Hacker News with Generative AI: Urban Planning

San Francancisco crime is down, way down (growsf.org)
Citywide crime in San Francisco is now at its lowest point in 23 years. And in the past year, San Francisco saw one of the biggest drops in crime among major U.S. cities, including a 45% drop in property crime in the first quarter of 2025, alone.

Crime, San Francisco, Statistics, Urban Planning

9 points by JumpCrisscross 4 days ago | 0 comments

College Towns: Urbanism from a Past Era (governance.fyi)
How Universities Accidentally Preserved the Walkable America We Demolished Everywhere Else

Urban Planning, History, Academia, Cities

66 points by toomuchtodo 8 days ago | 137 comments

America's Magical Thinking about Housing (theatlantic.com)
The city of Austin built a lot of homes. Now rent is falling, and some people seem to think that’s a bad thing.

Housing, Economics, Urban Planning, Texas

7 points by lantry 8 days ago | 2 comments

On Jane Jacobs (2017) (salmagundi.skidmore.edu)
The legend of Jane Jacobs centers on the writer who revolutionized our thinking about cities with her now-classic The Death and Life of Great American Cities, and the fearless activist who stood up to planning czar Robert Moses’s rampaging road construction, thereby saving Gotham. A recent, rather cartoonish film on the subject is even titled: Citizen Jane: The Battle for New York. It is an irresistible David vs. Goliath story with a feminist twist.

Urban Planning, History, Activism, Biography

70 points by herbertl 9 days ago | 46 comments

Billionaires dream of building utopian techno-city in Greenland (popsci.com)
A handful of wealthy, politically connected Silicon Valley investors are reportedly eyeing Greenland’s icy shores as the site for a techno-utopian “freedom city.”

Greenland, Technology, Urban Planning, Billionaires, Politics

12 points by geox 13 days ago | 5 comments

Crime is down, way down (growsf.org)
Citywide crime in San Francisco is now at its lowest point in 23 years. And in the past year, San Francisco saw one of the biggest drops in crime among major U.S. cities, including a 45% drop in property crime in the first quarter of 2025, alone.

Crime, San Francisco, Statistics, Urban Planning

7 points by davikr 15 days ago | 8 comments

Demystifying Development: Does It Pencil? (ternercenter.app)
The developer journey to build and finance new housing is long and complicated. Throughout this process, a developer must take into account several market and regulatory factors that impact whether or not they can successfully propose and build residential projects.

Housing, Finance, Urban Planning

10 points by coldsunrays 16 days ago | 2 comments

"The Phantom Tollbooth" Was Supposed to Be a Nonfiction Book About Cities (arbesman.substack.com)
The Phantom Tollbooth was initially supposed to be a children’s book about cities.

Children's Literature, Writing, Urban Planning

12 points by arbesman 18 days ago | 1 comments

Let's Ban Billboards (iambateman.com)
Most improvements to cities are hard — they take millions of dollars and years of planning.

Urban Planning, Advertising, Public Policy

359 points by iambateman 19 days ago | 296 comments

YIMBYism as Industrial Policy (slowboring.com)
Shenzhen is China’s leading high-tech hub. The once obscure fishing village became a pillar of the global economy thanks to its proximity to Hong Kong and to being designated a Special Economic Zone in the earliest days of Deng’s reforms, plus some other smart choices and good luck. Part and parcel of that economic transformation is that the city has physically transformed from looking like a poor fishing village to looking like a major 21st-century city.

Urban Planning, China, Economic Development

45 points by JumpCrisscross 22 days ago | 90 comments

Paris Votes for 500 More Car Free Streets (theenergymix.com)
As Paris votes to make another 500 streets car-free, the first residents are moving into a newly-built town outside Cambridge, UK, where the bicycle, not the car, is king.

Paris, Urban Planning, Transportation, Sustainability, Public Policy

22 points by Sontho 23 days ago | 7 comments

Spanish speakers in Philadelphia break traditional rules of speech in signs (phys.org)
I've discovered something fascinating about how Spanish speakers in Philadelphia address each other and communicate through public signs.

Linguistics, Urban Planning, Philadelphia, Culture, Language

3 points by PaulHoule 23 days ago | 2 comments

Living Car-Free in Arizona, on Purpose and Happily (nytimes.com)
One community near Phoenix is taking a “completely different” approach to development.

Lifestyle, Arizona, Urban Planning, Sustainability

23 points by lxm 29 days ago | 2 comments

A Startup Linked to Peter Thiel Wants to Build "Next Great City" in Greenland (insidehook.com)

Startup, Greenland, Real Estate, Urban Planning, Peter Thiel

3 points by amarcheschi 30 days ago | 0 comments

Portlander creates AI-powered device to monitor street health (bikeportland.org)
If you ride on NE 26th Avenue and Wasco, you might have noticed a small square box with a camera lens peering out onto the street.

