We’re Seeing a Groundswell of People Doing Amazing Things in Their Communities

The Strong Towns Tension With YIMBYism: The Strong Towns approach to housing has some obvious tensions with NIMBYism, but what about YIMBYism? That’s the topic for discussion on the table for today’s episode of the Strong Towns Podcast, because while our approach has more in common with th... by The Strong Towns Podcast

66 min listen

Alex Alsup: What Percentage of Property in the U.S. Is Locally Owned?: This week on the Strong Towns Podcast, host Chuck Marohn is joined by Alex Alsup of Regrid, an organization that, among other things, has put together the only 100% complete national parcel map for the United States. Alsup chats with us about this 10... by The Strong Towns Podcast

45 min listen

Where Strong Towns Stands As We Enter Another Election Year: As the U.S. enters another election year—one that is certain to be contentious—we know that many Americans are going to be engrossed in the conversation about national politics. And many of our readers want to know where Strong Towns stands on the is... by The Strong Towns Podcast

58 min listen

A Chat With Barkha Patel, Who Helped Achieve Zero Traffic Deaths in Jersey City: On this week’s episode, Chuck chats with Barkha Patel, the Director of Infrastructure for Jersey City. Patel has pioneered changes in her city that have dramatically reduced traffic fatalities—in fact, this month marked seven years that Jersey City h... by The Strong Towns Podcast

59 min listen

Why We Need To Show Empathy Toward Drivers in Conversations About Street Safety: Bike Talk is a radio show dedicated to the idea that we need to prioritize bikes as a form of public transportation, and they recently invited Chuck to appear on an episode. It was a great conversation, and so we’re sharing that audio with you today ... by The Strong Towns Podcast

51 min listen

Benjamin Herold: The Unraveling of America’s Suburbs: Benjamin Herold, author of Disillusioned: Five Families and the Unraveling of America’s Suburbs, joins host Chuck Marohn on this week’s episode of the Strong Towns Podcast. Disillusioned tells the story of five families from Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas,... by The Strong Towns Podcast

56 min listen

What Is the Role of Philanthropy in Building Stronger Towns?: What’s the role of philanthropy when it comes to building strong towns? How do we get philanthropy involved, and how do we make good investments? How do we access federal programs and bigger resources effectively? This is a tension within our convers... by The Strong Towns Podcast

53 min listen

Sam Quinones: Recovering Addicts Are Having a Bottom-Up Revolution in This Small Kentucky Town: Journalist and author Sam Quinones returns to the Strong Towns Podcast for the third time to discuss a recent, moving article he’s written for The Free Press: “Opioids Decimated a Kentucky Town. Recovering Addicts Are Saving It.” It’s the story of Ha... by The Strong Towns Podcast

26 min listen

Tony Jordan and Chris Meyer: Pushing for People Over Parking: This week’s episode of the Strong Towns Podcast is all about parking reform, and here to talk with host Chuck Marohn on the matter are Tony Jordan and Chris Meyer. Jordan is the president of the Parking Reform Network, a bottom-up nonprofit that’s wo... by The Strong Towns Podcast

65 min listen

Eric Goldwyn: Why U.S. Transit Is So Expensive (and How To Fix It): On this week’s episode, host Chuck Marohn talks with Eric Goldwyn, a leading urban scholar and program director at the Marron Institute of Urban Management, as well as a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Transportation and Land-Use program at the N... by The Strong Towns Podcast

58 min listen

Meet the Freeway Fighters Who Are Suing the Texas Department of Transportation: One of the most egregious highway expansion projects we’ve encountered is the I-35 project in Austin, Texas. A lot of good people have been fighting it for a long time, and on this week’s episode of the Strong Towns Podcast, host Chuck Marohn will be... by The Strong Towns Podcast

55 min listen

Shima Hamidi: Narrow Lanes Save Lives: On this week’s episode, Chuck talks with Dr. Shima Hamidi of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, who, in November 2023, published a study on how wide lanes on urban streets promote more crashes, whereas narrower lanes—as narrow as ni... by The Strong Towns Podcast

39 min listen

Minnesota Introduces First-in-the-Nation Bill To Eliminate Minimum Parking Mandates Statewide: On this week’s episode, Chuck Marohn talks about a trip he made to the Minnesota state capitol, where he was invited to take part in a press conference in which a bill was launched. Strong Towns is a bottom-up, member-based movement, and so getting i... by The Strong Towns Podcast

44 min listen

Where Is Sprawl Good? (Featuring Joe Minicozzi): At Strong Towns, we try to avoid using the word “sprawl” as a shorthand term in our content—and we’d even go so far as to say that sprawl isn’t the problem we’re trying to solve in our communities. All that said, are there any instances where sprawl ... by The Strong Towns Podcast

