Suburbia

Billionaire Ed Roski seems bound and determined to give those people opposed to the construction of a new stadium to lure an NFL team back to Greater Los Angeles plenty of cause for concern.  Recently, Roski's lobbyists have been pushing Sacramento law makers to grant exemptions from environmental and planning requirements for his mega-stadium project in the City of Industry.

As livable streets advocates work to make headway in breaking the cycle of American auto dependence, the folks at Planetizen have put together a video narrative that explains how we got here. "The Story of Sprawl," a double DVD set produced by Managing Editor Tim Halbur, is a compilation of historical films dating from 1939 to 1965, documenting the confluence of factors that fostered the quintessential land use motif of the 20th century: far-flung, low-density, driving-intensive residential and commercial development. The discs include commentary from planning notables including Andrés Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, John Norquist, Neal Peirce, James Howard Kunstler and Robert Cervero, featured in the clip above.

As today's post from Seattle Transit Blog acknowledges, criticizing the place where someone lives is one of the surest ways to create division and contention when discussing planning issues:

Yesterday, news broke that the City of Industry City Council unanimously voted to approve a plan to construct a new stadium to try and entice the Bills from Buffallo or the Raiders from Oakland.  Putting aside any arguments about whether this is a good idea, because it clearly isnt', I thought it could create a fun weekend excercise for Streetsbloggers.  If you were the transportation engineer for this project, what would your plan for this stadium be?

Last week the Federal Transit Administration finally approved the Silver Line, a long-awaited addition to the capital region's transit system that will extend to suburbs in northern Virginia. There are still a few hoops to jump through to secure the necessary funding, but it looks like some relief is in sight for the area's crushing congestion.

Watch this vid touting a contraption called the "SpeedFit," then get your punchlines ready. We like this one from the YouTube peanut gallery:

Yesterday was a big day in Sacramento as many important pieces of legislation required action by Governor Schwarzenegger or would expire even though they were passed by both branches of the state legislature.  The result?  The Governor signed legislation that links sprawl to climate change but also vetoed legislation that would have placed a fee on all containers entering and leaving the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.

Via Planetizen, Richard Florida argues the decline in the popularity of suburbs is not just a product of rising oil prices, but a result of a new "spatial fix" that is reorganizing how and where people live their lives. From Florida's column in the Globe and Mail: