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  • Eric Fredericks 11:30 pm on January 1, 2007 Permalink | Reply  

    The 2006 Website of the Year: CoolTown Studios 

    It’s probably no surprise that we’ve selected CoolTown Studios as the walkable-related Website of the Year. After all, isn’t it always the case that what is selected in January as the “whatever of the month” ends up being the “whatever of the year” as well? CoolTown Studios is certainly deserving of the selection.

    Neil Takemoto, who runs the site, has posted over 200 articles this year—maybe more like 250. The articles cover a wide-range of topics, but all are very related to what is discussed on our site. Mr. Takemoto always posts great visuals with his articles, including many fantastic photos he has taken. Their company is also sponsoring some very interesting real estate proposals, including their $10,000 reward for helping cool towns get built and their $150 million equity network for CoolTowns. Perhaps someday I can take advantage! CoolTown Studios has been a trend setter for all other planning- and architecture-related blogs.

    Now, that I’ve completely lost all of our loyal readers to CoolTown Studios ;) , I want to make an announcement. We will no longer be selecting sites as our “site of the month.” We are instead going to focus more on general articles and will just feature other interesting websites from time to time. I certainly hope this doesn’t take away from our sincerity in honoring CoolTown Studios with this award, we’re just looking to go in a different direction with this site.

    I also want to take this opportunity to wish everyone a Happy New Year! One of my resolutions is to write more articles this year…

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

  • Eric Fredericks 11:35 pm on December 30, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    December Website of the Month: Brand Avenue 

    The Site of the Month for December, Brand Avenue, is a site I recently stumbled upon and I actually have no idea who runs it. However, I think it is a cool site with great content that also looks slick. The site has a heavy focus on architecture and urban issues (notice a trend with selecting architecture sites—and I’m a planner). Be sure to check out the article entitled Woonerven. The woonerf concept is starting to pick up traction in the United States, although it’s generally called “Home Zones” here. I like the term woonerf better!

    Brand Avenue will be considered for the 2006 Walkable Neighborhoods Website of the Year award, along with the past and future recipients of the monthly awards.

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

  • Eric Fredericks 10:05 pm on December 1, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    November Website of the Month: LivinginUrbanSac 

    LivinginUrbanSac is one of my favorite sites on the web. Of course, that’s probably because I live in “UrbanSac” and have a large fascination with what’s going on in the walkable parts of Sacramento. Even if you’re not from Sacramento, it is a great site to scope out because it is a highlight reel of sorts for a city that’s rapidly becoming a hip and upper class American city. Yes, Sacramento—I strongly believe that this city is going to be mentioned in the same breath as other elite walkable cities around the US in a few years (mainly because we have a great grid system, a fantastic tree canopy, and so many mixed-use developments in the urban core). I have yet to find a better website that covers the projects and issues occurring in our urban core. There are similar sites in other second-tier cities like Sacramento, and I think sites like these are important to keep spreading the walkability message in places that are starting to see urban renewal and revitalization of the urban core. Therefore, LivinginUrbanSac is our pick for website of the month of November.

    LivinginUrbanSac will be considered for the 2006 Walkable Neighborhoods Website of the Year award, along with the past and future recipients of the monthly awards.

    A note for those of you that noticed I’ve cheated on this posting—we all get a little busy sometimes!!

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

  • Eric Fredericks 5:52 pm on November 1, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    October Website of the Month: Walk Sydney Streets Photos 

    Alan Waddell of Sydney, Australia is an amazing man. He has been interviewed by dozens of media outlets throughout Australia and the world. On his birthday two years ago, he even received a congratulatory letter from Prime Minister John Howard. Why has he received so much attention? Because he loves to walk. Everywhere. All while snapping various photos of wacky and whimsical things he observes while walking around Sydney. This might not seem like such a big deal, until you find out that Alan is 92 years young and is documenting by photography his walking through EVERY suburb of Sydney (A note for non-Australian readers – there are hundreds of “suburbs” within the city limits of Sydney. To Americans, the suburbs of city would be more like districts within cities here. There are hundreds of suburbs within Sydney, and Sydney has somewhere around 4.5 million people. That’s what makes him so impressive!). Mr. Waddell has a website on which he posts all of the photos he finds interesting during his walks. To date, he has posted 601 photos. Mr. Waddell’s website, Walk Sydney Streets Photos, is selected as our October Site of the Month.

