Urban Policy

Sacramento lawmakers are in a trap. U.S. District Judge Lawrence Karlton will decide in little more than three months whether to set a population cap on the state’s vastly overcrowded prison system, potentially forcing the early release of thousands of convicted criminals. To keep the court at bay, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has asked the Legislature to approve billions in new prison construction money, and to consider revising sentencing and parole laws to put fewer criminals behind bars.

The trap is this:… more

"If New York City is a business, it isn’t Wal-Mart -- it isn’t trying to be the lowest-priced product in the market. It’s a high-end product, maybe even a luxury product. New York offers tremendous value, but only for those companies able to capitalize on it."

-- Mayor Michael Bloomberg, January 2003

These seem the best of times for America’s elite cities. Wall Street’s 2006 megabonuses created thousands of instant millionaires, and, with their venture-fund soulmates in places like San Francisco,… more

Eli Broad has suggested that once its big makeover is complete, Grand Avenue will be comparable to the Champs-Elysees. That’s bunk. But it may look a little like Sesame Street, and that’s terrific.

The children’s public television program -- which, in the words of a recent study by a University of New Hampshire scholar, has "strived to exemplify and create an egalitarian and more tolerant community" -- has had a tough time being replicated in the real world. This is especially… more

For the last five years, speculators, big developers and homeowners have gorged on Los Angeles real estate. The huge run-up in prices -- more than 135% from 2001 to 2006 -- has greatly increased the spending power of property owners. Yet there has been a worrisome consequence: Working and middle-class families are moving out -- and failing to move in -- because they cannot afford a house here. Long term, that’s not good for the local economy. As perverse as… more

In the opening sequence of Martin Scorsese’s Oscar-contender The Departed, Jack Nicholson’s gangster character recalls that when he was young, the priests used to tell the Irish American children of South Boston that they could either become cops or criminals.

The movie, which is essentially an urban morality tale played out between Irish American gangsters and cops, is only the latest in a long line of American films featuring the rivalry between good and bad in ethnic enclaves. (Think James Cagney… more

Asked which American cities have been the biggest economic winners of the new millennium, almost anyone reading a daily newspaper or watching a nightly news show would name places like New York, San Francisco, Boston, and Washington, D.C., where condo and single-family home prices have surged and the wealthy enjoyed a bonanza by leveraging their real estate assets.

In fact, the true hotspots are scattered across a landscape all but unknown to the Manhattan-based media. Soaring condo prices are a minor… more

While not a Slow City by design, Floyd, pop. 434, embodies much of the ideology that the Italian founders of the Città Lente (slow city in Italian) movement have been trying to get small towns around the world to embrace since 1999.

The idea applies in particular to cities bypassed by globalization. Rather than rely on age-old ways to spur the economy — more development and tax breaks for businesses that create jobs — towns are encouraged to stay small and… more

LONG BEACH - Take a walk in Long Beach and what do you see?

Stray from the palm-lined streets by the ocean shore, the bustling hubs at Pine Avenue, the Pike or Belmont Shore; leave the manicured lawns of the Virginia Country Club area or the Bixby neighborhoods, and there's another Long Beach.

It is the Long Beach that struggles daily to make the rent, rather than the one that plops down a fortune for an ocean-view condo.

It is the Long Beach… more

In the increasingly popular move of making urban living part of the Inland landscape, Ontario is upping the stakes.

Construction has started on the city's bid for a slice of big-city life, called Piemonte at Ontario Center, where stores and restaurants are planned to go alongside -- and under -- condominiums. Panattoni Development also expects to put up several office buildings and a 256-room hotel, all of it centered around what no other Inland city has: An 11,000-seat arena.

Piemonte, as planned,… more

The fact that the U.S. population will soon top 300 million has led some environmentalists to gnash their teeth over the nation’s ability to handle our expanded "ecological footprint." One can also imagine that few champagne bottles are being popped in Parisian salons.

And there’s even worse news ahead for those who hate the notion of numerous Americans: By 2050 there will be 400 million of us. This surge marks a major watershed in our history, recreating the American Republic and… more