Walkable City Rules
101 Steps to Making Better Places
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Narrated by:
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Jeff Speck
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By:
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Jeff Speck
About this listen
“Cities are the future of the human race, and Jeff Speck knows how to make them work.” (David Owen, staff writer at the New Yorker)
Nearly every US city would like to be more walkable - for reasons of health, wealth, and the environment - yet few are taking the proper steps to get there. The goals are often clear, but the path is seldom easy. Jeff Speck’s follow-up to his best-selling Walkable City is the resource that cities and citizens need to usher in an era of renewed street life. Walkable City Rules is a doer’s guide to making change in cities, and making it now.
The 101 rules are practical yet engaging - worded for arguments at the planning commission, illustrated for clarity, and packed with specifications as well as data. For ease of use, the rules are grouped into 19 chapters that cover everything from selling walkability, to getting the parking right, escaping automobilism, making comfortable spaces and interesting places, and doing it now!
Walkable City was written to inspire; Walkable City Rules was written to enable. It is the most comprehensive tool available for bringing the latest and most effective city-planning practices to bear in your community. The content and presentation make it a force multiplier for place-makers and change-makers everywhere.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
©2018 Jeff Speck (P)2018 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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For nearly 70 years, the suburbs were as American as apple pie. But in recent years things have started to change. An epic housing crisis revealed existing problems with this unique pattern of development, while the steady pull of long-simmering economic, societal and demographic forces has culminated in a Perfect Storm that has led to a profound shift in the way we desire to live. In The End of the Suburbs journalist Leigh Gallagher traces the rise and fall of American suburbia from the stately railroad suburbs that sprung up outside American cities in the 19th and early 20th centuries to current-day sprawling exurbs.
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Informative, but the title is a lie
- By Marie on 08-27-13
By: Leigh Gallagher
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The 99% Invisible City
- A Field Guide to the Hidden World of Everyday Design
- By: Kurt Kohlstedt, Roman Mars
- Narrated by: Roman Mars
- Length: 10 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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99% Invisible is a big-ideas podcast about small-seeming things, revealing stories baked into the buildings we inhabit, the streets we drive, and the sidewalks we traverse. The show celebrates design and architecture in all of its functional glory and accidental absurdity, with intriguing tales of both designers and the people impacted by their designs.
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The 99% Invisible City
- By Louise Schraa on 01-09-21
By: Kurt Kohlstedt, and others
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The Big Roads
- The Untold Story of the Engineers, Visionaries, and Trailblazers Who Created the American Superhighways
- By: Earl Swift
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 12 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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From author Earl Swift comes the surprising history of the U.S. interstate system, a fascinating route through the dreams, discoveries, and protests that shaped these mighty roads.
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Lessons from The Big Roads
- By Joshua Kim on 05-06-12
By: Earl Swift
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Triumph of the City
- How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier
- By: Edward Glaeser
- Narrated by: Lloyd James
- Length: 12 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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America is an urban nation. More than two thirds of us live on the three percent of land that contains our cities. Yet cities get a bad rap: they're dirty, poor, unhealthy, crime ridden, expensive, environmentally unfriendly. Or are they? As Edward Glaeser proves in this myth-shattering book, cities are actually the healthiest, greenest, and richest (in cultural and economic terms) places to live.
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Urbanophile Brain Candy
- By Clay Downing on 12-18-15
By: Edward Glaeser
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A Brief History of Motion
- From the Wheel, to the Car, to What Comes Next
- By: Tom Standage
- Narrated by: Liam Gerrard
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Tom Standage's fleet-footed and surprising global histories have delighted fans and sold hundreds of thousands of copies. Now, he returns with a provocative account of an overlooked form of technology - personal transportation - and explores how it has shaped societies and cultures over millennia. Beginning around 3,500 BCE with the wheel - a device that didn't catch on until a couple thousand years after its invention - Standage zips through the eras of horsepower, trains, and bicycles, revealing how each successive mode of transit embedded itself in the world we live in.
