Cities today face considerable land use, environmental, and economic challenges resulting from policies prioritizing automobiles and requiring ample off-street park- ing. In an effort to influence travel behavior and reduce parking supply, Buffalo (NY) adopted the Green Code in 2017. This zoning code reform repealed minimum parking requirements citywide and provided a “natural experiment” to investigate effects of parking deregulation among 36 major developments in its first 2 years. Our research produced two key findings. First, 47% of major developments included fewer parking spaces than previously permissible, suggesting earlier minimum parking requirements may have been excessive. Second, mixed-use developments introduced 53% fewer parking spaces than would have been required by earlier minimum requirements as developers readily took advantage of the newfound possibility to include less off-street parking. Aggregate parking spaces among single-use projects exceeded the earlier minimum requirements, suggesting developers of such projects were less motivated to deviate from accepted practices in determining the parking supply for urban development.

Eliminating parking minimums can reduce unnecessary parking supply and encourage development constrained by excessive minimum requirements. Land use, location, and trans- portation demand initiatives affect the quantity of off-street parking supplied in response to market con- ditions. Our findings suggest mixed-use developers are likely to take advantage of the ability to provide less parking in highly accessible locations. Though many developers quickly pivot to the newfound possi- bilities of providing fewer parking spaces, others continue to meet earlier requirements. Cities of all types stand to benefit from undoing constraining parking policies of the past and allowing developers to trans- form parking lots to “higher uses.”

Click here to read the article in the Journal of the American Planning Association.

This research traces the demilitarisation of Raadi airbase in Tartu, Esto- nia, where an early twentieth century aviation facility was transformed, during the Soviet occupation of Estonia, into a Cold War military power centre. Using archival documents and images, the contested urban space that contained this transformation is explored in this chapter through several lenses: the shifting ownership and uses of a key urban site, ad- ministrative restraints that limited urban growth and physical barriers that controlled security. The sheer size of the airfield, and the need to ‘close’ the section of the city in which it was situated, has strongly shaped urban growth throughout the twentieth century. Cultural space and mil- itary demands have competed throughout history to dominate this im- portant urban site, formerly a prestigious manor house, occupied by the ‘secret’ airfield, where a new national museum was recently dedicated on a former runway.

Hess, Daniel Baldwin and Taavi Pae. 2020. Competing militarisation and urban development during the Cold War: how a large Soviet air base came to dominate Tartu, Estonia in Cold War Cities: Politics, Culture and Atomic Urbanism, 1945‐65.  (Richard Brook, Martin Dodge, and Jonathan Hogg, eds.) pp. 148-166. London, UK: Routledge. ISBN 9781138573611

Click here to view the book Cold War Cities on the Routledge webpage.

Going dark: the post-pandemic transformation of the metropolitan retail landscape

by Alex Bitterman and Daniel Baldwin Hess

Since the start of the 2020 crisis, nearly one-third of American households have placed an online grocery order, representing a 200 per cent surge in online grocery shopping, of which more than 26 per cent were first-time online shoppers.

Conversion from bricks-and-mortar stores to dark stores will have an impact on the urban form and built environment, but the darkening of mom-and-pop boutiques will have a much greater effect on the long-term viability of shopping districts, central business districts and high streets (and the neighbourhoods they serve).

To read the full article in Town Planning Review click here.

Shuttered Canada-US border highlights different approaches to the pandemic – and differences between the two countries

by Daniel Baldwin Hess and Alex Bitterman

The United States and Canada have long enjoyed a stable relationship. The countries share history, the longest non militarized international border in the world, and strong economic ties.

But the recent closure of the U.S.-Canada border because of the coronavirus underscores a growing divide between the two countries.

To read the full article in The Conversation click here.

Cold War-style preparedness could help fight future pandemics

by Alex Bitterman and Daniel Baldwin Hess

A key group of allies is missing in the U.S. effort to face the coronavirus pandemic: the American people. 

In the wake of World War II and during the Cold War, the U.S. was the world’s best at planning and preparing for mobilizing the citizenry to take action in an emergency. In those days, the anticipated emergency was a nuclear attack on the U.S., likely resulting in a loss of national leadership that required local governments and members of the public to step up.

To read the full article in The Conversation click here.

Vertical segregation of apartment building dwellers during late state socialism in Bucharest, Romania

Szymon Marcinczak and Daniel Baldwin Hess

To access the article in Urban Geography click here.

This article examines patterns of within-building vertical segregation in Bucharest, Romania under late socialism using micro-data (individual/household level information) from the 1992 Romanian national census. The data allows examination of separation of households according to the floor on which a household is located and according to the residential sector/district of Bucharest. Findings suggest that common social and demographic factors are related to the location of households in both horizontal and vertical dimensions of urban space. We also find that a freely functioning real estate market is not necessary to produce vertical segregation. Consequently, since vertical segregation existed in early and modern capitalist cities – and bearing in mind that the phenomenon existed under socialism too – we conclude that, like horizontal socio-spatial separation, vertical segregation is an intrinsic characteristic of modern cities and a feature of urban space that did not diminish when pre-industrial cities disappeared.

Edited by Hess and Tammaru

This open access book focuses on the formation and later socio-spatial trajectories of large housing estates in the Baltic countries—Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

To access the book on the Springer Publishing website click here.

Edited by Hess, Tammaru, and van Ham

This open access book explores the formation and socio-spatial trajectories of large housing estates.  Through case studies of housing estates in 14 European centers, this collection identifies policy measures that have been used to address challenges in housing estates in Europe’s metropolitan centers.

To access the book on the Springer Publishing website click here. 

Across Europe, a wave of migrants from war-stricken parts of the world has, since the beginning of the 2015 refugee crisis, washed over national borders. Resulting demographic change has inflamed vigorous debate about the extent to which borders should be controlled and open-migration allowed. In Estonia, a modest migration trend has reversed long-term population decline. In 2015, for the first time in 25 years, Estonia experienced greater immigration than emigration. While an increase in migration may benefit Estonia in the short term through population gains and greater economic productivity, new long- term challenges arise related to social cohesion and poverty.

Click here to read the full article in The Baltic Times.

An article in U.S. News & World Report about plans by government officials in Estonia to roll out free public transportation nationwide, which, if successful, would make the Baltic state the first country to implement such a system, interviews Daniel B. Hess, professor of urban and regional planning in the UB School of Architecture and Planning. “As we continue to urbanize and have denser places that need many people reaching them, there will be an increasing need for public transit to serve these places with high-capacity transit vehicles, such as buses, streetcars or subways,” he said. “Any growing city where there’s a premium on land value and the traffic is choking, and where it’s very expensive to travel by car and park, seems a possibility for free public transport.”

Click here to read the full article in U.S. News & World Report.