The top urban planning issue in California in 2017 was housing. You may now return to your regularly scheduled reading.
OK, so it wasn’t quite that simple or that monolithic. But you’d be hard-pressed to find a topic that affected more Californians and that manifested itself in more ways than the housing crisis did this year. It came up big in the legislative agenda, with 15 laws passed out of 130 bills introduced. It came up in the budget. It prompted activism and creative planning (as well as some obstructionism) in cities large and small. It inspired us at CP&DR to offer our two cents on how the state can built more housing — and how Californians can avoid strangling each other amid heated debates over related topics like gentrification and over-building.
That’s not all, though. 2017 was also the year cities prepared for legalized marijuana, grappled with the election of Donald Trump, envisioned dystopias, and made progress on nice things such as freeway caps.
For an informal guide to the interest sand concerns of planners and urbanists statewide, herewith are CP&DR’s most popular stories — by readership — of 2017 by category.
News & Features | Commentary & Analysis | Legal | Reviews
Bills Seek to Streamline Approvals, Tighten Up Housing Element Lists
Budget Draft Includes Policy Principles, but Little Money, for Housing
Cities, Housing Advocates Take Different Approaches to Housing Crisis
Post-Recession, Master Planned Communities Come Back to Life
Post-Prop. 64, California Cities Consider How to Go Green
Package of Housing Bills Heads to Governor (Updated)
Fort Ord Design Guidelines Draw National Attention
Freeway Caps May Reshape California Urban Areas
Dispute over Gas Station Erupts into Legal Battle in Sacramento
OPR Releases First Update to General Plan Guidelines in 17 Years
Four Takeaways From This Year's Housing Bills
It's Time to Stop Demonization of Developers
California's Nastiest Urban-Rural Rivalry
Why Cities Should Back Off of Setbacks
Radical Left Burns Bridges amid Quest To Build Housing
Insight: Creeping Incrementalism in Housing Policy?
Tech Windfall, Deportation Order Threaten to Snap Los Angeles in Half
Housing and Transportation Aren't Separate Things
The Los Angeles Riots after 25 Years
Appellate Court Gives Malibu Voters A Harsh Lesson
Trump Order Reframes Wetlands Regulation
Prop. 218 Doesn't Apply to Initiatives
Supreme Court Hoists Jarvis On Its Own Petard
Housing Element Law Prevails in Los Gatos
Death by Gentrification: Review of 'How to Kill a City'
Searching for Los Angeles in Blade Runner 2049
