Gentrification is the most misunderstood concept in America today. Much needed investment and newcomers do not equal displacement. Let’s set the record straight.

The Urban Displacement Project, a Cal Berkeley initiative that aims to understand the nature of gentrification and displacement in American cities, defines gentrification as:

“a process of neighborhood change that includes economic change in a historically disinvested neighborhood — by means of real estate investment and new higher-income residents moving in — as well as demographic change — not only in terms of income level, but also in terms of changes in the education level or racial…

A Photo Essay on The Holy City

This is the first entry in a series documenting the beauty, quirks and fabric of great cities & towns. It’s meant as an observational journal to document my thoughts and perspective on a given place, as well as a tangible guide to what good urbanism looks like in the real world.

Almost two years ago, I went to Charleston for the first time. It was a place I had thought about constantly. Growing up in suburban New York, I was starved for walkable places with high quality architecture. Whenever I went into the…

You never get a second chance to make a first impression.

Eye rolls allowed. I hesitate to use a platitude so freely, and for the opening line of a piece, no less. But the reason phrases like this are so often used is that there’s no small degree of truth to them. So, platitude. As humans, we’re wickedly judgmental. Though we try our best to give everyone and everything a fair shake, only the most strong willed can overcome the power of passing initial judgement. I’m not so strong willed.

Regardless of what one sees or experiences in their stay…

A once in a generation excuse to make our places better

The Death of Cities has been greatly exaggerated.

Covid-19 temporarily suspended much of what makes urban life so great. Overnight, those things we enjoyed most —cross cultural connection through food & experience, nightlife & world class entertainment, serendipity in chance encounters, and general person to person contact — became the very things we could least afford to do. Temporarily.

As the light at the end of this pandemic tunnel appears to be shining brighter, we have an excuse to create better places. Excuse, because opportunity is so often overused, and so rarely taken advantage of. Opportunity requires…

Instagram should almost never be used as a metric to gauge success or self-worth. Unless you’re a city, in which case you should definitely care about your presence on the world’s largest photo-sharing app. But likes aren’t the reason why Instagram is important for cities, though, nor is the app all that useful itself either. Its importance comes from the representation of a like as an indicator of those places that speak to us the most. For anyone who’s come across architecture on Instagram, chances are it’s been from a select group of places; London, Amsterdam, Kyoto, Paris, Lisbon, Venice…

3,000 men marched in a melange of military & civilian uniforms along the Hudson River in Lower Manhattan. Led by the calvary of New York City’s Police Force, these men weren’t going into battle, at least not in the traditional sense. After a raft of self-congratulatory speeches and requisite ribbon cuttings, the troops ascended the West Side Highway. Begun in 1929, with its first section completed in 1930, the West Side opened on November 13th as the first elevated expressway in the world.

Celebrations were in order for this global first. The roadway marked a triumph over a stretch of…

Sugar-coating is fantastic. As with anything that has potentially significant impacts when overused, though, there’s a time and a place for it. Hot churro coming out of the deep fryer? You bet. Sugar coat it. The greatest problems we face as a nation today? Not so much.

We’re in the middle of an extreme housing crisis that has only gotten worse since the Pandemic began. Problems of affordability, equity and overcrowding (a direct effect of too-expensive housing) have been exacerbated via job loss, tax revenue shortfalls and re-allocation of capital. In a country where nearly 11 million households (1/4 of…