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Strong Towns

@strong_towns

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We're changing *everything* about the North American pattern of development, from the bottom up.
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What if fixing our streets meant removing unnecessary pavement instead of replacing it? by @strong_towns

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12 hours ago

Some transit ideas solve a practical problem, while others make the system more inviting, and these five ideas from around America show how small changes can give more people reasons to ride. by @strong_towns

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a day ago

The best communities are places where neighbors know each other, people feel connected, and everyone has an opportunity to make a difference. by @strong_towns

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2 days ago

Communities need more housing, and many are adding units, but are we producing homes people can afford from the start?

A rising unit count tells us very little about whether the market is producing the entry-level options communities actually need. The first rung of the market is essential because it gives people an affordable place to begin, and small starter homes, backyard cottages, ADUs, and similar housing give communities more ways to create it.

A healthy housing market needs more ways for those homes to get built, including small, incremental projects in existing neighborhoods and broader changes that make this kind of production easier. by @strong_towns

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3 days ago

Decreasing the speed limit by five miles per hour won’t slow drivers if the design of the road itself still encourages speed. Repeated crashes demand physical changes that make safer speeds part of how the street works. by @strong_towns

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4 days ago

Professional loyalty must protect the right to challenge accepted practice, because criticism is essential to improvement.

Engineering depends on judgment, and judgment improves when assumptions can be challenged in the open. A culture that treats criticism as disloyal pushes valuable concerns out of public view.

Open disagreement exposes blind spots, helps correct flaws and keeps a profession from getting stuck with practices that no longer work. by @strong_towns

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7 days ago

With another highway funding deadline coming December 11, Congress has a chance to stop treating a completed interstate-building project like an endless one. by @strong_towns

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8 days ago

Faster speed has a place on roads, while slower movement belongs on streets because the two are designed to serve fundamentally different purposes.

Roads connect places, so they work best when movement is simple and predictable. Streets are part of the destination itself, where homes, businesses, sidewalks, crossings and public life all come together, creating economic value, social activity and more for a driver to notice and respond to.

When one place tries to serve both purposes at once, you get a hybrid stroad that does neither especially well. When the environment clearly reflects the job of the place, speed stops being an argument about fast versus slow and becomes a question of what belongs where. by @strong_towns

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9 days ago

After 1956, every state dollar spent on federal highways could bring nine more from Washington.

That incentive helped turn many traditional Main Streets into routes for high-speed through-traffic, weakening the local businesses and community life those streets had long supported. by @strong_towns

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10 days ago

A few hundred square feet is standard for an apartment building, yet putting that same amount of housing on its own lot often becomes a zoning problem.

Minimum lot sizes and setbacks can force a modest home onto far more land than it needs, making small starter homes harder to build even where the neighborhood can already support them.

Allowing smaller homes on smaller lots gives cities a simple way to add housing gradually. by @strong_towns

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10 days ago

Building a house on a smaller lot shouldn’t be a radical idea. by @strong_towns

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11 days ago

What changes when a few people who keep noticing the same problem finally find one another?

Through her social media account Memphis Urbanism, Kelsey Huse makes everyday street conditions easier to see and understand, helping people recognize experiences they may have noticed but never had a way to put into words.

Her Local-Motive session looked at how even a relatively small group can connect around those shared observations, organize, and start moving a local issue forward. by @strong_towns

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