By Catarina Kidd, AICP. JOHN SCHWARZ, an environmental planner for 22 years, is president and principal of JHS Consulting, specializing in environmental planning. He holds an MBA from Santa Clara University and a B.A. in environmental studies from UC Santa Barbara. What brought you to environmental planning? As a student at UC Santa Barbara, I […]
Meet a local planner — John Schwarz Read More »
By Catarina Kidd, AICP. MAREN MOEGEL, an urban and architectural designer and master planner with broad international experience, is Studio Director at Studio T-SQ in Oakland, California. She is working on urban mixed-use projects throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. What is your education background? I have lived in Berkeley and the East Bay since
Meet a local planner — Maren Moegel Read More »
IN MEMORIAM APA has informed us of the death of its retired APA Executive Director Frank S. So on February 22, 2019. So graduated from Youngstown University and earned his master’s degree in city and regional planning from Ohio State University. He joined the staff of the American Society of Planning Officials in 1967, and
Frank So, FAICP, 81; helped create Planning magazine Read More »
New regional infrastructure across Berkeley, Oakland, and Emeryville By Matt Taecker, AICP. THIS IS A VISION PLAN that reimagines how the very wide rights-of-way existing along the Shattuck-Adeline-Stanford corridor can be used to increase community livability and promote urban sustainability. These generous rights-of-way originally accommodated rail and were repurposed in the 20th century primarily for
From arterial roadway to greenway Read More »
By James A. Castañeda, AICP. WILL THIS BE YOUR FIRST NATIONAL PLANNING CONFERENCE? I remember walking into Union Station in Washington, DC, in the spring of 2004 and marveling at the opening reception. As a student about to graduate with a city and regional planning degree, it was a thrill to be around people in
Director’s note – April 2019 Read More »
Samuel Herzberg, AICP. TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS AGO, an expedition led by Gaspar de Portolá travelled 1,200 miles up the Alta California coast to explore an overland route for establishing Spanish harbors at San Diego and Monterey Bay. Following well-established footpaths that marked trade routes between native villages, the expedition traveled farther north, and
Marking history with the Ohlone-Portolá Heritage Trail project Read More »
By Al Savay, AICP. RETHINKING SINGLE FAMILY HOUSE SIZE. The single-family detached house is an icon — a symbol of the American Dream. Owning a single-family home is the culmination of hard work, financial planning, risk, strategic thinking, and sacrifice. Demographic changes have revealed major shifts in how our country views home ownership. Even so,
How much house is too much? Read More »
By Jennifer Gastelum and Charlie Knox, AICP. IN AN EFFORT TO ADDRESS THE STATEWIDE HOUSING SHORTFALL, the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) has begun the process of making money available to every city and county in California to expedite housing construction. Senate Bill 2, the “Building Homes and Jobs Act,” was signed
California launches program to increase housing production Read More »
The story of Mare Island, a Base reuse, and Factory OS By Afshan Hamid, AICP. A HOUSING AND TECHNOLOGY DISRUPTION is occurring on Mare Island in Vallejo, California. For 142 years, the island functioned as a naval shipyard for 40,000 workers and more than 500 ships, including cruisers and battleships that served in several wars,
A disruptive housing technology Read More »
By Alex Lantsberg, AICP, and Roxana Aslan. CALIFORNIA is caught in a pair of traps affecting what kind of housing is built and where, and how it is produced. Together, they reinforce a dynamic of suppressed housing construction, unaffordability, and displacement. Policy makers are understandably focused on making it easier to issue permits for where
Taking the high road to fix California’s broken housing production system Read More »
