National Trail Map

https://www.traillink.com/viewnationalmap/

Heartland soul: Many issues divide America, but few stir passions like deciding upon the boundaries of “the Midwest.” Maybe it’s an impossible task, because the Midwest isn’t just a geographic entity: It can also be a cultural identity only loosely associated with the land itself. Sure, Chicago, Milwaukee, and Minneapolis are easily Midwestern, but what about Pittsburgh or Buffalo? To get to the bottom of this, CityLab data reporter and fully licensed Midwesterner David Montgomery asked readers to tell us themselves.

More than 12,000 people responded to a simple survey asking two questions: What zip code do you live in, and do you consider it part of the Midwest? The results so far, shown above, won’t end any debates, but do offer a picture of how the region is popularly understood. David also spoke with geographers to understand what, beyond borders, defines America’s midsection. Read: We Mapped ‘the Midwest’ for You, So Stop Arguing

Indian city cracked the problem of urban spread

How one Indian city cracked the problem of urban spread

A hundred-year-old colonial law comes in handy

Print edition | Asia

Nov 24th 2018| AHMEDABAD

Afew miles west of Ahmedabad, in the state of Gujarat, a smiling patriarch named Shivaji still farms the land around the small redbrick home where he was born. But the city is creeping towards him. Mr Shivaji has already sold about a quarter of his land to a speculator (he hid the money in a hole before India suddenly cancelled most banknotes two years ago, forcing him to come up with a better plan). Slicing through his farm is a wide, straight strip of grass on which the municipal government will eventually build a road. Under it, a sewer has already been installed.

Ahmedabad, which contains 6m people, is growing by about 2% a year, both in population and in size. In that sense, it is a typical Indian city. But whereas most Indian cities—and indeed most of them in the emerging world—sprawl haphazardly, Ahmedabad is spreading in an orderly way. Many farms close to the metropolis, like Mr Shivaji’s, already contain the ghostly outline of a rectilinear road grid. This is gradually being filled with homes, offices and parks (see picture, which shows part of Ahmedabad’s urban fringe and one edge of Lucknow, a city in Uttar Pradesh). In some ways Ahmedabad is more like 19th-century Barcelona or New York than a modern Indian city. It is also a model for the future.

Click to read the full article:

https://www.economist.com/asia/2018/11/24/how-one-indian-city-cracked-the-problem-of-urban-spread?fsrc=scn/fb/te/bl/ed/howoneindiancitycrackedtheproblemofurbanspreadsprawlswell

Sustainable Economic Development Strategy

Sustainable Economic Development combines economic development and environmental improvement into one discipline. Follow the principles below:
Leave your City better then you found it.
"Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.“

· Increase Sustainability and Green Technology
· Retain and Expand Existing Businesses
· Nurture and Grow New Businesses

· Revitalize the Heart of Peoria
· Attract New investment and Business

· Create a Positive Image of the City
· Increase the Diversity of the Economic Base
· Provide Solid Jobs at Good Wages
· Promote efficient buildings

· Use recycled material in buildings

· Recycle building material waste
· Encourage rain harvesting & irrigation
· Use passive solar orientation of

buildings
· Encourage solar and wind energy systems
· Employ green roofs

· Support the use of natural landscaping
· Improve municipal staff knowledge of “green” techniques
· Support quality construction for long lived buildings
· Encourage mixed use development
· Support walk to work programs

· Design wetlands, drainage systems, retention and bio swales into parks
· Update codes to encourage “green” development

· Support the local production of “green” technology equipment

· Encourage development that supports transit
· Support efforts to redevelop older communities

· Permit Live / Work Space development

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· Support natural open space and parks
· Use open surface natural drainage where feasible