History / Preservation
Microdevelopers Build a Promising Future Using Buffalo's Past
Buffalo is benefiting from a wave of "microdevelopment" driven by entrepreneurs and young urbanists with a belief in preservation as social activism. By rehabbing vacant properties one at a time they're hoping to turn around a city.
New Yorkers Take Pride in Resilience, Preserve Scars from Sandy
As New York and New Jersey continue to recover from Hurricane Sandy, some residents choose to preserve the watermarks left on their homes and businesses as a way to commemorate their survival.
What Did New York Sound Like in the 1920s?
"The Roaring 'Twenties", an interactive soundscape created by a historian of sound, technology and cultures of listening at Princeton, seeks to immerse people in the sounds of 1929 New York City, and demonstrate that noise pollution is nothing new.
“Make Love, Not Worse”: On the State of Landscape Preservation
Charles Birnbaum, founder of TCLF, discusses the challenges with preserving and managing significant Modernist landscapes, lifting the veil on the field’s key contributors, and why its easier to love a landscape than a building.
St. Louis Takes a Farsighted Approach to Preserving Its Past
Recognizing the potential value of its historic homes and industrial buildings, but with few plans for reuse in the immediate future, the City of St. Louis is proposing to establish a preservation fund to mothball some of its 6,000 vacant buildings.
Could the Demolition of Prentice Hospital Inspire a Preservation Renaissance?
Last week, the long saga over the preservation of Bertrand Goldberg's Prentice Hospital entered its nadir with the start of demolition. But could the intensity of the building's defense lead to a reinvigoration of preservation around Modernism?
Reuse of Old Bridges Elevates Urban Living
Melanie D.G. Kaplan examines a growing trend in adaptive reuse—the transformation of old and underutilized bridges into elevated parks, walkways, and engines of economic development.
Smell This: The History of Architecture, Told Through Scent
For those who think architectural history isn’t something to sniff at, a new exhibition at the California College of the Arts aims to convince otherwise.
Gateway Arch Among List of World Monuments in Need of Preservation
This week the World Monuments Fund (WMF) published their biannual list of the globe's cultural heritage most at risk "from the forces of nature and the impact of social, political, and economic change." 67 sites in 41 countries made this year's list.
Minneapolis' Influential Modernist "Park Plaza" Saved from Demolition
The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF) and the Preservation Alliance of Minnesota (PAM) have reached a settlement with the City of Minneapolis to preserve and rehabilitate Peavey Plaza, ending a lawsuit brought by the groups to prevent demolition.
A Mesmerizing Interactive History of the High-Rise
Told over four parts meant to evoke chapters in a storybook using films, photos, archive materials, text, and miniature games, this "Op-Doc" is a short masterclass in the 2,500-year global history of vertical living.
What Is a Place Without the People?
In an illustrated essay, Chuck Wolfe contrasts the ideal form of the New England town with an abandoned French village, calling out the human infrastructure essential to successful urban places.
Preservation of World's Cultural Treasures Goes Digital
Using high definition scanners, digital modeling, and Scan-to-BIM software, consultants and non-profits are helping to restore historic structures following natural disasters, and cataloging treasures before calamity strikes.
Friday Eye Candy: All of World History on One Chart
Who needs four years of costly undergraduate education in History (sorry Mom & Dad) when you can just consult John B. Sparks' "Histomap" of 1931. Writing in Slate's "The Vault" blog, Rebecca Onion looks at the 5-foot-long guide to world history.
Mahatma Gandhi: Sustainable Transportation Visionary?
Mahatma Gandhi's utilization of non-violent civil disobedience to fight for civil rights is taught to school children around the world, but his views on the importance of biking and walking are less well known. Navdeep Asija investigates.
Exploring the Mental Terrain of Ancient Mapmaking
A new exhibition on Greco-Roman mapmaking at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World in New York examines the relationship between geographic and metaphysical world views.
Renovation of Ruined Castle Selected Britain's Best Building
This year's Stirling Prize, the highest honor awarded by the Royal Institute of British Architects, has gone to Witherford Watson Mann architects for their deft renovation of historic Astley Castle, which was destroyed by fire in 1978.
How Metadata is Changing Architectural History
Gabrielle Esperdy explores the development of an online encyclopedia of American architecture — and argues that metadata is a crucial tool for future historians.
Environmentalists Fight Feds Over Drilling in Utah's Treasured Public Lands
Utah's San Rafael Swell is the scene of an energy showdown between conservationists who want to preserve this unique landscape (potentially a national monument), private oil and gas companies that want to drill there, and the BLM that has to decide.
Brutal or Beautiful? UK Celebrates Post-War Architectural Heritage
A warehouse, electricity substation, and brutalist apartment complex are among the buildings recently granted heritage protection by the British government. Heritage designation for post-war architecture, however, remains contentious.
Urban Design for Planners 1: Software Tools
This six-course series explores essential urban design concepts using open source software and equips planners with the tools they need to participate fully in the urban design process.
Planning for Universal Design
Learn the tools for implementing Universal Design in planning regulations.
EMC Planning Group, Inc.
Planetizen
Planetizen
Mpact (formerly Rail~Volution)
Great Falls Development Authority, Inc.
HUDs Office of Policy Development and Research
NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service
