No future awaits those who rage against family, work, and community.
Where there is no bread, there is no Law. Where there is no Law, there is no bread.
— Rabbi Elazar Ben Azariah read more »
Urban IssuesHow Race Politics Burns Out
by Joel Kotkin 08/14/2020
No future awaits those who rage against family, work, and community. Where there is no bread, there is no Law. Where there is no Law, there is no bread. »
Subjects:
COVID Work Trip Reduction Estimates: CSAs with Transit Legacy Cities
by Wendell Cox 08/13/2020
America’s elite central business districts have symbolized the ascendency of big cities, epitomized by soaring office towers. But today, due the COVID-19 pandemic, so much office work performed in these CBDs can be done remotely, that their future seems far less towering than in the past. In contrast, less dense areas, notably exurbs, appear to have suffered less loss in their employment patterns. read more » »
Chinese Science Fiction's Disaster Dystopias
by Joel Kotkin 08/11/2020
In Ma Jian’s new novel, the protagonist, Ma Daode, may be a corrupt, womanizing local official, but he is a corrupt, womanizing local official with a mission. His goal is to develop a drug that will allow President Xi Jinping’s vision of a glorious Chinese future to dominate not only citizens’ daily lives but their sleeping hours as well. This is his utopian quest. The China dream, Ma Daode suggests, “is not the selfish, individualist dream chased by Western countries. read more » »
Subjects:
The Future of Driving
by Randal OToole 08/10/2020
A new study from accounting firm KPMG predicts that auto travel in the United States will be 9 to 10 percent less after the pandemic than it was before. Telecommuting, says the report, will lead to a 10 to 20 percent reduction in commuting by car while on-line shopping will lead to a 10 to 30 percent reduction in shopping trips. read more » »
Subjects:
In Praise of Streetcar Suburbs, Defined and Illustrated
by Pete Saunders 08/09/2020
If there is a single American development pattern or style that I love most, it is the streetcar suburb. Bringing more of this pattern back to our cities would be a great thing. read more » »
Subjects:
Slower Municipality Growth in China: 2010-2019
by Wendell Cox 08/07/2020
China, which many see as the exemplar of rapid urban growth, is accelerating its own shift towards greater dispersion. During the 2000s, the largest municipalities (formerly called prefectures) of China grew very quickly. Much of this was a result of an increasing “floating population,” people who moved to the cities from rural areas for employment, especially in factories producing goods for export and in construction. Between 2000 and 2010, according to the China Statistical Yearbook: 2019, the floating read more » »
The Return of White Flight
by Aaron M. Renn 08/06/2020
America’s downtowns, particularly those of the major cities at the heart of large metro regions of over one million people, have seen significant residential development and population growth in the recent years. Downtown Chicago, for example, has nearly 100,000 more residents than it did in the 1980s. Visit almost any downtown and see many nearly identical apartment buildings sprouting. read more » »
Subjects:
America's Long Suffering Rail Commuters
by Wendell Cox 07/31/2020
The long, streaking commuter trains (suburban rail) carrying workers mostly into and out of downtown every day may give the impression of “rapid transit.” However, regardless of the top speeds they reach, the average suburban rail rider spends far more time traveling to work than those using other modes of getting to work (Figure 1). They spend far longer than the majority of commuters, who drive alone. Even in the New York combined statistical area (CSA), with the largest suburban rail network a majority drive to work (Figure 2). read more » California's Woke Hypocrisy
by Joel Kotkin 07/30/2020
No state wears its multicultural veneer more ostentatiously than California. The Golden State’s leaders believe that they lead a progressive paradise, ushering in what theorists Laura Tyson and Lenny Mendonca call “a new progressive era.” Others see California as deserving of nationhood; it reflects, as a New York Times columnist put it, “the shared values of our increasingly tolerant and pluralistic society.” read more » »
Restart, Reset, Retool, Refill
by Ninigret Partners and Interface Studio 07/29/2020
Considerations for downtowns, commercial corridors, and main streets We are at the end of the beginning. There are going to be closures, vacancies, and job losses across communities. How long and how deep will be a function of how well the next three-to-six months are managed read more » »
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Subscribe to NG ArticlesThe Coming of Neo-FeudalismJoel Kotkin's newest book The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class is now available to order. Learn more about this title and Joel's other books. Infinite SuburbiaInfinite Suburbia is the culmination of the MIT Norman B. Leventhal Center for Advanced Urbanism's yearlong study of the future of suburban development. Find out more. Recent blog posts
BooksAuthored by Aaron Renn, The Urban State of Mind: Meditations on the City is the first Urbanophile e-book, featuring provocative essays on the key issues facing our cities, including innovation, talent attraction and brain drain, global soft power, sustainability, economic development, and localism. Recent popular content
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