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Great listen
- By CKerb on 11-09-21
By: Tom Standage
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Divided Highways
- Building the Interstate Highways, Transforming American Life
- By: Tom Lewis
- Narrated by: Jim D. Johnston
- Length: 13 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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In Divided Highways, Tom Lewis offers an encompassing account of highway development in the United States. In the early twentieth century Congress created the Bureau of Public Roads to improve roads and the lives of rural Americans. The Bureau was the forerunner of the Interstate Highway System of 1956, which promoted a technocratic approach to modern road building sometimes at the expense of individual lives, regional characteristics, and the landscape.
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Lots of interesting facts. Poor narration
- By Richard on 06-01-21
By: Tom Lewis
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Driving Honda
- Inside the World’s Most Innovative Car Company
- By: Jeffrey Rothfeder
- Narrated by: Mel Foster
- Length: 10 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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For decades there have been two iconic Japanese auto companies. One has been endlessly studied and written about. The other has been generally underappreciated and misunderstood. Until now. Since its birth as a motorcycle company in 1949, Honda has steadily grown into the world’s fifth largest automaker and top engine manufacturer, as well as one of the most beloved, most profitable, and most consistently innovative multinational corporations.
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it was ok.
- By chris p on 11-16-18
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The Well-Tempered City
- What Modern Science, Ancient Civilizations, and Human Nature Teach Us About the Future of Urban Life
- By: Jonathan F. P. Rose
- Narrated by: Barry Abrams
- Length: 14 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Cities are birthplaces of civilization; centers of culture, trade, and progress; cauldrons of opportunity - and the home of 80 percent of the world's population by 2050. As the 21st century progresses, metropolitan areas will bear the brunt of global megatrends such as climate change, natural resource depletion, population growth, income inequality, mass migrations, and education and health disparities, among many others.
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The best way to save the future is to look at the past
- By Kate on 10-01-22
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Sun, Sin, Suburbia
- The History of Modern Las Vegas Revised and Expanded
- By: Geoff Schumacher
- Narrated by: Douglas R. Pratt
- Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Las Vegas is gambling's mecca - Sin City the Entertainment Capital of the World with 40 million visitors a year. But that's just part of the story. This carefully documented history tracks the rise of Las Vegas from its vital role in World War II, of the Rat Pack era of the 50s, the explosive growth of the 90s, and it's colossal collapse in the post 2008 real-estate crash. It offers a history of the iconic Strip, but also profiles the neighborhoods where over 2 million people live.
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Good History of Vegas - old, modern and mundane
- By Amazon Customer on 06-13-14
By: Geoff Schumacher
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Autonomy
- The Quest to Build the Driverless Car—and How It Will Reshape Our World
- By: Lawrence D. Burns, Christopher Shulgan
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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In Autonomy, former GM executive and current advisor to the Google Self-Driving Car project Lawrence Burns offers a sweeping history of the race to make the driverless car a reality. In the past decade, Silicon Valley companies like Google, Tesla and Uber have positioned themselves to revolutionize the way we move around by developing driverless vehicles while traditional auto companies like General Motors, Ford, and Daimler have been fighting back by partnering by with new tech start-ups.
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Easy listen, non-technical perspective
- By James S. on 09-14-18
By: Lawrence D. Burns, and others
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The Smart Swarm
- By: Peter Miller
- Narrated by: Sean Pratt
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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In a world where speed and flexibility are valued more than ever, leaders from the corporate boardroom to the military are looking for answers from seemingly unlikely experts - the ones in the grass, in the air, in the lakes, and in the woods. In this innovative audiobook, veteran National Geographic editor Peter Miller shows how swarm species, such as ants, bees, and fish, can teach us to tackle some of the most complex conundrums in business, politics, and technology.
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FLOCK TO THIS BOOK!
