CNU January 2008 e-Update

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If you have an item for a future e-Update, please email Lee Crandell. If you have further questions about CNU activities, please contact our office at cnuinfo@cnu.org or 312-551-7300.

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1. Your Input Needed: Street Design and Emergency Response Initiative

We are seeking your input on research ideas to support a new collaborative effort on smart growth streets and emergency response.  The project aims to provide solutions for communities developing pedestrian friendly neighborhood streets.  These designs typically emphasize more narrow, interconnected street networks.  While this creates better pedestrian environments and reduces storm water runoff, it raises concerns with fire officials about impacts on emergency response operations.  Recognizing this concern, many communities have worked with fire officials to adopt street design strategies that do not compromise response times or building access.  Additionally, many older communities with narrow residential streets have a long history of addressing such issues.  Despite the existence of such solutions, widespread adoption of more flexible standards is lacking. 

Practitioners and researchers who have been engaged with this issue on the ground can help articulate the research agenda.

Read more to learn how you can help...

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2. CNU XVI Sneak Peek: Survey and Scholarships

Get a sneak peek at the CNU XVI program and help CNU better coordinate the Congress at the same time by participating in a brief survey. CNU XVI offers over 50 seminars on Friday, April 4, and Saturday, April 5. Attendance at some sessions will earn you AIA or AICP continuing education credits. The survey will help us gauge your overall interest in the sessions and ensure the best possible learning experience (and better coordinate the size of the seminar with the size of its room). The survey lists session titles, but not full descriptions; we’re still working on those, so keep checking the CNU XVI website for updates. The deadline for completing this survey is Tuesday, Jan. 22.

Also, don't forget that CNU offers scholarships to CNU XVI for students, citizen activists, and advocates promoting New Urbanism. Scholarships are based on need and interest. There are also plenty of opportunities to volunteer and receive a reduced or complementary registration. The application deadline is Wednesday, Feb. 6. Visit the Scholarships and Volunteer Opportunities page at the CNU XVI website for the details.

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3. Top Teardown Survey

Contribute to CNU's list of top highway to boulevard opportunities

Is there an aging highway running near your downtown that disrupts the street grid and keeps property values down? Given the "success" of America's twentieth century highway-building era, your city probably has one of these roads. Often along waterfronts, the highways cut huge swaths across our cities, decimating neighborhoods and reducing quality of life for city residents.

Cities all around the world are replacing urban highways with surface streets, saving billions of dollars on transportation infrastructure and revitalizing adjacent land with walkable, compact development. Learn more about our Highways-to-Boulevards Initiative and the current battles residents are taking on in Seattle and Buffalo.

Do you see potential for your city's highway to be replaced with a surface street and a connected street grid? Please fill out the Top Teardown Survey to tell us about the highway and the surrounding area.

The Congress for the New Urbanism and the Center for Neighborhood Technology are pulling together a national list of highways that are excellent candidates for the teardown model. With your input, this list will identify opportunities to offer less expensive, urban alternatives to the reconstruction of urban expressways.

Transportation models that support connected street grids, allow for more investment in transit, and revitalize urbanism will make reducing our greenhouse gas emissions that much more convenient -- particularly as the U.S. evaluates its federal transportation and climate policy.

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4. Hans Monderman: 1945 - 2008

A great friend of CNU has died. Hans Monderman was the intellectual leader and founder of the "shared space" movement. A Dutch traffic engineer, Monderman's simple but elegant ideas are revolutionizing street design in Europe. For some time CNU tried to attract him to a Congress. He and his wife didn't like traveling and so he never appeared before us until this November when CNU and the Prince's Foundation held a Transport Summit in London. Monderman was brilliant and entranced devoted new urbanists such as Phil Erickson, Norman Garrick, Rick Hall, and Ellen Greenberg. View his slideshow here.

He will be missed by all of us and especially by his collaborator Ben Hamilton-Baille, a British traffic engineer who spoke at CNU XIII in Pasadena.

