REAL ESTATE
Burnham Yard announced as preferred site for new Broncos stadium
Denver Mayor Mike Johnston last week joined the Denver Broncos and the State of Colorado in announcing historic Burnham Yard, an abandoned railyard in Central Denver, as the preferred site for a new, privately-funded world-class stadium. The partnership allows the city to finally unlock the Burnham Yard land, connect it to surrounding neighborhoods, and generate billions of dollars in new economic opportunity. The stadium development project represents a privately-funded several billion-dollar investment, including environmental cleanup of the polluted land, which was used as a railyard for more than 150 years.
https://denvergov.org/Government/Agencies-Departments-Offices/Agencies-Departments-Offices-Directory/Community-Planning-and-Development/Planning/Plans-in-Progress/Burnham-Yard-Community-Planning
Human and ‘Digital Employee’ Collaboration Will Transform Workplace Design
While recent AI adoption has mostly taken place within the tidy confines of the personal computer, the effects of digital workers and AI integration will soon spill over into physical spaces, potentially reshaping individual and group culture within organizations. Recent news reports show that companies like J.P. Morgan Chase and Bank of America are investing billions in new tech initiatives, and others, like BNY, are beginning to integrate “digital employees” into their workforces. Large financial service firms are leading the charge to integrate AI into their work, and, as a result, financial services firms are likely to also lead the revolution in seamless GenAI workplace design.
https://www.gensler.com/blog/human-digital-employee-collaboration-workplace-design
Ann Arbor is reinventing the power company
Ann Arbor, Michigan, is trying something different: a new city-owned utility is building a local power network within city limits, made up of solar microgrids and geothermal energy installed at homes and businesses. “They’re creating a whole new model of energy delivery for a city,” says Mike Shriberg, a professor at University of Michigan’s School for Environment and Sustainability who lives in Ann Arbor. The new utility won’t replace the area’s existing power company, DTE Energy. But it will help the city move much faster toward zero-carbon power.
https://www.fastcompany.com/91395511/ann-arbor-is-reinventing-the-power-company
Why China can build so quickly and America can’t
There isn’t a single answer to the question about why China can move fast and why we can’t, but Wang offers one I haven’t heard before. He says one of the most important distinctions between the US and China is that the US is a society run by lawyers and China is a society run by engineers — and that many of our differences flow from this divide.
https://www.vox.com/the-gray-area/459355/china-us-infrastructure-building-housing-high-speed-rail
AFFORDABLE HOUSING
Colorado needs about 100K more housing units to meet demand, demographers estimate
The report concluded that in 2023, Colorado had a housing shortfall of 106,000 units. Researchers analyzed census data including the total housing units in the state, number of households, age of heads of household, number of second homes and number of uninhabitable units. The report’s authors acknowledged that their work does not fully capture all populations in the state, such as those experiencing homelessness, since they relied on imperfect census data. The shortfall began to accelerate around 2007 and peaked at 140,000 units in 2019. Sin
https://coloradonewsline.com/briefs/colorado-housing-shortfall-estimate/
Unlocking the Missing Middle: Why the U.S. Housing Model Needs a Redesign
Around the world, cities are facing an urgent and complex housing challenge. Demand continues to grow, but the supply of affordable, high-quality homes — especially the “missing middle” options like townhomes and mid-sized multi-family buildings — has failed to keep up. In the U.S., rising interest rates have slowed new development, while prices keep climbing. But the issue isn’t just financial. Real progress depends on rethinking zoning laws, modernizing building codes, and shifting cultural expectations around density and design. There are promising signs. In Europe, governments are partnering with cooperative banks and using healthy, sustainable materials to deliver well-designed, affordable housing in city centers. There are faint signals in the U.S. as well. The Vistria Group recently announced that their private real estate fund with a focus on affordable housing has reached $2.5 billion, indicating some growth and commercial interest in the market.
https://www.gensler.com/blog/unlocking-the-missing-middle-us-housing-model-redesign
REAL ESTATE AND MOBILITY
Restaurants, retailers invited to transform DIA’s Jeppesen Terminal
DIA is moving forward with the final phase of the Great Hall Program – the $2.1 billion initiative aiming to revamp Jeppesen Terminal. Today, the airport is seeking restaurants and retailers to occupy the transformed terminal. To date, the Great Hall has added security checkpoints, bathrooms, and automated self-bag drops to expedite traffic as it competes as one of the world’s busiest airports. Just last month, DIA opened a second space for passenger screenings that promises shorter wait times and updated technology, increasing screening capacity to 240 people per hour. Now, CEO Phil Washington says he is looking for tenants to fill DIA’s newly renovated storefronts.
https://www.bizjournals.com/denver/news/2025/09/19/denver-international-airport-great-hall-tenants.html
Why Are We Still Building Car-Oriented Development Next to Transit?
