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The Los Angeles chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA|LA) has released an open letter to mayoral candidates Rick Caruso and Karen Bass suggesting 10 fixes to zoning requirements and the approval processes that would positively impact citywide efforts to tackle an ongoing housing... View full entry
Houses of worship in California are now in the position to take on the state’s largest social problem with the adaptation of new legislation that allows for housing development on plots that are, in almost every case, zoned exclusively for commercial use. In July, Governor Gavin... View full entry
The disappearance of such affordable homes is central to the American housing crisis. The nation has a deepening shortage of housing. But, more specifically, there isn’t enough of this housing: small, no-frills homes that would give a family new to the country or a young couple with student debt a foothold to build equity. [...]
At the root is the math problem of putting — or keeping — a low-cost home on increasingly pricey land.
— The New York Times
America has a long history of gradually siphoning away architecture made for predominantly middle-class people (think pre-war buildings in Manhattan or Levittown tract housing on Long Island) and is now simply under-delivering what could otherwise be an equalizing force as a result of prevailing... View full entry
After Hurricane Fiona tore through Puerto Rico on Sunday [Sept. 18], roads in the small mountain city of Caguas—hit with more than 20 inches of rain—were underwater. Landslides washed away some streets. As on the rest of the island, the electric grid went down, and it wasn’t clear how many homes had been damaged or destroyed. But in two new prototype homes, the electricity stayed on. — Fast Company
The prototypes are single-family homes completely off-grid with electricity and potable water. They were designed by New York City and Puerto Rico-based Marvel Architects and paid for by nonprofit Acacia Network. The homes utilize hurricane and... View full entry
The University of Oregon has been awarded more than $16 million in federal funds as part of a grant to the Oregon Mass Timber Coalition from the Build Back Better Regional Challenge. A total of $41.4 million was awarded to the coalition by the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Economic... View full entry
Milwaukee’s $15 million proposal to renovate 150 vacant, city-owned homes is moving forward. On Monday, the Department of City Development (DCD) announced the development teams, a mix of nonprofit and for-profit developers, that will participate in the first round of the Homes MKE initiative. The participants were selected from a request-for-proposals (RFP) process that generated a tremendous response. — Urban Milwaukee
A total of 66 proposals were submitted, an unprecedented number according to the DCD, with 15 developers selected. Milwaukee will sell the houses for as little as $1 and provide an estimated $75,000 development subsidy and grant a $5,000 workforce subsidy. Following the renovations, the properties... View full entry
The ongoing housing crisis in Los Angeles County may soon become the subject of a new dedicated government agency after the California State Assembly voted on Wednesday to approve SB 679. If signed into law, the bill would authorize the county to create an entity called the Los Angeles... View full entry
A group of North American professors is seeking to debunk commonly-held stereotypes about mobile home parks in the United States. City & Regional Planning Assistant Professor Zachary Lamb (University of California, Berkeley), Geography & Planning Assistant Professor Jason Spicer (University of... View full entry
An opening date has been set for the exciting new Hip Hop Museum (UHHM) project in the South Bronx. Located on the site claiming to be the birthplace of hip hop, the new $80 million museum, which is part of a larger $349 million mixed-use residential development called Bronx Point, will... View full entry
It could look like another round of flight from the city. Or what we may be witnessing is a “second draft” of the American suburbs.
Many communities that were once white, exclusionary, and car-dependent are today diverse and evolving places, still distinct from the big city but just as distinct from their own “first draft” more than a half-century ago.
— Vox
The American suburbs are continuing to diversify and gain millennials and increased numbers of immigrants, two groups that have traditionally been confined to cities. More mixed-use and affordable developments are being delivered in suburban areas where single-family constructions have long... View full entry
New York City Mayor Eric Adams has announced a new adaptive reuse task force that will explore the vast untapped potential for rehabilitation present in the city’s considerable stock of outdated office buildings. Born out of the new Local Law 43, the task force is charged with producing... View full entry
Around the same time the new world record holder for tall mass timber buildings — the 25-story Ascent tower — is making its much-awaited debut in Milwaukee, another North American design proposal has been revealed in Toronto that would surmount the historic milestone by a... View full entry
A Boston development that’s billed as New England’s first LGBTQ-friendly senior affordable housing project broke ground Friday. The Pryde will convert the former William Barton Rogers Middle School in Boston’s Hyde Park neighborhood into 74 units of mixed-income housing for seniors. — NBC Boston
The project is being led by developer Pennrose and local nonprofit LGBTQ Senior Housing, Inc. Boston-based architecture firm DiMella Shaffer carried out the facility’s design. The development will maintain the original 1899 building, which has been vacant since 2015, and its two additions... View full entry
Roughly 2.4 million New York City tenants will face the biggest rent hikes they’ve seen in nearly a decade after the Rent Guidelines Board approved the increases in a split vote Tuesday night at Cooper Union. — Gothamist
The mayor-appointed nine-person panel, which determines rent adjustments for the approximately one million rent-stabilized apartments in New York City, voted five to four to increase rents by 3.25% for one-year leases and 5% for two-year leases. The rates fall in the middle of ranges approved... View full entry
New York City Mayor Eric Adams has announced the completion of the first phase of a five-acre redevelopment project called The Peninsula. The project will bring hundreds of affordable homes and community amenities to the former site of the Spofford Juvenile Detention... View full entry
