<story><title>New Cities</title><url>http://blog.ycombinator.com/new-cities</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>davidw</author><text>I think &amp;quot;old cities&amp;quot; are pretty good too: the kind where they were built for people, rather than cars, and where you could build things without a dense thicket of regulations almost entirely unrelated to safety.  Another thing that seems to work well is limiting the amount of up-front large scale projects and growing incrementally.  No one can plan for everything ( &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Economic_calculation_problem&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Economic_calculation_problem&lt;/a&gt; ) .&lt;p&gt;Recommended reading:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.strongtowns.org&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.strongtowns.org&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;marketurbanism.com&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;marketurbanism.com&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;The Rent Is Too Damn High: What To Do About It, And Why It Matters More Than You Think: &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;amzn.to&amp;#x2F;28W6et9&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;amzn.to&amp;#x2F;28W6et9&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;Edit&lt;/i&gt; - I&amp;#x27;ll add that I think it&amp;#x27;s great that YC is spending some money to look into this, as it&amp;#x27;s a huge issue for many desirable, productive cities these days.  Huge as in billions of dollars:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.bloomberg.com&amp;#x2F;news&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;2015-05-07&amp;#x2F;here-s-how-much-new-york-and-san-francisco-s-tight-housing-markets-are-hurting-the-economy&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.bloomberg.com&amp;#x2F;news&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;2015-05-07&amp;#x2F;here-s-how...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>sama</author><text>Cars have a place in cities but maybe they should be in tunnels underground or something.&lt;p&gt;I view money locked up in real estate as money in a very suboptimal place.  We pay too much &amp;#x27;rent&amp;#x27; in general; it&amp;#x27;d be far better to try to make housing&amp;#x2F;office space cheap and have people invest the extra money in productive assets.</text></comment>
<story><title>New Cities</title><url>http://blog.ycombinator.com/new-cities</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>davidw</author><text>I think &amp;quot;old cities&amp;quot; are pretty good too: the kind where they were built for people, rather than cars, and where you could build things without a dense thicket of regulations almost entirely unrelated to safety.  Another thing that seems to work well is limiting the amount of up-front large scale projects and growing incrementally.  No one can plan for everything ( &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Economic_calculation_problem&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Economic_calculation_problem&lt;/a&gt; ) .&lt;p&gt;Recommended reading:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.strongtowns.org&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.strongtowns.org&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;marketurbanism.com&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;marketurbanism.com&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;The Rent Is Too Damn High: What To Do About It, And Why It Matters More Than You Think: &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;amzn.to&amp;#x2F;28W6et9&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;amzn.to&amp;#x2F;28W6et9&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;Edit&lt;/i&gt; - I&amp;#x27;ll add that I think it&amp;#x27;s great that YC is spending some money to look into this, as it&amp;#x27;s a huge issue for many desirable, productive cities these days.  Huge as in billions of dollars:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.bloomberg.com&amp;#x2F;news&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;2015-05-07&amp;#x2F;here-s-how-much-new-york-and-san-francisco-s-tight-housing-markets-are-hurting-the-economy&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.bloomberg.com&amp;#x2F;news&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;2015-05-07&amp;#x2F;here-s-how...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>antr</author><text>For anyone interested in this research subject should watch all the talks at the Architecture IO conference: &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.architecture.io&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.architecture.io&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;Talks include subjects such as walkability, city design, urban data visualisation, crowd modelling, new transportation systems, etc.</text></comment>