Just in time for Friday's Rio Olympics, it's time to take a look back at former Olympic villages: specifically, what good are they post-games? In London, the 560 acres of the East End that was transformed into the grounds for the 2012 Olympics have undergone the Olly Wainwright examination in his... View full entry
San Francisco's Millennium Tower has been sinking at a rate of two inches per year since it was completed in 2008, which is about ten inches more than the builders had anticipated the building settling for its entire lifetime. Not to be boring, the tower is also tilting slightly to the northwest... View full entry
Nearly 40 percent of Detroit residents live below the poverty line. In many cities, poor people rent — but the home ownership rate here is high. After the 2008 housing crash, it took the city of Detroit five years to start reappraising homes — and poor homeowners like Hicks, who lives on disability, struggled to pay their taxes. Over the past decade, there have been more than 100,000 tax foreclosures in Detroit. — Marketplace
For more news from the Motor City, check out these links:Previewing the 2016 Venice Biennale: the United States' "Architectural Imagination"Dispatch from the Venice Biennale: a healthy dose of dissent from Detroit Resists, The Architecture Lobby and more"Bleeding Rainbow"... View full entry
Special traffic regulations giving priority to athletes and VIP visitors to the Rio 2016 games have caused 20km (12.5 mile) traffic jams in the streets of Rio de Janeiro, days ahead of the opening ceremony.
Since the new dedicated Olympic lanes opened on Monday, traffic during the morning rush hour has been reduced to a crawl with average speeds of less than 15 km per hour, according to O Globo.
— the Guardian
Opening on Friday, the Rio Olympic Games aren't exactly going smoothly. Athletes are refusing to move into the apparently-incomplete Olympic Village. The city's favelas are "rapidly gentrifying", —displacing families, in the meantime. Workers are dying. Construction... View full entry
According to the Los Angeles Times, the sunny city of Phoenix, Arizona might become a little cooler, as the city develops a plan to give 25% of the city a tree canopy by 2030. Currently, the city has about half as much shade.The city plans to use a mix of steel 'trees', native plants like... View full entry
While zoning is a perfectly fine strategy to map new suburban cul-de-sac subdivisions and to stop growth, it backfires when we try to use it to guide the future of an evolving, dynamic city like Los Angeles. Zoning is a 20th century relic designed to “protect” existing residents from the encroachment of people and buildings they see as “undesirable.” [...]
we should be following Chicago’s approach by focusing on public spaces, infrastructure and other common assets.
— latimes.com
Related on Archinect:Frank Gehry's Sunset Strip mixed-user approved by LA City Planning Commission, with 15% affordable unitsCalifornia lawmakers turn to "granny flats" to help ease housing shortageMichael Maltzan proposes greening L.A.'s 134 freewayIs Los Angeles becoming a "real" city?LAPD... View full entry
Today, Airbnb is revealing a new division tasked with inventing new futures for the company, called Samara. Airbnb is also unveiling Samara’s first project: a communal housing project designed to revitalize a small town in Japan. That model isn’t meant to be a one-off. After this project, Airbnb will look to scale it to other declining small towns across the world. The idea is that Airbnb could become a force not only in sharing homes, but in urban planning. — FastCo.Design
Airbnb's experiment in urban planning was sparked by the success of an elderly woman in a rural Japanese town, Tsuyama Okayama, who listed her home on the site. While near Japan's most famous cedar forests, the town didn't receive many tourists.But build it and they will come: soon, tourists... View full entry
[John Irwin, one of the project's developers, noted:] "This is the right direction for development in L.A., embracing both the benefits of good planning—as well as a commitment to providing affordable housing at varying income levels, which we have agreed to increase” [...]
Ryu’s Chief of Staff Sarah Dusseault argued before the commissioners that setting such a low bar for affordable housing would set a bad precedent as the city is in the midst of an affordable housing crisis.
— losfelizledger.com
More Frank on Archinect: Frank Gehry's renderings for L.A.'s Sunset Strip revealedWhat's happening with Frank Gehry's masterplan for the LA River?Artist Daniel Buren spruces up Gehry's Fondation Louis Vuitton with colorful interventionLos Angeles River revitalization: prosperity for all or just a... View full entry
On June 23rd, 2016, the UK voted to leave the European Union. In the following month, the pound dropped 10% in value against the US dollar (the lowest since the 1980s), PM David Cameron resigned, Boris Johnson resigned, Nigel Farage too (not before insulting all of the European parliament), and... View full entry
On issues related to the funding, mass transit, biking, and the environment, the two parties have staked out dramatically different views about how they envision the future of the nation’s transportation system.
Democrats are proposing an expansive increase in federal support for transportation investment, with a focus on building access to opportunity, bolstering access to non-automobile modes, reducing the impacts of climate change, and maintaining the role of unions.
— The Transport Politic
Republicans, on the other hand, propose no increase in federal spending (though Mr. Trump may disagree), an elimination of the federal role in funding non-automotive transportation, an emphasis on pollution-spewing modes and energy sources, and a reduction in the role of unions.For more on the... View full entry
To help ease California’s housing crisis, Gov. Jerry Brown and state lawmakers are turning to people’s backyards.
Multiple bills with the endorsement of Brown are moving through the Legislature to make it easier for homeowners to build small units on their properties, whether in their garages, as additions to existing homes or as new, freestanding structures.
[Mayor] Eric Garcetti and other supporters hope the relaxed rules will spur backyard home building to combat a housing shortage..
— Los Angeles Times
For more on Los Angeles' major housing crisis, check out these links:Los Angeles sues property owner who allegedly evicted tenants for Airbnb flipLA has a housing crisis – but the problem isn't those fancy new towersMeditating on the "Past Future Housing" of Los Angeles with Morgan Fisher and... View full entry
Preliminary plans have been revealed for two more residential projects that together “would add more than 2,100 residential units and 1.7 million square feet” to Two Bridges, the area along the East River where the Lower East Side meets Chinatown. A building at 271-283 South Street may rise 60 stories, while another at 260 South Street could reach 66 stories. See how this planned and under-construction new development will alter the LES skyline through CityRealty.com's Google Earth rendering. — 6sqft.com
Artwashing. What a great new political watchword. As in, watch out that your neighbourhood doesn’t get “artwashed” too. Just look how Tate Modern has wrecked London and how the Guggenheim trashed Bilbao. Get away, ye galleries! Let’s keep urban wastelands as bleak as they already are!
It’s a neat reversal of the thinking that has seen cities all over the world embrace art galleries, museums and biennials in pursuit of regeneration.
— the Guardian
The editorial hones in on struggles by residents of the Los Angeles neighborhood of Boyle Heights to push back against a rapid influx of galleries, which they view as the avant-garde of gentrification.For more on the community's efforts to resist becoming the next Silverlake/Echo Park/Culver... View full entry
In this New York Times interview with Ginia Bellafante, Jeanne Gang discusses the importance and challenges of designing work that isn't simply aesthetically pleasing, but that influences positive changes in social behavior and policy. In addition to her work on waterways, she discusses her idea... View full entry
Mayor Eric Garcetti's office released a statement yesterday announcing that Gruen Associates, Mia Lehrer + Associates, Oyler Wu Collaborative, and civil and structural engineering firm Psomas will design the final 12 miles of the San Fernando Valley portion of the Los Angeles River Greenway. The... View full entry
