Architecture & Urban Planning

"It's an incentive program for the private sector, to get them to invest in an area when it's probably cheaper to go somewhere else," said Ruth Steiner, a professor of urban and regional planning at the University of Florida and director of the school's Center for Health and the Built Environment. Read the story

“By next September and October there will be 22 new community gardens, school gardens and library gardens because of this work,” said Hugh Hogan, executive director of the North Star Fund, which helps allocate the grants to nonprofit groups. “Only 2% of this area is green open space.” Read the full article

Those rules were developed with public health in mind and aimed to limit the risks of transmitting animal-borne diseases to people, said Ruth Steiner, a professor of planning at the University of Florida. Cities need to keep that in mind as they hear from advocates of local agriculture, many of whom are worried about the quality and safety of their food, she said.

The study, "Connecting Natural Landscapes Using a Landscape Permeability Model to Prioritize Conservation Activities in the United States," appears in the journal Conservation Letters. Authors include David Theobald of CSU, Kenyon Fields and Michael Soulé from Wildlands Network and Sarah Reed from the Wildlife Conservation Society. Read the full story

Sen. Barbara Boxer seems to have achieved the impossible by crafting a transportation bill that is overcoming partisan gridlock in the U.S. Senate. Recently, the Senate voted 85-11 to advance Boxer's transportation bill, MAP-21, to a floor vote that is expected to be scheduled when Congress returns to Washington on Feb. 27. Read the full op-ed

How can we ensure the water that runs off our driveways and parking lots is safe for the environment? 2009 Switzer Fellow Brenda Zollitsch works with municipalities to address pollution that impacts waterways.

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"One of my first thoughts is perhaps (I-75) shouldn't have been built through that area," said Ruth Steiner, an associate professor in urban and regional planning at the University of Florida. Read the full story