Supporting Communities, Preserving Resources and Enriching Lives… Changing Maryland for the better!
March 12, 2014
Agricultural/Rural Preservation farm easements, land preservation, MALPF, Maryland Agricultural Land Preservation Foundation, Maryland Board of Public Works, resource protection and planning policy, smart growth Leave a comment
On March 5, the Maryland Board of Public Works (BPW) approved 11 land preservation easements for the Maryland Agricultural Land Preservation Foundation (MALPF) comprising 1,175 acres. Easements pay landowners to preserve their tracts in perpetuity.
The first statewide farmland preservation program in the nation, MALPF has preserved close to 300,000 acres of farm and forestland. It is considered to be at the forefront of national land preservation programs. More
July 18, 2013
Planning and the Food System, Smart Growth Agriculture, Food System, Food Trust, Growing Power, sustainability 3 Comments
Co-author, MDP
Innovations in the food system continue to promote healthy communities and economic growth by improving access to locally produced, high quality, nutritious food. Since the publication of the Maryland Department of Planning’s (MDP) Models and Guidelines report #28, Planning for the Food System, we have heard of many successful projects. MDP is blogging about what has been accomplished recently by those whose best practices are described in the report: farmers and other entrepreneurs; not-for-profit organizations; governments; and schools, hospitals, and other institutions that work to improve the food system (production, processing, marketing, distribution, consumption, and waste management). More
June 13, 2013
General, Planning Cross Bronx Expressway, Garvin, New York City, Power Broker, Robert Caro, Robert Moses, urban planning 1 Comment
Fourth of a 4-part series
Robert Moses, in the late 1930s (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Any discussion of the ever-controversial Robert Moses must account for The Powerbroker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York, the monumental, Pulitzer Prize-winning biography by Robert Caro because it is the seminal work on Moses. In the endnotes of The Planning Game, Mr. Garvin acknowledges the grandeur and scope of The Power Broker and then adds the following:
But the book contains errors of fact, sometimes provides an erroneous context for the events it describes, and includes opinions that ignore important, relevant information. Thus, despite my admiration for the author’s achievements, I have avoided using any information from The Power Broker that is not corroborated by at least one other unbiased reference. Instead, wherever possible, I have relied on newspaper articles, primary sources, and Moses’s published accounts of what took place and what he thought. More
June 12, 2013
General, Planning Center City Philadelphia, Edmund Bacon, Kevin Bacon, New York City, Pennsylvania Railroad, Philadelphia, Suburban Station, urban planning 1 Comment
Third of a 4-part series
Bacon of Philly
In Philadelphia, Burnham’s approach to big plans was exchanged for a focus on discrete, individual projects that nevertheless contributed to a grand vision.
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Edmund Norwood Bacon (May 2, 1910 – October 14, 2005) was a noted American urban planner, architect, educator and author.
Several years ago, the actor Kevin Bacon said that in his home town of Philadelphia, his father was more famous than he. Edmund Bacon headed the planning commission from 1949 to 1970 and deserves much of the credit for reviving downtown Philadelphia.
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June 11, 2013
General, Planning Chicago, Daniel Burnham, Kevin Bacon, Michigan Avenue, Millennium Park, World's Columbian Exposition 1 Comment
Second of a 4-part series
Burnham: No Little Plans
Daniel Burnham on the terrace of his Evanston, IL home. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Following the success of the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893, and with the city’s civic and business elite behind him, Burnham led the planning of improvements for Chicago beginning in 1906. Six committees worked on various issues: lake parks; streets and boulevards; railway terminals; interurban railways; and finance. More
June 10, 2013
General, Planning Alexander Garvin, Chicago, Daniel Burnham, Edmund Bacon, Georges-Eugène Haussmann, Paris, physical landscape, Robert Moses 5 Comments
First of a 4-part series
Are you a planner? Then what do you have in common with Georges-Eugène Haussmann, Daniel Burnham, Robert Moses, and Edmund Bacon?
Plenty.
According to Alexander Garvin, author of a new and engaging book titled The Planning Game: Lessons from Great Cities (W.W. Norton & Company, 2013, 223 pages), all planners are involved in “the planning game.” More