49 min listen

Reading Member Comments—Live From Buc-ee’s!: Alright, it’s not exactly “live,” but while visiting Austin, Chuck Marohn couldn’t resist stopping by a Buc-ee’s to marvel at this Texas-sized gas station. It’s emblematic of the overbuilt, spread-out, auto-oriented infrastructure plaguing states lik... by The Strong Towns Podcast

14 min listen

We Must Become More Sensitive to the Stress Our Cities Are Under: Different people are sensitive to different things around them, and this Member Week, we’re asking you to challenge yourself to become a little more sensitive to the things that are happening in your community. What do you see when you look around yo... by The Strong Towns Podcast

58 min listen

Seth Kaplan: Repairing American Society, One Zip Code at a Time: On this episode of the Strong Towns Podcast, host Chuck Marohn talks with friend, author, and expert on fragile states, Seth Kaplan. His new book, Fragile Neighborhoods, offers a bold new vision for addressing social decline in America, one zip code ... by The Strong Towns Podcast

53 min listen

Conor Semler: A New Decision-Making Framework for Street Design: On this episode of the Strong Towns Podcast, host Chuck Marohn chats with Conor Semler, an associate planner with Kittelson and Associates. Semler was involved in the development of both the National Association of City Transportation Officials’s Urb... by The Strong Towns Podcast

51 min listen

Strong Towns Is Jane Jacobs in Action: Strong Towns founder and president, Charles Marohn, was invited to the Lit with Charles podcast to discuss Jane Jacobs’ seminal work, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, and the impact it has had on urban planning and the building of cities.... by The Strong Towns Podcast

53 min listen

The Arguments for Speed Cameras…and Why They Don’t Hold Up: On this episode of the Strong Towns Podcast, host Chuck Marohn talks about his concerns with speed cameras. Plenty of people dislike speed cameras as surveillance devices and, conversely, many urbanists support the use of speed cameras as a tool to m... by The Strong Towns Podcast

63 min listen

Steve Mouzon: How Do We Rebuild Maui?: In light of the recent wildfires in Maui (and other parts of Hawaii), this week’s Strong Towns Podcast episode features a conversation with Steve Mouzon, author of The Original Green and member of the Strong Towns Advisory Board. Mouzon’s work with r... by The Strong Towns Podcast

61 min listen

Walkable City Design Is Critical for Economic Health: After World War II, the U.S. embarked on an experiment in how we build cities. Instead of creating places scaled to people who walked, we built suburbs that focused on moving cars quickly and efficiently. Many cities in North America are looking to b... by The Strong Towns Podcast

84 min listen

Citizen Versus Developer? No! It’s Citizen As Developer.: Recently, an article came out of Medicine Hat, Alberta, reflecting on some development conversations happening within the city, inspired by Strong Towns presentations. When Chuck Marohn read the article, he felt core insights were missing or misunder... by The Strong Towns Podcast

39 min listen

Four Communities Are Becoming Examples of Change: Change is not always easy, and without examples, it can be difficult to reimagine how we do things. That’s just one of the reasons Strong Towns decided to launch the Community Action Lab: a carefully customized, two-year relationship between Strong T... by The Strong Towns Podcast

54 min listen

From 500 to 5,000: What Strong Towns Members Are Doing to Make Their Places Better: Just a couple weeks ago, we got the opportunity to meet nearly 500 Strong Towns members for the first time at the Strong Towns National Gathering. It is evident that Strong Towns members are people who care deeply about their place: We heard so many ... by The Strong Towns Podcast

43 min listen

Dollar Stores Are Leeching the Economic Vitality of Communities Across the U.S.: A recent report from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance reveals some shocking facts: In 2021, half of the new stores opened in the U.S. were chain dollar stores. Moreover, Dollar Store and Dollar Tree (which are part of the Family Dollar system) t... by The Strong Towns Podcast

54 min listen

Ian Lockwood: Thoughts From an Engineer by The Strong Towns Podcast

57 min listen

What’s Going On With the Recent Bank Failures?: In March 2023, major banks collapsed, interest rates have been rising, and many people are greatly—and rightly—concerned about inflation. In this week’s episode of the Strong Towns Podcast, Chuck Marohn talks about the financial system, and provides ... by The Strong Towns Podcast

59 min listen

Growth Through Destruction: In 1906, a powerful earthquake in San Francisco, California, damaged a good portion of the city, causing havoc and distress as 28,188 buildings were destroyed, and over 3,000 people were killed. Curiously, after this tragic disaster, things began to ... by The Strong Towns Podcast

57 min listen

On the Conservative Reaction to 15-Minute Cities: We believe everyone can build a Strong Town, but all too often, political differences divide communities, and instead of working together to build stronger neighborhoods from a bottom-up approach, we get caught up in contentious, top-down ideas and c... by The Strong Towns Podcast

56 min listen

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We’re Seeing a Groundswell of People Doing Amazing Things in Their Communities

We’re Seeing a Groundswell of People Doing Amazing Things in Their Communities

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