We keep calling for transit-oriented development (TOD) — or transit-oriented communities (TOC), as we say here in Canada, where I practice as an urban designer. Yet, too often, it is still car-oriented development built next to a train, and our cities are missing a golden opportunity. Despite placing density near rail and rapid transit, we continue to default for wide roads and high parking ratio. In doing so, we dilute the very purpose of transit-oriented development: to shift travel behavior away from the car and toward transit, walking, and cycling.
https://nextcity.org/urbanist-news/why-are-we-still-building-car-oriented-development-next-to-transit
Vehicle Miles Travelled, Level of Service, and a Soon-to-be-Insolvent Transportation Trust Fund
In the world of traffic engineering and transportation planning, there are a few terms practitioners use quite often. One of the most common is “Level of Service,” also known as LOS. It is used to describe how congested a road is from the user’s perspective, expressed on a scale of A to F — like a grade school class. A means free flow, while F means gridlock. It is mostly used for motor vehicles, but it can also be used for pedestrians (I am not lying; look it up). Why is this important, you ask? Well, these concepts form the foundation of how we make transportation-related decisions. The best examples of this are Traffic Impact Studies (TIS), also known as Traffic Impact Assessments (TIAs). These studies evaluate the impacts of new developments on the surrounding transportation system.
https://www.planetizen.com/blogs/135966-vehicle-miles-travelled-level-service-and-soon-be-insolvent-transportation-trust-fund
How a Macy’s parking structure became L.A.’s latest luxury apartment complex
But like many other indoor malls, the Westside Pavilion fell out of favor in the 21st century before closing in 2019 to be converted to offices for rent. Now the former mall also has housing, which is even more in demand than offices these days. New residents will be allowed to start moving in this week. On a spot once occupied by what the developer called an “absolutely horrible, obsolete” parking structure, there are now 201 luxury apartments — a six-story complex that includes townhouses with front doors that open onto a residential street. “You have your own stoop,” developer Lee Wagman said of the townhouses. “It’s kind of like a brownstone.”
https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2025-09-01/residents-are-moving-into-once-grand-westside-shopping-center
MOBILITY
A self-driving car traffic jam is coming for US cities
Over the last 15 years, the rise of ride-hail, a service similar to robotaxis, has increased total driving, thickened congestion, and undermined transit. Autonomous vehicles, which offer privacy and service consistency that ride-hail cannot, could turbocharge the number of cars on the road, making a mess of urban streets. (Waymo did not comment on the record for this story, and Zoox and Tesla did not respond to requests for comment.) AVs are coming, but they cannot just plug and play into our existing transportation networks. If cities don’t update their rulebooks, they risk repeating the mistakes of the last century.
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/461393/self-driving-cars-cities-congestion-avs-parking
While Seattle Population Spikes, Car Population Stalls Out
Seattle’s human population is growing fast, but its car population has stalled out. Between 2017 and 2023, Seattle added 35,000 households, but just 3,300 cars, new Census data has revealed — in news that is music to urbanist ears. Gene Balk broke down the data in his most recent “FYI Guy” column in the Seattle Times. “Census data shows the number of vehicles in the city has been effectively unchanged for years, even as the number of households has grown,” Balk wrote. “Because the number of cars has basically plateaued while the number of households has grown, the rate of car ownership has declined.” In fact, the rate of car ownership appears to be down about 10% in just six years time, and the share of households that are carless grew 25%, reaching 20% of all Seattle households, according to Census data. Renter households are driving this trend: “Around 9 out of 10 carless homes were rental units in 2023,” Balk noted.
https://www.theurbanist.org/2025/09/07/while-seattle-population-spikes-car-population-stalls-out/
New York says 17.6 million fewer vehicles have entered Manhattan in 2025
The program charges most passenger vehicles a toll of $9 during peak periods to enter Manhattan south of 60th Street, in a bid to cut congestion and raise funds to improve mass transit. The Trump administration is trying to kill the program but a judge has put that effort on hold, as well as blocking the federal government from withholding approval or funding for New York projects. New York Governor Kathy Hochul and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority said on Tuesday crossing times into Manhattan in the congestion zone have dropped, making the Brooklyn Bridge 13% faster, Holland Tunnel 36% faster and Lincoln Tunnel 5% faster. Crashes in the Manhattan congestion zone are down 14%, while traffic injuries are down by 15%, while ridership on buses is up 13% and on subways up 9%.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/new-york-says-176-million-fewer-vehicles-have-entered-manhattan-2025-2025-09-09/
