City Council Takes Up Traffic Calming Manual on 9/18/08; Traffic Concerns from Ward 3; Impact of Traffic Calming on Bicyclists and Snow Removal

The following proposed resolution in on the agenda of the Northampton City Council for 9/18/08: The City Council endorses the Northampton Traffic Calming Manual and directs the Transportation and Parking Commission to monitor the program’s implementation, efficacy, and public feedback and, as necessary, approve any future modifications needed to achieve the City of Northampton’s overall […]

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Rutherford Platt, “The Humane Micropolis” – Full Text

Dr. Rutherford Platt has kindly given us permission to reprint the full text of his September 6 guest column in the Gazette. Dr. Platt cautions about the hazards of overplanning a city: The ‘humane micropolis’ Northampton has evolved on its own terms “Design Northampton Week,” which begins this Sunday evening at the Senior Center on […]

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Video and Slides: Final Presentation of Design Northampton Week

Here is a Google video of the final presentation of Design Northampton Week. It’s 2 hours and 5 minutes long. Notre Dame Professor Philip Bess and his graduate students offer urban design suggestions for Northampton, drawing on principles of New Urbanism and compact growth. This PDF file (63 pages, 5.8MB) contains all the slides shown. […]

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Video: Fourth public “in-process” presentation and feedback session for Design Northampton Week

Here is a complete Google video of Design Northampton Week’s fourth public “in-process” presentation and feedback session that took place on September 12. It’s one hour and 20 minutes long. Thanks to Katharine Baker, a member of the Northampton Design Forum organizing committee, for volunteering to operate our video cameras. This was the last “in-process” […]

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Video: Third public “in-process” presentation and feedback session for Design Northampton Week

Here is a complete Vimeo video of Design Northampton Week’s third public “in-process” presentation and feedback session that took place on September 11. It’s one hour and 32 minutes long. Notre Dame students presented ideas for revitalizing King Street between Bridge Road and North Street. They also made suggestions about Hospital Hill (Village Hill), particularly […]

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Video: Second public “in-process” presentation and feedback session for Design Northampton Week

Here is a complete Google video of Design Northampton Week’s second public “in-process” presentation and feedback session that took place last night. It’s one hour and 51 minutes long. Notre Dame students presented ideas for making the line of buildings along certain major streets more coherent. Pleasant Street and downtown Florence received attention. The students […]

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Video: First public “in-process” presentation and feedback session for Design Northampton Week

Here is a complete Google video of Design Northampton Week’s first public “in-process” presentation and feedback session that took place last night. It’s one hour and 42 minutes long. The Notre Dame design team discussed the historical settlement patterns and geography of Northampton and indicated potential areas of focus. Citizens were not shy to give […]

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Complete Slides from Northampton Design Week Opening Presentation

The Notre Dame team has kindly made the slides from their opening presentation available as PDF (93 pages, 5.8MB). You can watch a video of Notre Dame Professor Philip Bess giving this presentation and read his handout. Below are selected slides that particularly caught our attention. The two slides below underscore how zones of dramatically […]

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Video: Design Northampton Week Opening Presentation

The video of last night’s opening presentation for Design Northampton Week is now ready to view. It’s 2 hours and 11 minutes long. Notre Dame Professor Philip Bess defines terms like space and anti-space, then offers his vision of good urban design, plus a way to look at zoning based on density (transect-based zoning). Poorly-built […]

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Design Northampton Week: Full Schedule and Handout from Opening Presentation

Professor Philip Bess of Notre Dame gave the opening presentation of Design Northampton Week this evening to an intent crowd at Northampton’s Senior Center. The presentation lasted a little over two hours. We’ll do our best to make our video of the event available within a day or two. This handout provided by Notre Dame […]

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