A quote from Ken Jackson, publisher of local news site Urban CNY, that's going in near the end of my paper about social justice and highway removal. After saying that the loudest voices for removal belong to those who portray the highway as a physical barrier dividing the city, he writes:

The city is not divided by a highway, Syracuse is divided ( Read more... )

I feel like I may gain ten pounds in the process since I'm just eating whatever I feel like whenever I want to as I write, but the writing is getting done. Yay ( Read more... )

Some people participate in NaNoWriMo. I'm the single contestant in VeLoPaWriWe (Very Local Paper Writing Week.) Word count: 831(ish) / 5000! The plot includes capitalist processes moving problems around in space instead of solving them, and mid-century urban renewal as "negro removal" (quoting social critic James Baldwin ( Read more... )

Another bit found in research (this time for my poli-sci paper) that's too good not to share. And that will warm the hearts of car-skeptical urbanists like myself ( Read more... )

This "dorms for grownups" project is in my city of Syracuse! I think I'd really enjoy giving this kind of living situation a shot; it appeals to me in the same way that living in a co-op does. I also feel that we need to experiment as a society with approaches to small-space living in urban areas. Unfortunately, at around $700 a month, this would ( Read more... )

A photo before I go to sleep. I miss working with photos ( Read more... )

Ok urban studies, history, or general academic and research folks. Just who is Lewis Mumford and what made him an expert on cities? I've read his Wikipedia page and it feels like he was a kind of amateur architectural historian who made good and wrote a door-stop of a tome about the history of cities (which many academics and other folks now cite ( Read more... )

"A place of many places, the city folds over on itself in so many layers and relationships that it is incomprehensible. One cannot "take it in," one never feels as though there is nothing new and interesting to explore, no new and interesting people to meet ( Read more... )

Here's a summary of a recent literature review on issues of urban gentrification that I'm going to read when I have time. In case you're interested ( Read more... )

A discussion of parasitic methods big-box retailers use to systematically avoid paying what I would argue is their fair share in taxes ( Read more... )