Daily Shig (Blog)

The campaign in Napa County over a ballot measure that would impose a 1% growth limit may be a microcosm of the entire Bay Area.

On one side are slow-growth advocates with the usual arguments about density, traffic, greedy developers and untrustworthy politicians. On the other side are developers with promises for creating housing in a very nice setting within a few miles of tens of thousands of jobs. In between are local government officials, who may end up arm wrestling with lawyers over who should review the project.
» read more | Paul Shigley's blog

As Barack Obama would be the first to say, you can’t underestimate the importance of North Carolina anymore. At 9.1 million people and counting, it’s now the 10th most populous state in the nation, and it has added a million people just since the 2000 Census. Another few boom years and North Carolina – along with Georgia – will pass Michigan in population.
» read more | Bill Fulton's blog

My laptop battery started dying just as I noticed the huge bats somewhere around Barstow.
» read more | Paul Shigley's blog

In the race for endorsements, the anti-Proposition 98 camp has lapped the competition. The question is whether the endorsements will make any difference in an election that is likely to see very low voter turnout.
» read more | Paul Shigley's blog

Six. That’s how many housing starts there were in the Marysville-Yuba City area in March.

This is an area with a population of more than 150,000 people, an area that has needed four digits to count annual housing production during recent years.

But in March 2008? Six housing starts. That’s the definition of a real estate slump.
» read more | Paul Shigley's blog

Here’s a puzzler for you: What land use creates more pedestrians than any other?

Transit stations? Office buildings? Condos?

Try airports!

Every single person who arrives at an airport from out of town arrives without a car. At many airports, the first vehicle in which people ride after landing is a train of some sort. So what’s the rush to put them into cars?
» read more | Bill Fulton's blog

Even on a typical day, Las Vegas often seems like an extension of Los Angeles. Throngs of tourists arrive via car on the I-15 each day, and it’s not uncommon to walk down the Strip and run into people you know.

This week, however, the American Planning Association conference – being conducted at two hotels along the Strip – has often seemed like an extension of Los Angeles as well. Not only is the conference flooded with planners from L.A., but there are so many sessions on L.A. that it could become a whole separate track!
» read more | Bill Fulton's blog

Today, as planners, we are constantly inundated with new ideas and theories, and nowhere can this become more of a reality than a planning conference in Las Vegas. This year’s national APA Conference is being held between the Paris and Bally’s casinos, quintessential locations for gambling, shopping, dining, nightlife, and, well, apparently planning conferences. Where else can conference sessions be held in banquet halls decorated like extravagant French parlors?

» read more | Paul Shigley's blog

All the urban planners in the country are in Las Vegas this week, and it’s clear they have a love/hate relationship with the place.

Vegas is kitschy and over the top, and at first glance it always looks like the least sustainable place on the planet. Vegas is acres of neon plastered across the front of 30-story casinos in the 100-degree desert – each casino more outlandishly upscale than the other – along with the occasional lake and 200-foot water fountain.
» read more | Bill Fulton's blog

OK, so everybody’s bought into the idea that Sacramento’s Blueprint process is a national model of regional smart growth planning. But what happens next in this cooler-than-we-ever-imagined metropolis? Depending on who you talk to the answer is:

» read more | Bill Fulton's blog