Eulogy by Eric Britton, another UK devotee of Monderman

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5. What's New @ CNU.org

Here's a sample of what's new at CNU.org:

Jobs/RFPs -- CNU seeks Administration and Finance Director
@ http://www.cnu.org/node/1692
Applications due January 31, 2008. Visit the CNU Jobs/RFPs board to view other opportunities or advertise your own for free.

CNU Salons -- Doug Farr on Smart City Radio
@ http://www.cnu.org/node/1753
Doug Farr discusses Sustainable Urbanism, LEED for Neighborhood Development, and the 2030 Community Challenge with Smart City Radio's Carol Coletta. Listen and discuss with other CNU members.

CNU Salons -- Public Transit: A green line
@ http://www.cnu.org/node/1700
As New Jersey's Gov. Jon Corzine proposes a TOD tax credit, Illinois hits do-or-die day in its transit funding crisis.

CNU Salons -- New Urbanism in Phoenix
@ http://www.cnu.org/node/1688
Is Phoenix too far gone, or is there something new urbanists can do to affect real change?

If you haven't experienced CNU.org yet, it's time for you to see what you're missing. Please take a moment to log into our site and learn about the features it has to offer. Please read our Login Instructions to get started.

Visit http://www.cnu.org/features to learn more about the website.

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6. CNT and STPP Workshop: Transportation & Land Use for Walkable Communities, Jan. 30-31, 2008 in Orlando, Fla.

STPP and CNT are hosting a workshop to help participants identify and create an integrated land use and transportation vision for their community that includes mobility choices for everyone. The workshop is directed at advocates, local officials and planning professionals.

The workshop will feature leading transportation and development experts and local officials as speakers and panelists. It will offer a variety of interactive exercises and field trips designed to give participants a better understanding of the land use – transportation relationship and how you can get your community moving in the right direction.

Registration is open at www.cnt.org/events/tsp-workshop. Please contact davids@cnt.org for more information.

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7. Driehaus Form-Based Codes Award Call for Submissions

Winners to Be Announced at CNU XVI

The Board of Directors of the Form-Based Codes Institute (FBCI) takes pleasure in announcing its second annual award for achievement in the writing and implementation of Form-Based Codes. Form-Based Codes are defined as a method of regulating development to achieve a specific urban form. They create a predictable public realm primarily by controlling physical form and secondarily by land use. Entries should foster built results consistent with a master plan and/or advance the field of Form-Based Code writing. Submitted codes must have been adopted into law by a unit of local government.

Award winners will be announced April 5, 2008 at CNU XVI in Austin, Texas. Winners may be invited to participate in a discussion of their codes at this session of the Congress. Additionally, winning entries will be featured on the Form-Based Codes Institute website.

Submissions must be received by FBCI no later than Friday, February 1, 2008.

For more information, visit the Form-Based Codes Institute website.

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8. Third Australian New Urbanism Congress: Brisbane, February 6-9, 2008

The Australian Council for New Urbanism (ACNU) is holding its third Congress in sub-tropical Brisbane, February 6-9, 2008. Keynote speakers will include Victor Dover and Shelley Poticha from the U.S. and Paul Murrain from the U.K., in addition to leading Australian new urbanist practitioners, including Evan Jones, Chip Kaufman, Wendy Morris, Peter Richards, and Clive Alcock. The Congress will showcase the current status of New Urbanism in Australia, and will debate some key challenges facing New Urbanism down under, including sustainable regional structuring, university integration and transit-planning, achieving viable neighborhood centers, and delivering mixed-use main-street-based town centers.

The program includes tours to projects in South East Queensland, covering both urban regeneration and new communities. The Congress will be held at the Kelvin Grove Urban Village, a new integrated university village, located near one of Brisbane's new showcase busways. This location provides a great opportunity for delegates to experience first-hand this innovative, government-facilitated mixed-use center combining education, residential, retail, health, and business into a vibrant new precinct.

The three-day congress will be preceded by a three-day Master Class Design Workshop, focused on a challenging but strategic site in western Brisbane, led by Australian and overseas design experts; and by a Charrette Training Course, run by Bill Lennertz from NCI, in conjunction with Australian charrette experts.

Further information can be obtained from www.acnu.org. Information on Kelvin Grove Urban Village can be found at www.kguv.com.au.