- By serine on 04-25-16
By: Peter Miller
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Walkable City
- How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time
- By: Jeff Speck
- Narrated by: Jeff Speck
- Length: 6 hrs and 45 mins
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Jeff Speck has dedicated his career to determining what makes cities thrive. And he has boiled it down to one key factor: walkability. The very idea of a modern metropolis evokes visions of bustling sidewalks, vital mass transit, and a vibrant, pedestrian-friendly urban core. But in the typical American city, the car is still king, and downtown is a place that’s easy to drive to but often not worth arriving at. Making walkability happen is relatively easy and cheap; seeing exactly what needs to be done is the trick.
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Interesting topic and thoughtful insight, subpar recording.
- By Andrew Nicks on 05-12-18
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The Death and Life of Great American Cities
- 50th Anniversary Edition
- By: Jane Jacobs, Jason Epstein - introduction
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Thirty years after its publication, The Death and Life of Great American Cities was described by The New York Times as "perhaps the most influential single work in the history of town planning....[It] can also be seen in a much larger context. It is first of all a work of literature; the descriptions of street life as a kind of ballet and the bitingly satiric account of traditional planning theory can still be read for pleasure even by those who long ago absorbed and appropriated the book's arguments."
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Fantastic text, dull on audio
- By Meghan on 02-13-15
By: Jane Jacobs, and others
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The 99% Invisible City
- A Field Guide to the Hidden World of Everyday Design
- By: Kurt Kohlstedt, Roman Mars
- Narrated by: Roman Mars
- Length: 10 hrs and 48 mins
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Overall
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Performance
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99% Invisible is a big-ideas podcast about small-seeming things, revealing stories baked into the buildings we inhabit, the streets we drive, and the sidewalks we traverse. The show celebrates design and architecture in all of its functional glory and accidental absurdity, with intriguing tales of both designers and the people impacted by their designs.
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The 99% Invisible City
- By Louise Schraa on 01-09-21
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Escaping the Housing Trap
- The Strong Towns Response to the Housing Crisis
- By: Charles L. Marohn Jr., Daniel Herriges
- Narrated by: Stephen R. Thorne
- Length: 10 hrs and 2 mins
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Escaping the Housing Trap is the must-have resource for everyone with a stake in the future of housing in America-and that means everyone. Listeners will find discussions of housing as an investment and how the country's neighborhoods are being transformed by the introduction of large amounts of investment; explorations of housing as shelter, including discussions of zoning policy and NIMBYism; and a comprehensive overview of the Strong Towns approach to solving the American housing crisis.
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A timely book about being a part of local change for the better
- By Daniel A Weisler on 10-01-24
By: Charles L. Marohn Jr., and others
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Confessions of a Recovering Engineer
- Transportation for a Strong Town
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In Confessions of a Recovering Engineer, renowned speaker and author of Strong Towns Charles L. Marohn, Jr., delivers an accessible and engaging exploration of America's transportation system, laying bare the reasons why it no longer works as it once did, and how to modernize transportation to better serve local communities.
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Well Worth Your Time To Read or Listen To!
- By Cliff on 02-08-22
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Palaces for the People
- How Social Infrastructure Can Help Fight Inequality, Polarization, and the Decline of Civic Life
- By: Eric Klinenberg
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 8 hrs and 32 mins
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In Palaces for the People, Eric Klinenberg suggests a way forward. He believes that the future of democratic societies rests not simply on shared values but on shared spaces: the libraries, synagogues, and parks where crucial, sometimes life-saving connections, are formed. These are places where people gather, making friends across group lines and strengthening the entire community. Klinenberg calls this the “social infrastructure”: When it is strong, neighborhoods flourish; when it is neglected, as it has been in recent years, families and individuals must fend for themselves.
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Okayyy
- By K on 04-11-19
By: Eric Klinenberg
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Walkable City
- How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time
- By: Jeff Speck
- Narrated by: Jeff Speck
- Length: 6 hrs and 45 mins
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Jeff Speck has dedicated his career to determining what makes cities thrive. And he has boiled it down to one key factor: walkability. The very idea of a modern metropolis evokes visions of bustling sidewalks, vital mass transit, and a vibrant, pedestrian-friendly urban core. But in the typical American city, the car is still king, and downtown is a place that’s easy to drive to but often not worth arriving at. Making walkability happen is relatively easy and cheap; seeing exactly what needs to be done is the trick.
