Congratulations to Kevin Wright for being first to correctly identify our last sidewalk photo as the new streetscape along West Market Street. The sidewalk view was taken looking east at 39th Street. Kevin wins a Broken Sidewalk magnet for his Louisville geography prowess. Here’s a new sidewalk ready to be identified in the comments below for your chance to win your own magnet. (The rules: Leave a real email so we can get in touch if you win; No repeat winners for four months; Comments must be left on this news roundup.) Good luck!
And now on with this week’s top urbanism #cityreads.
Seattle’s smart take on how to help the poor: subsidize their transit. Seattle has decided to model not only the compassionate but a just city by attempting incredibly interesting fixes for urban inequality through minimum wage, free pre-school, and now transit. With a smaller population and lower cost of living this is something Louisville could do even better! Washington Post: Wonkblog
How to Design a Beautiful City, According to Swiss Philosopher Alain de Botton. Alain de Botton is a brilliant thinker across a multitude of topics. His work on architecture and design is as beautiful as it is interesting. Curbed
On the U.S. Transportation System’s Structures of Inequality. “The tendency of transportation planning of the 20th and 21st centuries to negatively impact poor and minority populations received deep attention on national media outlets over the past few days.” Planetizen
Sprawl Costs the Public More Than Twice as Much as Compact Development. This nice little infographic does a lot of work toward revealing the real costs involved in suburban sprawl. Streetsblog
Joe Dunman: Development without preservation isn’t a risk worth taking. Dunman tackles urban issues with poise, ease, and a clarity that astounds. His analysis on the preservation vs. development issue in Louisville tackles the problem head on and gets the issue out front of the personalities. Insider Louisville
This Artist Spent 3 Years Mapping Every Brooklyn Block—With Garbage. Jennifer Maravillas, a one time Louisvillian (whoop whoop!) has spent three years walking every single block in Brooklyn, collecting ‘garbage’ and using it to illustrate a gorgeous map of the borough. City Lab
Can We Get A Farming Community Subdivision? The Lexington Street Sweeper takes a look at farming community subdivisions, both their history and feasibility in this piece. Lexington Street Sweeper
This vertical farm will provide Wyoming residents with 100,000 lbs of fresh produce each year. Breaking out of the narrative that Wyoming is the ‘wild west’ or simply a space of resource extraction, this article begins to shape a story about the state’s ‘inhabited’ cities. Inhabitat
Homeless Shelter Proves to Be Important Ingredient in Reno’s Revitalization Success. In this all too rare example of public/private cooperation, we see what can be done to address the immediate needs of homeless individuals if not the more systemic issue of homelessness itself. Next City
Two Notes of Caution on America’s ‘Record’ Mass Transit Year. As always, New York and buses mess up the numbers for everybody. Check out the nuances around ‘record mass’ transit of which you might not have been aware. City Lab