Artificial Intelligence, Urban Planning, Portland, Technology, Street Infrastructure

22 points by burlesona 32 days ago | 4 comments

Honking Complaints Plunge 69% Inside Congestion Pricing Zone (thecity.nyc)
Honking-mad motorists are laying off the horn in the core of Manhattan since the January launch of congestion pricing, data reveals — with New Yorkers’ beefs about blaring horns plummeting nearly 70% from the same time last year.

Traffic, Congestion Pricing, Urban Planning

7 points by JumpCrisscross 35 days ago | 0 comments

Small cities leaders lack a playbook for dealing with economic decline (phys.org)
The challenges facing big cities such as Detroit and Cleveland have been widely examined by experts over the decades, as each has dealt with the loss of population and major industries.

Economic Development, Urban Planning, Small Cities

20 points by PaulHoule 35 days ago | 1 comments

Congestion Pricing Is a Policy Miracle (bettercities.substack.com)
On January 5th 2025, Congestion Pricing went into effect in New York City. It was a long and winding road (as I detailed here last summer), but Governor Hochul finally made the right decision and allowed the policy to go into effect (albeit at a $9 price point vs. the initial $15).

Politics, Urban Planning

175 points by oftenwrong 36 days ago | 328 comments

Mapping Blurred Spaces – Maps in multiple dimensions (visionscarto.net)
Going into our fieldwork in Marikina City, I had the preconceived notion that spaces of home and work should be separate. However, this perspective was challenged by the realities I encountered in the field.

Mapping, Urban Planning, Anthropology, Philippines

3 points by StromFLIX 36 days ago | 0 comments

Honking Complaints Plunge 69% Inside Congestion Pricing Zone (thecity.nyc)
Honking-mad motorists are laying off the horn in the core of Manhattan since the January launch of congestion pricing, data reveals — with New Yorkers’ beefs about blaring horns plummeting nearly 70% from the same time last year.

Traffic, Congestion Pricing, Data Analysis, Urban Planning

6 points by PaulHoule 37 days ago | 1 comments

The Last Drops of Mexico City (longlead.com)
One of the world’s largest and most populated cities may run out of drinking water in the near future.

Water Scarcity, Mexico City, Urban Planning

209 points by anarbadalov 37 days ago | 215 comments

Supply constraints do not explain house price, quantity growth across US cities (nber.org)
The standard view of housing markets holds that the flexibility of local housing supply–shaped by factors like geography and regulation–strongly affects the response of house prices, house quantities and population to rising housing demand.

Real Estate, Economics, Housing Market, Urban Planning, Research

222 points by pessimizer 38 days ago | 365 comments

How is a Bike Tunnel this Freak'n Great? [video] (youtube.com)

Transportation, Infrastructure, Video, Urban Planning

28 points by ingve 39 days ago | 4 comments

Peru's Great Urban Experiment (2023) (archaeology.org)

Peru, Archaeology, Urban Planning, History

62 points by Thevet 41 days ago | 38 comments

'Let the Fire Teach Us': How L.A. Is Building Back Better (reasonstobecheerful.world)
As communities recover from the devastation of wildfires, rebuilding offers an opportunity to prioritize resilience to future disasters.

Wildfires, Climate Change, Resilience, Urban Planning, Community Recovery

4 points by PaulHoule 42 days ago | 0 comments

Chinese Towers and American Blocks (worksinprogress.co)
China builds towers in a park, while America, and nearly everyone else, builds squat mid-rise blocks. The difference comes down to regulation, not culture.

Architecture, Urban Planning, China, United States

5 points by paulpauper 42 days ago | 0 comments

Czech scientists study trees' ability to absorb traffic noise (radio.cz)
Trees do not only improve air quality by removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. They can also significantly reduce noise levels by absorbing and refracting sound waves. Scientists from Brno are currently investigating how trees could be used as sound barriers against traffic noise.

Environmental Science, Noise Pollution, Urban Planning, Acoustics

27 points by mooreds 43 days ago | 1 comments

'Global weirding': climate whiplash hitting biggest cities (theguardian.com)
Climate whiplash is already hitting major cities around the world, bringing deadly swings between extreme wet and dry weather as the climate crisis intensifies, a report has revealed.

Climate Change, Extreme Weather, Urban Planning, Science, Environment

11 points by ljf 45 days ago | 0 comments

Tech Execs Are Pushing to Build 'Freedom Cities' Run by Corporations (gizmodo.com)
A billionaire-backed push to develop libertarian enclaves in Central America is being imported back to the United States, where its proponents want to lay the groundwork for their own privately run, corporately governed cities.

Corporations, Politics, Urban Planning, Central America, United States

12 points by clumsysmurf 45 days ago | 13 comments

Mapping the University of Chicago's 135-year expansion into Hyde Park and beyond (chicagomaroon.github.io)
In 1890, the newly chartered University of Chicago aimed to “remove the mind of the student from the busy mercantile conditions of Chicago.”

History, Urban Planning, Chicago, Education

209 points by speckx 46 days ago | 77 comments