"The trend toward building ever bigger houses, which has gained momentum for over a decade in suburbs across the nation, has now arrived in one of America's largest bedroom communities: the San Fernando Valley. This week the Los Angeles City Council approved the first "anti-mansionization"... View full entry

Why are some of the biggest names in architecture queueing up to build on flooded Cotswolds gravel pits? The Guardian View full entry

New York City is now adopting London's famed 'ring of steel', a perimeter made 'of concrete barriers, checkpoints and thousands of video cameras. City planners call the system, set up to defend against bombings by the Irish Republican Army, "fortress urbanism."' NYTimes View full entry

Over the next few years London's skyline will change dramatically with ever-taller high-rises planned in Canary Wharf and Bishopsgate. But is bigger really always best, asks Deyan Sudjic | related: Seventy-storey Ian Simpson tower could be first of a cluster of Southwark skyscrapers, from... View full entry

Two opinions: for NYC, a prescription for spending capital on public space; for Denver, a Hickenlooper/Florida/Kotkin cocktail. View full entry

BIDOUN magazine devotes an issue to the Dubai phenomenon, with articles and projects by the likes of WORKac and FOA. View full entry

Internet sleuths discovered that anyone using Microsoft's new "Virtual Earth" Web site for a bird's-eye view of Apple's corporate headquarters saw only a grainy overhead photograph of what appears to be a single, nondescript warehouse and a deserted parking lot _ not Apple's sprawling campus... View full entry

The BBC reviews TED | Mugabe says homeless squatters should be joyful for the new homes they are going to get by 2010! | read this short history of squatter policy in India as resttlement colonies fail to woo urban slum dwellers in Delhi | while 35% of pakistanis live in mud slums, and rains... View full entry

You have probably already heard about the building boom in China, but the infrastructure is more ba-da-boom than boom with 85,000km of fresh asphalt. | bbc View full entry

Wind turbines are ugly and no one wants to live near one. Right? Wrong. Steve Rose on the new architects of spin -guardian View full entry

Last week's G8 summit underlined the dangers of global warming. But efforts to solve Britain's housing crisis are making it worse. How and why? read in telegraph uk View full entry

792,000 yard long yard sale dubbed the Highway 127 Corridor Sale, puts new meaning to the word strip mall or perhaps a better meaning. NYT View full entry

Mike Davis turns his sights on Sheik Mo and Dubai. View full entry

From the AN: The Mets, the Jets, the Nets, the Yanks ”” new stadia all around! But where to put them? Architect and urbanist Michael Sorkin surveyed the five boroughs for sites to consider. Go View full entry

IKEA-style Refugee housing | Pratima Joshi builds housing for urban poor | assessing Mugabe's eminent domain;chrono of events ; map of homes bulldozed; 3 trillion to reconstruction? | Korean immigrants in Japan prepare for "fight to death" to save their squatter community in Kyoto | Documentary... View full entry