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Design Mobility Neighborliness Regulation Suburbia Transit

Designing for Resilience: Policies Are Great, but Design Is What Will Change Your Life

I recently married my boyfriend Rob and moved ten minutes from my home in Sanger Heights into a garage flat belonging to a couple from our church. Rob had been living here for a few months already and as we headed home from our honeymoon in Santa Fe, I began thinking about what our new […]

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Design Travel

What Ever Happened to Beauty?

Few things provide a lesson in urban banality like driving from one Texas city to another along Interstate 35. Over the past two months, I’ve found myself resigned to this unfortunate experience several times for trips to Houston, San Antonio, Garland, and Dallas, and then back to Waco each time. If I’m driving alone, the […]

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Design Neighborliness

Social Infrastructure: The Real Investment Our Cities Need

My first summer of living in Waco, Texas, I sat up late one night journaling. It had been about 10 months since leaving Brooklyn. What did I miss, exactly, I wondered to myself as I leaned my head back against my pillow. A few predictable answers filled my mind: public transit, bodegas guarded by one-eyed […]

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Design Neighborliness

In Hospitable Cities, You’re Welcomed by Design

A few weeks ago, my boyfriend Rob and I were driving back after a long hike in Waco’s beautiful Cameron Park when we spotted a locally owned baked-goods truck a few blocks from my house. After living in this neighborhood for almost a year, I decided it was time to try their gluten-free bacon jalapeno […]

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Design

Snow Day: Can Your City Pass The “Winter Test”?

This article originally ran for Strong Towns. Nearly a year ago, just after moving to Waco, Texas, I found myself huddled on the couch with my roommate, wearing every possible layer I could and jumping up every few minutes to do jumping jacks and burpees. Once in a while, I’d peek outside the window and […]

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Design Mobility

The Hidden Inequity of Car-Based Design

Last Christmas, I had a lengthy and interesting debate with my mom about car dependence and the value of living in walkable places. Given her age and various health challenges, my mom was understandably suspicious about the idea of living without her trusty minivan. So I was surprised when she began sending me text messages […]

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Design

The relationship between urban design and charity

One of the most well-known Christian parables is the story of the Good Samaritan. When a law expert asks Jesus how to inherit eternal life, Jesus reminds him to keep the law, summarized in the First and Second Commandments. “But who is my neighbor?” the legal expert asks. Jesus then tells the story of a […]