Category: Resources

120 Day Stimulus Spending Report – D.C.

120 Day Stimulus Spending Report – D.C.

Posted on by katie

This report is a product of Smart Growth America (SGA), a coalition of national, state and local organizations working to improve the ways we plan and build our towns, cities, and metropolitan areas.

As part of that mission, SGA and our partners have been working with states and cities to help shape how they spend their stimulus funds. In March 2009, SGA issued Spending the Stimulus, a report describing the wide range of projects for which the bulk of the states’ ARRA transportation spending could be used.

Prince George’s County: New Carrollton Preliminary Transit District Development Plan and Proposed Transit District Overlay Zoning Map Amendment

Posted on by ian

Overall, we want to express our enthusiasm for the plan to recreate the New Carrollton station area as a great metropolitan center with a grand transit station as the anchor. We concur with the real estate experts panel report of the Urban Land Institute that “the first step in catalyzing development at the station area is to focus on the station itself.” Built in 1978, the station is one of the oldest in the system. The station, however, is a leading economic development asset for the county.

REGIONAL – Urban Land Institute’s “Beltway Burden”

REGIONAL – Urban Land Institute’s “Beltway Burden”

Posted on by ian

To find affordable homes, many in the workforce have followed the popular advice to “drive till you qualify” by moving to remote suburbs such as Warren and Fauquier counties, VA, in the west; Spotsylvania County, VA, and Charles County, MD, in the south; Frederick County in the north; and Calvert County, MD, in the east.  As reflected in this report, however, efforts to save on housing expenses often lead to higher transportation costs, with the result that an even larger portion of household budgets are consumed by the combined burden of housing and transportation costs.

Click  here to view full report >>

PBS Frontline Documentary “Poisoned Waters” Featuring Stewart Schwartz

Posted on by tom

PBS’s Pulitzer-prize winner journalist Hedrick Smith exposes in his new Frontline documentary “Poisoned Waters” the damage being done to the nation’s delicate aquatic ecosystems like Puget Sound and the Chesapeake Bay. During his investigation, he finds that one of the major sources of the problem is our land use decisions and how we have chosen to grow. Low-density residential and commerical development built in the Chesapeake Bay watershed provide acres of impervious surface that send stormwater, laden with pollutants from parking lots and highways, rushing into the bay.

Stewart Schwartz, CSG’s Executive Director, leads Hedrick Smith on a tour of Arlington County and shows how smart growth helps protect the Bay by reducing stormwater runoff through redevelopment of parking lots into compact, walkable, urban communities. Watch the clip of the tour below, or see the full video on PBS’s website. Chris Miller, the president of the Piedmont Environmental Council, our partner organization, also comments on the options for our region during the clip.