    Every time I visit this site, I end up spending a long time on it. Some of his photos are true gems. Plus, it brings back all of the memories of the time I spent living in Sydney. I really loved the city – it is my favorite city in the world (and I’ve been to a lot of them in several different countries). I did not own a car while I lived there, so I walked everywhere. Where I didn’t walk, I hopped on the great city buses or the trains. Sydney is a highly walkable city, not to mention it is incredibly beautiful (view some of my photos of Sydney here). I’m so jealous that Mr. Waddell has the privilege of walking in such a beautiful city each day (not that Sacramento isn’t beautiful as well). Hopefully, Mr. Waddell would like to do an interview with us in the future if he happens upon any spare time. We wish Mr. Waddell the all the best and good weather as he continues his documentation.

    Walk Sydney Streets Photos will be considered for the 2006 Walkable Neighborhoods Website of the Year award, along with the past and future recipients of the monthly awards.

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

  • Eric Fredericks 4:11 pm on September 30, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    September Website of the Month: The Urban Commons 

    The Website of the Month for September we’ve selected is fairly local – just a short hop down the Capitol Corridor to Oakland. The Urban Commons is run by Jesse Hudson who describes the site as “an online journal focused on the politics and culture of city life.” Mr. Hudson attempts to “explore cities and urban life through urbanism, the arts, architecture, transportation and economics.” The site is quite entertaining to read, and tends to focus a lot on Oakland and Bay Area issues. If you’re unfamiliar with Oakland, or maybe have only heard the negatives about it (such as the Oakland Raiders miserable start to the season), then you should definitely visit this site. Oakland has several fantastic neighborhoods. The site also discusses topics related to walkability from all over the world. Mr. Hudson just redesigned the site and it looks fantastic.

    The Urban Commons will be considered for the 2006 Walkable Neighborhoods Website of the Year award, along with the past and future recipients of the monthly awards.

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

    • Central City 1:19 pm on October 6, 2006 Permalink

      Congrats on the domain ,and thanks for the site suggestion , it is a great site with great links . . .

  • Eric Fredericks 9:27 pm on August 31, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    August Website of the Month: The New York City Streets Renaissance 

    Perhaps I did a little foreshadowing in my previous post on which site would be chosen for the August Site of the Month. The selection for this month is The New York City Streets Renaissance. The NYCSR is a “coalition of community groups, elected officials, business leaders, and concerned citizens from across the five boroughs who are working together to bring long-overdue, common sense improvements to our neighborhood streets.” Their website is full of very valuable information, including the Streets Blog. My favorite part of the site is their video gallery. The videos are outstanding! Much credit goes to Clarence Eckerson Jr. for producing the videos. The videos, while mainly focused on New York City issues, are applicable to just about every city or town.

    We certainly hope that NYCSR is successful in making NYC more pedestrian and bike friendly. It’s quite a tragedy when the most densely populated city in America with perhaps the most pedestrian-generating activity centers is also one the most dangerous for bikes and peds! Hopefully Mayor Bloomberg and the NYCDOT can take a cue from Enrique Peñalosa.

    The New York City Streets Renaissance will be considered for the 2006 Walkable Neighborhoods Website of the Year award, along with the past and future recipients of the monthly awards.

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

    • Alfred 8:43 am on July 27, 2009 Permalink

      That site seems pretty dead now. You should keep updating.

  • Eric Fredericks 9:03 pm on July 31, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    July Website of the Month: Sprawled Out: The Search for Community in the American Suburb 

    I love the feeling that comes to me after sitting back and trying to think of a good website to chose for the Site of the Month – and then suddenly it pops into my head. This month, the website that gave me that satisfaction is Sprawled Out: The Search for Community in the American Suburb. John Michlig, the creator of the site, stumbled across our website earlier this month and told us about his site. Here is how he described it:

    SPRAWLED OUT logs my work on a book designed to use my city of Franklin, Wisconsin as an example of the community planning process (or lack thereof) in modern American cities and towns around the country. As the title implies, there will be a certain bias against the sort of unchecked, freeway-fed expansion that the United States has seen since the end of World War II.

    The site is excellent and provides very current information on smart growth happenings, books, websites, and what is going on in Franklin. We certainly wish John the best of luck with his project.

    Sprawled Out will be considered for the 2006 Walkable Neighborhoods Website of the Year award, along with the past and future recipients of the monthly awards.

