Real Estate may save us after all, say strategists Christopher Leinberger and Patrick Doherty, but only if it responds to a growing demand for walkable, dynamic neighborhoods. Real estate represents 35% of our economy’s asset base, so its recovery is essential to the country’s “economic renaissance.” However, write Leinberger and Doherty in a recent article, changing housing preferences driven by Millennials and aging baby boomers will make that recovery look quite different than previous decades:
In the fight for livability, sometimes advocates can forget about those who are happily living in environments that others would deem “unlivable”: sprawling, car-dependent suburbs. If it’s all about making our lives more livable, “shouldn’t we be able to choose the sprawling suburbs if we want to?” asked a participant at the Partners’ “Building Livable Communities” Forum in September 2010. Well, yes, replied the panelists, but it’s not that easy. “Choosing” sprawl is not always the free choice that many believe it to be.
For his contributions to creating more environmentally, socially, and financially sustainable communities through his work as a developer, academic, and author.
Columnist Neal Pierce reports on the success of the Partnership for Sustainable Communities, the new federal collaboration of DOT, EPA, and HUD that has awarded a series of grants to communities "for roads and housing and environmental protection."
President of Partners for Livable Communities, Robert McNulty, was quoted in The Wall Street Journal article “Artists vs. Blight ,” discussing artist occupations of blighted homes and neighborhoods in transitioning communities such as Cleveland and Detroit.
