One of the true pleasures of living in Laurel Park is the independence from cars that it offers. In Laurel Park we can walk. We can bike. We can hop the bus. And we can get pretty much anywhere we need to be without the hassle and expense of driving, and with the joy...
A couple posts back we highlighted the success of the Sarasota Chalk Festival. Since then we've noticed numerous articles about street art, about how cities are embracing street art as part of larger urban regeneration efforts. A recent one from gristexplores...
This post is a bit long in coming, but check out the pics of the 2011 Sarasota Chalk Art Festival below. For those of us who were there, it's a nice reminder of how quickly the event has grown. For those of you who weren't...well, don't miss it in 2012! Sarasota has a...
Great article about the economics of mixed-use development, something we're always pushing here at Laurel Park Management. Mixed-use helps makes places walkable and livable. It helps make them better, more beautiful, and more vibrant. So, naturally, it provides an...
{click image for photo source} The John Ringling Causeway links Lido Key and St. Armand's Circle with the mainland and downtown Sarasota. Its sleek design mirrors our expansive sunsets, and the bridge features protected cycling and jogging lanes. Hart's Landing,...
Success is a funny thing, and more difficult to measure than one might immediately think. If a basketball player scores 30 points per game but destroys his team's chemistry with a poor attitude, is he really successful? Is a presidential campaign successful if half...
Okay, so—in a follow up to our last post—here are some critics' choices for the US of A's best public spaces. The article quoted is from Planetizen, a wonderful clearinghouse-style site of urban-themed articles. Do you agree with the critics? Disagree? Any nominees...
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQWWhnjNUtc] Gil Penalosa, the founder of 8-80 cities and a consultant with Gehl Architects, speaks at a TEDx conferences about towns and cities can adapt and improve. He's a smart guy, and his ideas and advice are beyond...
A couple weeks ago I posted about merits of replacing a second car (or even a first car) with a bicycle. Bicycles are big right now in the worlds of urban planning and placemaking, for many good reasons. As mentioned before: bikes are affordable, they don't add to...
{image source} Anyone who's read this blog from its inception knows that we at Laurel Park Management are big supporters of bicycles and the folks who ride them. To clear up a quick issue of nomenclature, I tend to use cycling when I mean higher speeds, longer...
