Kaid Benfield's blog

In a breathtaking series of press conferences and releases as well as a major report, the federal Partnership for Sustainable Communities, which is led by EPA, HUD, and the Department of Transportation, have rolled out coordinated, multiple announcements of federal assistance to an impressive and wide array of sustainability projects across t

41 million acres of rural land has been permanently lost in the last 25 years to highways, shopping malls, poorly planned sprawl and other development, according to

Peter Calthorpe was one of my early inspirations for getting into this field.  I read Peter's work in the mid-1990s, and,as an advocate for a major national environmental organization, I felt for the first time that I had a positive

Analysis of property tax revenues from Sarasota, Florida reveals that mixed-use, compact development outperforms Walmarts and conventional shopping malls by a considerable margin when compared on a revenue-per-acre basis.  So writes one of our better observers of the built environment, Mary Newsom,

Last week, federal Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced $293 million in new federal grants for major transit improvements, including new streetcars, buses, and transit facilities.  The Federal Transit Administration awarded the grants under two programs, funding six new streetcar and bus rapid transit projects (collectively $130 million) from the Federal Transit Administration's <

Enraged at the spill in the Gulf and the American appetite for oil that ultimately caused it?

Two weeks ago, I wrote a post on my NRDC blog (‘Walkability 101-A’) drawing from Washington architect

The housing market is trending ever more dramatically toward smart growth. A look at recent home sales data in the Washington, DC metro area shows how.

Recently, I attended the annual conference of the American Planning Association, where I was invited to speak.

The Living City Block is an ambitious project in Denver’s LoDo (Lower Downtown) to demonstrate the potential of combining environmentally conscious business and economic development with revitalizat