I still get new responses every few weeks. And the phenomenon itself just won’t go away; in fact, it seems to be getting worse. Or better, if you agree with the
I’m supportive of almost all efforts to improve the accessibility of public spaces and commercial buildings to those with access and functional needs. Whether blind, deaf, mobility impaired, or some other characteristic that impedes one’s ability to get around in situations that 95% of us take for granted, I’m hard pressed to find much to
The photo below captures an item so banal that I don’t think it has yet entered popular conversation, and I’m not sure it ever will. It isn’t controversial to my knowledge, and it’s hardly conspicuous enough to arouse ire for visual blight. Yet. Virtually everyone understands why they exist, or if they don’t understand, it
It’s hard to imagine any American town of a certain size—small enough that most would still consider it just a town, but big enough that it probably fits the political classification of a city—that doesn’t have, or at least had, an old storefront movie theater as part of its main street. Everyone knows the type:
Alexandria, Virginia, a place I cover frequently in this blog, is a medium sized city of considerable affluence. Sitting directly across the river from the District of Columbia, it predates the founding of our nation’s capital by a good forty years, meaning it never intended to function as a suburb. Neither a national capital nor
Urban planning, like most disciplines, endures its fair share of fads and passing fancies, many of which the advocates manage to elevate to temporary orthodoxy. And if “temporary orthodoxy” seems like an oxymoron, it shouldn’t require a great deal of introspection to realize that many orthodoxies remain doctrinaire for about a decade. And then they
“Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!” This line from Wizard of Oz (the 1939 movie, not the Frank E. Baum book) has ascended to such currency that’s it’s essentially a catchphrase. And those who use it, from age five to eighty-five, often forget the full connotation to its original function. Sure, it
I promise—cross my heart and hope to die—that I didn’t plan this blog article in light of recent events. A single closed bank branch is hardly cause for alarm, especially compared to what’s been happening to the entire operations of some fairly large banks these last few weeks. And we may still be fully in
Among transportation planners, it is almost universally acknowledged that two-way streets are healthier for downtown vitality than one-way streets. Storefronts on two-way streets tend to command higher lease rates, indicating that demand among prospective tenants is greater than a similar storefront that fronts a one-way street. It’s not because one-way streets get less traffic; in
After inadvertently stumbling across some vintage footage of shopping culture from yesteryear, I couldn’t help but ask myself: Is it reasonable, at this point, to compare the revolution in how we consume goods
I hate to keep revisiting this subject, but gosh darn it, the first time I did, it became one of my most popular articles. I still get new responses every few weeks. And
I’m supportive of almost all efforts to improve the accessibility of public spaces and commercial buildings to those with access and functional needs. Whether blind, deaf, mobility impaired, or some other characteristic that
The photo below captures an item so banal that I don’t think it has yet entered popular conversation, and I’m not sure it ever will. It isn’t controversial to my knowledge, and it’s
It’s hard to imagine any American town of a certain size—small enough that most would still consider it just a town, but big enough that it probably fits the political classification of a
Alexandria, Virginia, a place I cover frequently in this blog, is a medium sized city of considerable affluence. Sitting directly across the river from the District of Columbia, it predates the founding of
Urban planning, like most disciplines, endures its fair share of fads and passing fancies, many of which the advocates manage to elevate to temporary orthodoxy. And if “temporary orthodoxy” seems like an oxymoron,
“Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!” This line from Wizard of Oz (the 1939 movie, not the Frank E. Baum book) has ascended to such currency that’s it’s essentially a
I promise—cross my heart and hope to die—that I didn’t plan this blog article in light of recent events. A single closed bank branch is hardly cause for alarm, especially compared to what’s
Among transportation planners, it is almost universally acknowledged that two-way streets are healthier for downtown vitality than one-way streets. Storefronts on two-way streets tend to command higher lease rates, indicating that demand among