It’s not just because Americans wanted more space
Why are suburban yards so big?, Stewart Hicks asks: It’s not just because Americans wanted more space, systems underground required it. After World War II, developers began building suburbs at a scale...
View ArticleElements of public spaces that accommodated the very young, the very old, and...
When the pioneering urban sociologist William Whyte studied the movement of pedestrians in cities, David Epstein explains (in Inside the Box), he found that elements of public spaces that accommodated...
View ArticleA country can’t get rich by making housing scarce
Restrictions on the supply of housing are not a simple transfer from renters to homeowners or from young to old, Matt Yglesias explains: They are an incredibly value-destroying leaky bucket of...
View ArticleA critical problem is one that people are willing to pay a considerable price...
Politics is nothing but an ocean of hyperbole, Bryan Caplan reminds us, as he cites this passage from Edward Banfield‘s 1974 classic, The Unheavenly City Revisited: A great part of the wealth of our...
View ArticleWe really don’t know what it would be like to live in a red city in a red state
When his best friend in Austin quips, “It’s great living in a blue city in a red state,” Bryan Caplan is tempted to reply, “ We really don’t know what it would be like to live in a red city in a red...
View ArticleOnly six commercial towers over 300 metres were built in the US in the first...
The first two decades of the 21st century marked a phenomenal shift in skyscraper construction from the United States to Asia: Only six commercial towers over 300 metres were built in the US in the...
View ArticleThis inverts the historical pattern and creates local variety and global...
The most important reason why historical towns produced beautiful architecture without design is vernacular architecture: When Amalfi was built, everyone used local materials and styles out of...
View ArticleAs far as fire risk is concerned, these areas combine the worst aspects of...
Over a century ago, people started to live together more densely than ever before, and this transformed fires from unfortunate incidents to conflagrations that destroyed entire cities: By the 1870s,...
View ArticleDespite severe economic stagnation, Japan is still a desirable place to live...
For more than three decades, Maxwell Tabarrok notes, Japan has endured near complete economic stagnation: But despite severe economic stagnation, Japan is still a desirable place to live and work. The...
View ArticleThe medieval house might have been built to specifications approved by a...
Dozens of rodents carry plague, Ed West notes, but it would only become deadly to humans when Yersinia pestis infected the flea of the black rat (Rattus rattus): Black rats are sedentary homebodies and...
View ArticleThose crossing through the Holland Tunnel see the most time savings
New York City’s congestion pricing program has been in place for one month, implementing tolls on drivers who enter certain, often gridlocked, areas of Manhattan: And so far, the results are...
View ArticleThe scale was almost comical
Last month, Dwarkesh spent two weeks in China, visiting Beijing, Chengdu, Dujiangyan, Chongqing, Shanghai, and Hangzho: It’s funny how China has basically the inverse problem as America. We subsidize...
View ArticleResidents found themselves surrounded by polluted water, poisoned air, and a...
Brian Potter explains how California turned against growth: Residents found themselves surrounded by polluted water, poisoned air, and a destroyed landscape. Views and natural beauty were increasingly...
View ArticleAll of the global cities that we think of as epic took up less than eight...
In The Accidental Superpower, Peter Zeihan reminds us that moving things around is hard: Anyone who has ever rowed a boat or paddled a canoe in a place where he had to make a portage can (quite...
View ArticleHaving garbage-strewn subways that effectively serve as mobile homeless...
It’s always jarring to come home to the US, Chris Arnade notes, often from much poorer countries, to find that our infrastructure is infinitely worse: But it was what happened after I left the airport...
View ArticlePopulation centers were once built with defense as a top priority
As part of Kyiv’s reconstruction effort, city administrators and government officials should consider modifications to bolster the city’s defenses: Had the Ukrainian government constructed the dam in a...
View ArticleThe federal court decision affecting homeless tent encampments in America
Five years ago, a federal court issued a crucial ruling, Martin v. Boise, affecting homeless tent encampments in America: People experiencing homelessness, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals said,...
View ArticleThe problem is particularly acute in Los Angeles and San Francisco
A recent Boston Consulting Group survey found that many office buildings are at risk of becoming “zombies,” with low usage, high vacancy and quickly diminishing financial viability: The problem is...
View ArticleThe US has about 250 billion square feet of residential floor space
The US has about 250 billion square feet of residential floor space, spread across about 100 million individual buildings: The majority of that square footage is found in single family homes, which...
View ArticleCastle design assumes the enemy will reach the walls
The battlements along the top of a castle wall were designed to allow a small number of defenders to exchange fire effectively with a large number of attackers, and in so doing to keep those attackers...
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