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Interesting topic and thoughtful insight, subpar recording.
- By Andrew Nicks on 05-12-18
By: Jeff Speck
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The Death and Life of Great American Cities
- 50th Anniversary Edition
- By: Jane Jacobs, Jason Epstein - introduction
- Narrated by: Donna Rawlins
- Length: 18 hrs
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Performance
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Story
Thirty years after its publication, The Death and Life of Great American Cities was described by The New York Times as "perhaps the most influential single work in the history of town planning....[It] can also be seen in a much larger context. It is first of all a work of literature; the descriptions of street life as a kind of ballet and the bitingly satiric account of traditional planning theory can still be read for pleasure even by those who long ago absorbed and appropriated the book's arguments."
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Fantastic text, dull on audio
- By Meghan on 02-13-15
By: Jane Jacobs, and others
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The 99% Invisible City
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- Narrated by: Roman Mars
- Length: 10 hrs and 48 mins
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99% Invisible is a big-ideas podcast about small-seeming things, revealing stories baked into the buildings we inhabit, the streets we drive, and the sidewalks we traverse. The show celebrates design and architecture in all of its functional glory and accidental absurdity, with intriguing tales of both designers and the people impacted by their designs.
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The 99% Invisible City
- By Louise Schraa on 01-09-21
By: Kurt Kohlstedt, and others
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Escaping the Housing Trap
- The Strong Towns Response to the Housing Crisis
- By: Charles L. Marohn Jr., Daniel Herriges
- Narrated by: Stephen R. Thorne
- Length: 10 hrs and 2 mins
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Escaping the Housing Trap is the must-have resource for everyone with a stake in the future of housing in America-and that means everyone. Listeners will find discussions of housing as an investment and how the country's neighborhoods are being transformed by the introduction of large amounts of investment; explorations of housing as shelter, including discussions of zoning policy and NIMBYism; and a comprehensive overview of the Strong Towns approach to solving the American housing crisis.
-
-
A timely book about being a part of local change for the better
- By Daniel A Weisler on 10-01-24
By: Charles L. Marohn Jr., and others
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Confessions of a Recovering Engineer
- Transportation for a Strong Town
- By: Charles L. Marohn Jr.
- Narrated by: Christopher Douyard
- Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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In Confessions of a Recovering Engineer, renowned speaker and author of Strong Towns Charles L. Marohn, Jr., delivers an accessible and engaging exploration of America's transportation system, laying bare the reasons why it no longer works as it once did, and how to modernize transportation to better serve local communities.
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Well Worth Your Time To Read or Listen To!
- By Cliff on 02-08-22
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Palaces for the People
- How Social Infrastructure Can Help Fight Inequality, Polarization, and the Decline of Civic Life
- By: Eric Klinenberg
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
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In Palaces for the People, Eric Klinenberg suggests a way forward. He believes that the future of democratic societies rests not simply on shared values but on shared spaces: the libraries, synagogues, and parks where crucial, sometimes life-saving connections, are formed. These are places where people gather, making friends across group lines and strengthening the entire community. Klinenberg calls this the “social infrastructure”: When it is strong, neighborhoods flourish; when it is neglected, as it has been in recent years, families and individuals must fend for themselves.
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Okayyy
- By K on 04-11-19
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Strong Towns
- A Bottom-Up Revolution to Rebuild American Prosperity
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Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Build American Prosperity is a book of forward-thinking ideas that breaks with modern wisdom to present a new vision of urban development in the United States. Presenting the foundational ideas of the Strong Towns movement he cofounded, Charles Marohn explains why cities of all sizes continue to struggle to meet their basic needs, and reveals the new paradigm that can solve this longstanding problem.
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Where are the peer-reviewed sources and studies?
