Liberté, Égalité, Parking

I have a new favorite example about designing places for people, and how much human nature can complicate that process. Mont Saint-Michel is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, just over ⅓ of a square mile in size, and visited by 2.5M tourists per year. With just a few exceptions, it’s not possible to drive right up […]

The pool as a public place and trust exercise

For the first time as an adult, I’m swimming regularly for exercise, which – if you’re unfamiliar with how they do it over here in England – is a simple process. Nothing to it. First, walk to the Leisure Centre (of course they call it that) and check in. Next, disrobe, put on my trunks, […]

If Mpls & St Paul grow and add affordable housing and movie stars, will they be like Islington?

If you’re familiar with the Twin Cities, stretch your imagination with me and picture a city in which: Both exceptionally very wealthy and very poor people live. People reliably support liberal politicians. There’s an area to the west that’s also wealthy, has less poverty, and leans further right politically. Residents have a reputation for being […]

Observations from London: Introduction part 2

I’m starting this blog about urban planning and design of public places in London with potential relevance to MSP with a few posts setting the stage – this is the second. For the first, which included the first hypothetical challenge to the premise, click here. So, what are other reasons why I shouldn’t be doing […]

Observations from London

As of this writing, the mid-May meeting of the City of Minneapolis Transportation & Public Works Committee had 17 views total on YouTube. I know this because I watched it on a beautiful afternoon last week with other activities available to me, mainly for the discussion of the Winter Maintenance Study. It was an excellent […]