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

  • Eric Fredericks 10:49 pm on June 30, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    June Website(s) of the Month: Curbed, Curbed LA, and Curbed SF 

    The June websites of the month are unorthodox picks considering they are real estate blogs, but I find them quite fascinating and well worth mentioning on this site. You might ask why there are multiple picks for this month? Well, you cannot really select one of the sites without mentioning the other two. The selections for the month are Curbed, Curbed LA, and Curbed SF. These sites have become the center for virtual discussions on real estate in New York (Curbed), Los Angeles, and now, San Francisco. Curbed is also “the most-trafficked neighborhood and real-estate weblog on the web.�

    These sites were selected not only because of the real estate information provided, but also because the writers there get walkability and it is often reflected in their articles. The articles are often very humorous and cynical – especially when it comes to auto-oriented discussion. Even if you do not live in one of the three cities (I don’t), they are still a must read. I must admit that I enjoy reading the LA blog the best. Perhaps it is because I started reading it before Curbed SF was established and I liked reading about the city closer to home. Plus, Los Angeles faces so many interesting challenges! I will probably start focusing on Curbed SF a little more because I live so close to San Francisco and I know the city much better. Of course, the original Curbed is a brilliant website as well!

    The Curbed sites will be considered together as one entry for the 2006 Walkable Neighborhoods Website of the Year award along with the past and future recipients of the monthly awards.

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

    • Mortgage Mods 12:21 am on April 11, 2009 Permalink

      A fantastic read….very literate and informative. Many thanks….where is your RSS button ?

  • Eric Fredericks 7:25 pm on May 31, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    May Website of the Month: Gmaps Pedometer 

    This month’s selection for site of the month is a bit different from our previous selections. But the site is so useful and cool that we could not resist giving it top honors during a month supposedly dedicated to biking. Therefore, Gmaps Pedometer is the Site of the Month for May. The site is a Google Maps API hack that allows you to create walking route maps on top of the existing Google Maps interface (complete with aerial photos). You can edit your points on the map and create a walking route, measure distances and calories burned, and even SAVE your favorite walking routes.

    To see this program in action, click here to view a sample walking route I created in Downtown Sacramento. I created this map for a group of transportation planners I led on a walking audit of the revitalizing downtown. This was not the route I chose, however, I will hopefully post that route soon along with a narrative guide for interesting destinations along the route. This is just one of the many examples that I have used this website for in the past. For example, I use it for my cycling routes. I see it used in many other functions that I participate in as well.

    Congrats to Paul for creating such a successful site that has very useful purposes in the walkable world! Gmaps Pedometer will be considered for the 2006 Walkable Neighborhoods Website of the Year award along with the past and future recipients of the monthly awards.

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

    • Joshua Duggan 12:23 pm on June 2, 2006 Permalink

      You should also check out http://www.walkjogrun.net. I like this one because it gives you a table that lists the distances between your points. You can also change your speed and it will adjust your time.

      Also http://www.wayfaring.com. This one has some really awesome stuff you can do.

    • Eric 9:17 pm on June 2, 2006 Permalink

      As always, thanks for the great links, Josh. I had never visited walkjogrun but I’ll definitely have to link it. And I love wayfaring – I was working on a my favorite walkable places around the globe map, but I didn’t finish. Here’s the map I started to work on: http://www.wayfaring.com/maps/show/3770

  • Eric Fredericks 11:09 pm on April 30, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    April Website of The Month: Context Sensitive Solutions.org 

    April has been a busy month, and even though the number of articles written this month declined, there were some changes made to the design and features of this website that will hopefully enhance the user experience (for instance, check out the redesign of the photo gallery). Somewhere in between coding and volunteering for tree inventories, I stumbled across a great website called Context Sensitive Solutions.org. This site has a superb design and contains a plethora of information on context sensitive solutions (CSS) – from news articles, to event notification and coverage, to research articles on CSS, to case studies, to flexible designs – the list goes on and on. Because I was so overwhelmed by the information, I had no choice but to select this site as the Site of the Month for April.

    The site was “created by Project for Public Spaces in collaboration with Scenic America to assist the Federal Highway Administration in accomplishing one of its Vital Few Strategies – the integration of context sensitive solutions (CSS) into project planning, development, and implementation in all 50 states by September 2007.” The site also offers an excellent definition of CSS that was developed by FHWA:

    Context sensitive solutions (CSS) is a collaborative, interdisciplinary approach that involves all stakeholders to develop a transportation facility that fits its physical setting and preserves scenic, aesthetic, historic and environmental resources, while maintaining safety and mobility. CSS is an approach that considers the total context within which a transportation improvement project will exist.

    On the topic of CSS, Caltrans has been one of the institutional leaders for implementing CSS on statewide scale. In fact, Caltrans received an award from AASHTO for Best Practices in Smart Growth and Transportation 2004 Competition in the category of “Institutionalization or Organizational Change.� While it is a slow-going process to change the culture of an organization as large as Caltrans, significant strides have been made on the implementation of CSS processes department-wide.

    Context Sensitive Solutions.org will be considered for the 2006 Walkable Neighborhoods Website of the Year award along with the future recipients of the monthly awards.

    Popularity: 1% [?]

     

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