- By Amazon Customer on 07-20-21
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Paved Paradise
- How Parking Explains the World
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Overall
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Performance
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Parking, quite literally, has a death grip on America: each year a handful of Americans are tragically killed by their fellow citizens over parking spots. But even when we don’t resort to violence, we routinely do ridiculous things for parking, contorting our professional, social, and financial lives to get a spot. Indeed, in the century since the advent of the car, we have deformed—and in some cases demolished—our homes and our cities in a Sisyphean quest for cheap and convenient car storage.
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Would recommend
- By Jamie W. on 05-14-23
By: Henry Grabar
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City Limits
- Infrastructure, Inequality, and the Future of America's Highways
- By: Megan Kimble
- Narrated by: Megan Kimble
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
An eye-opening investigation into how our ever-expanding urban highways accelerated inequality and fractured communities—and a call for a more just, sustainable path forward.
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Rich, deeply researched data engagingly presented
- By Cyclist on 06-25-24
By: Megan Kimble
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Happy City
- Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design
- By: Charles Montgomery
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 12 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
After decades of unchecked sprawl, more people than ever are moving back to the city. Dense urban living has been prescribed as a panacea for the environmental and resource crises of our time. But is it better or worse for our happiness? Are subways, sidewalks, and tower dwelling improvements on the car dependence of sprawl?
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Great book-terrible narrator
- By Amazon Customer on 02-04-19
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The High Cost of Free Parking, Updated Edition
- By: Donald Shoup
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- Length: 23 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In this no-holds-barred treatise, Donald Shoup argues that free parking has contributed to auto dependence, rapid urban sprawl, extravagant energy use, and a host of other problems. Planners mandate free parking to alleviate congestion but end up distorting transportation choices, debasing urban design, damaging the economy, and degrading the environment. Ubiquitous free parking helps explain why our cities sprawl on a scale fit more for cars than for people. But it doesn't have to be this way.
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To my fellow gluttons for punishment
- By Morgan S on 03-05-23
By: Donald Shoup
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Arbitrary Lines
- How Zoning Broke the American City and How to Fix It
- By: M. Nolan Gray
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- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
The arbitrary lines of zoning maps across the country have come to dictate where Americans may live and work, forcing cities into a pattern of growth that is segregated and sprawling. The good news is that reform is in the air, with states across the country critically reevaluating zoning. In cities as diverse as Minneapolis, Fayetteville, and Hartford, the key pillars of zoning are under fire, with apartment bans being scrapped, minimum lot sizes dropping, and off-street parking requirements disappearing altogether.
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End Zoning
- By Vance V. Ginn on 04-03-24
By: M. Nolan Gray
What listeners say about Walkable City Rules
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Adam Pepper-Macias
- 06-23-23
A must read
I loved this book. And I will be referring to it throughout my life. Thank you!
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- Jenna C.
- 01-09-23
Rules to live by
Awesome book and made even better since performed by Jeff Speck. Every city planner and city council member should read this book.
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- Ostyn
- 02-23-19
Excellent compendium for pro and enthusiast alike
I will listen to this multiple times over and still not absorb all it has to offer. I appreciate it as a beacon to lead us all to better communities.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Sara Durghalli
- 06-20-21
Great follow up to walkable city!
I fully enjoyed this book after reading the Walkable City. I definitely will reread and revisit the ideas in this book. Definitely recommend to city planners, architects, civil engineers etc.
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- Jacob A Young
- 08-26-19
exceptional book
This book provides the core basics on all essential elements of planning cities and good development.
I have the audio and the printed copy for different reasons. Audio helps me get through it and printed as a resource.
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- abdelrahmanazmi
- 08-02-22
Clear to the point
The obvious follow up book for "Walkable City" This is a must have book for Architectural & Planning Students.
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- LOVA
- 10-04-22
Needs to fix the recording after they divided the book into 2
Performance good, story great, but the beginning of the 2nd part of the book was repeating from other parts of the book. Either Audible needs to fix it or the author does
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