ACNU especially welcomes attendees from beyond Australia, and suggests that a visit to Brisbane be combined with some time in Sydney, Melbourne, and Perth, armed with a copy of the book: Australian New Urbanism: A Guide to Projects, 2nd Ed 2006. (Details available at www.acnu.org.)

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9. New Partners for Smart Growth, Feb. 7-9, 2008 in Washington, D.C.;
Advocacy Day Feb. 6

The 7th Annual New Partners for Smart Growth: Building Safe, Healthy and Livable Communities Conference will be held February 7-9, 2008 in Washington, D.C.

Visit http://www.newpartners.org for detailed information on the conference program, tours of model projects, special workshops, invited speakers, and to register now. The registration deadline is January 25.

In connection with the New Partners Conference, an Advocacy Day on Capitol Hill is being organized on Wednesday, February 6, 2008.

Join smart growth advocates from around the country on Capitol Hill! Advocacy Day is a great way to take full advantage of this year's conference location in our nation's capital. Advocates will visit with their representatives to talk about key smart growth issues facing the 110th Congress. It's your chance to support a smart growth agenda in Congress.

Participation couldn't be easier and it's free. Your congressional meetings will be conducted with other advocates from your state and district, and all the scheduling details will be handled for you based on your registration. Plus, you'll receive free issue briefing and advance legislative advocacy training. We also provide all the materials you need to leave behind with your elected representatives.

Make your voice heard. Join your fellow smart growth advocates on Capitol Hill. Get more information and register to participate by January 25, 2008 at
http://www.newpartners.org/capitol_hill.html.

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10. ASLA Awards Call for Entries

Each year, ASLA recognizes projects that demonstrate a commitment to sustainable design through its professional and student awards program. Sustainability is a key criterion of all award categories. ASLA has released its 2008 awards call for entries and invites you to enter this year.

Award recipients receive featured coverage in Landscape Architecture magazine and in many other design and construction industry and general interest media. Residential category professional award recipients will also be featured in Garden Design magazine. Award recipients, their clients, and professors will be honored at the Awards Presentation Ceremony followed by a special luncheon during the 2008 ASLA Annual Meeting & EXPO in Philadelphia, October 3-7.

Professional entry forms and payment must be received by Friday, February 1, and submission binders are due by Friday, February 15. With the exception of the Communications and the Landmark Award categories, the official entrant must be a professional member of ASLA as an Associate, Full, or International member, or must be qualified to join ASLA in one of those categories.

Visit the ASLA 2008 Call for Entries web page for full details.

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11. Upcoming Courses from the Form-Based Codes Institute

Visit the Form-Based Codes Institute website for more information and a full list of events.

Form-Based Codes 301: Completing, Adopting and Administering the Code
Save the Date: January 25-26, 2008
Arizona State University, Phoenix, AZ
Participants must have completed FBC 101: Form-Based Codes - An Introductory Course to enroll.

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12. Upcoming Seminars and Workshops from the Seaside Institute

Visit the Seaside Institute website for more information and a full list of events. Current CNU members receive a 10% discount on workshop registrations with their membership card.

Great Houses for Great Neighborhoods
March 5-7, 2008
Seaside, Fla.

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13. Upcoming NCI Trainings - AICP Credit Now Available

Visit the National Charrette Institute (NCI) website for details on trainings. Current CNU members receive a 10% discount on NCI registration fees for public trainings held in Portland. Please note that all NCI trainings in the United States will qualify for AICP credit hours.

Celebration, FL · January 16-18
NCI Charrette Planner® certificate trainings
In conjunction with the University of Miami
Register

Brisbane, Australia · February 4-6
NCI Charrette Planner® certificate trainings
Prelude to the National Congress of the Australian Council for New Urbanism
More Information

Portland, OR · March 10-14
NCI Charrette Planner® certificate trainings
NCI Complete Charrette Manager™ certificate trainings
Register

Austin, TX · April 2
"Introduction to NCI Dynamic Planning" half-day module
In conjuction with CNU XVI
More Information and Register

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Congress for the New Urbanism
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