A couple of weeks ago I sweated out a "Scenery" column for Metroland on the Historic Albany Foundation's Walkabout Wednesdays.

It was an awkward thing to write, on account of my being fond of the organization, supportive of its mission, and interested in the walks-and yet there being no way I could avoid the overwhelming cultural weirdness of a ( Read more... )

Richard Florida, author of The Rise of the Creative Class and The Flight of the Creative Class, wants to hear about it.
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Ever made a "bad" move? Ever picked a city and then found it was wrong for you and your loved ones?   And then had to do it all over again?

Last fall when I asked for location stories for my new book, Who's Your City, we were ( Read more... )

As a budding young environmentalist, I organized regular "litter pick-ups" of my local stream, dragging along my little brother and often a couple neighborhood kids. Toward the end of the 6 months we spent in England during my father's sabbatical, I turned ten, and the main activity of the party was a neighborhood litter pick-up. My friends thought ( Read more... )

This week's Looking Up, The Unapologetic City, would be the introduction to my thesis if I were going for an urban planning or public administration masters. On a drive out of Albany and through Delmar a month or two ago, something just clicked for me about what never gets said in all these reports on "weak market," "third tier," or "rust belt" ( Read more... )

From the state of Michigan's Cool Cities economic development program's FAQ:

1. Are you saying we need a (larger) gay community to be cool?

We recognize that diverse communities with a welcoming environment for all types of people attract and retain more creative sector people, jobs and businesses. The presence of a gay community may be an indicator of ( Read more... )

In December 2005, Kalamazoo, Michigan, launched perhaps one of the most elegantly simple economic development initiatives I've ever heard of. Anonymous donors set up a fund and promised to pay full tuition at a state college or university for every graduate of the public school system. (Well, actually 100% of tuition if you've been there since ( Read more... )

Lots of you know that I'm a big nerd about city planning. So it's pretty great, as far as I'm concerned, to get to watch the city of Albany go through its first ever comprehensive planning process. (I spoke with someone at the American Planning Association about this for some background, and he was quite surprised that the capital city of New York ( Read more... )

This week's column.
"I sometimes have a tendency to think of that time in college as one where all of us, of all colors, were hypersensitive in a way that college students can be to any part of their lives, focusing in on tiny details because they can afford the ( Read more... )

 "At some point you have to choose to have a ruin. You don’t generally stumble one day upon a picturesque, clearly ancient ruin that everyone would agree is something to preserve. Along the way, it spent a long time as a decrepit and merely kind-of-old building, ( Read more... )

I tend to be a homebody. Recently, between working at home, parenting, and the return of winter weather, it's gotten kind of ridiculous. I can't easily remember the last time I went out to something other than a few folkie events, potluck, or the café a few blocks away.

So it was really, really nice that when Rebecca came home yesterday with a flier ( Read more... )