Tag: Urban Planning


Baltimore prepares to meet national 10 minute walk campaign challenge

Just a few months ago, a bold and ambitious new challenge was laid down by a coalition of nonprofits seeking to bring meaningful greenspaces within a 10-minute walk of every American. Among the 134 mayors who were already signed on at launch — Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh, whose vision for the city smartly integrates a…

What makes great cities succeed?

We attended the New York Times’ Cities for Tomorrow conference last week to find out. I mean, we have an idea or two around this topic (hint: open, urban green spaces), but we were excited to hear perspectives from expert leaders and innovators from around the country.  In short? Here’s what we took away: successful cities respect urban culture. We’re…

Telling a story—a remarkable story

We’ve taken our show on the road—complete with cameras, a drone and all sorts of sundry filmmaking equipment. Greetings, from beautiful Joplin, Missouri! This is a story that we’ve been so excited to tell—and now we are. A story of community resilience—how Joplin has recovered from unthinkable devastation from the EF5 tornado that ravaged the town nearly 6 years…

Does Your Brain Prefer a Green Road?

  At Nature Sacred, we keep a close eye on the academic research being published around nature and health & wellbeing. Via Research Shorts, each month we take what we see as some of the most interesting work being published and create a brief blurb for our readers — enabling you to be in the…

Riots, Respite and Renewal in West Baltimore

From the outside, it could be easy to make assumptions about Sandtown-Winchester—the West Baltimore neighborhood where Freddie Gray was fatally arrested two years ago today. Vacant, dilapidated homes and boarded-up storefronts tell a candid story—a story of persistent poverty, crime, and misfortune. Yet, if you look closely, bright glimmers of promise and progress dot the…

An Experience Within Green Infrastructure

This month we’ve briefly reviewed the shifts in large-scale urban infrastructure design. Effective technological innovations in transportation, communications, energy, and environmental services (water, wastewater, garbage disposal) in the 19th and early 20th century enabled economic growth, and contributed to the physical transformation of city planning and development. Today, cities across the globe are embracing ‘sustainable’…

Overlapping Benefits of Green Infrastructure

Urban greening initiatives are in operation or in development around the globe. In a roundtable this past week from Nature of Cities, David Maddox reminds us “…The word landscape conveys a richer meaning that includes, of course, the aesthetics of nature and the out of doors, but also the organization and design or infrastructure, the biophysical and social services…

A Brief History of Urban Infrastructure

Grey Infrastructure In the mid-19th century the “sanitary idea”, proposed by Edwin Chadwick in England, stressed the importance of the physical environment and the role of decaying organic matter as the source of disease. Sanitary engineering solutions emerged, focused on rapid and efficient disposal of urban wastes and providing clean water. What we now call Grey…

Healthy Communities for You and Your Parents

Health is often believed to be the outcome of personal choices, such as one’s diet, whether to drink bottled water, or how often to exercise. Yet health officials now recognize that one’s surroundings, from home to neighborhood, are equally important in promoting health. Spending time with family and friends, eating healthy, exercising regularly, and living in…

Can Community Spaces Relieve Stress?

Each month in our Open Voices blog we share insight from leaders in our communities who are advancing what it means to have sacred, open green spaces in our cities. In February, we look at the roots of the TKF Foundation’s mission to provide public greenspaces that offer temporary sanctuary, encourage reflection, provide solace and…

"A quiet place. My soul grows still. This, indeed, is a balm for the weary, a shelter for the beaten. I am so grateful for this sacred space. I am now renewed."

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