The Top 3 Strong Towns Articles from 2023: Ben's Picks
My first year as a writer at Strong Towns has been illuminating and rewarding. I felt I entered the arena with a strong understanding of, and passion for, the reforms that Strong Towns was seeking. I’ve since learned that many of the problems are worse than I realized, and many are a direct result of malicious intentions or willful neglect. But I’ve also been buoyed by my encounters with regular citizens, technical professionals, and elected leaders who aren’t daunted by the hefty challenges and have taken bold action to make their communities better, safer, and more resilient.
Here are a couple of my favorite articles I’ve gotten to work on this year, as well as some of the work I’ve enjoyed from other Strong Towns writers.
1. “This Florida Town Rode a Rail Trail to an Economic Revival,” by Ben Abramson
This was one of my favorite stories to write because it started with a simple observation: There is something special happening in this town. I had visited Winter Garden, Florida, a few times and shared with my Strong Towns colleagues how I appreciated its thriving downtown and classic American streetscape. Edward Erfurt, who had worked as a planner and architect in the region, told me that the city had been in decline, and its decision to embrace a regional rail-trail helped spark a comeback. Everyone I interviewed with the city told the same story, including one who shared that things were so bad it was once dubbed “Winter Garbage.” Officials and residents described a process in which they prioritized bringing people downtown, and saw welcoming cyclists as a catalyst. Decades later, the transformation is so extreme that when the local historical society sent me some “before” photos of city streets, I gasped aloud. Today, a city that had been seeking to reverse its decline is now striving to manage its growth.
2. “How One American City Reclaimed a Highway (and It Paid Off Big Time),” by Ben Abramson
Strong Towns has written extensively about the harms caused by highway building, and the heavy financial burdens urban highways imposed on North American cities. This article showed that even cities that inherited a bad hand can take steps to reverse the damage. Every Rochester official I spoke with was clear eyed about the fact the Inner Loop highway was unnecessary even when new, that it cleaved historic neighborhoods, and that it imposed ongoing transportation costs. So, they methodically built a case for how the city would be better off without it, brought federal, state, and local leaders on board, and now serve as a case study for how cities can reactivate productive land from the destructive era of rampant highway construction.
3. “The Technical Brush-Off (and How To Fight It),” by Edward Erfurt
This was another article that hit close to my observed experiences. I had been watching someone close to me seeking to address an infrastructure issue (a culvert on her property that appeared to contain septic overflow) and this piece read like a blow-by-blow of her experiences. “That is an issue out of the control of the municipality” forced her to engage with another agency that claimed it was, in fact, the municipality’s responsibility. This first stage of the brush-off was clearly “intended to stop progress and appease complaints.” Read this piece before you next engage with your town to learn how to effectively complain, and why you shouldn’t give up when officials throw predictable impediments in your path.
Honorable Mention: “What Ever Happened to Beauty?” by Tiffany Owens Reed
I once read a fascinating article about the history of the New York City education system that explained that the construction of grand, elegant school buildings was intended to convey to students that the city and the system cared about them. This phenomenon permeates our built environment, and this column by Tiffany Owens Reed persuasively makes the case that people can sense when they’re in a community that cares about them, compared to one that is just seeking to separate them from their money as efficiently as possible.
Ben Abramson is a Staff Writer at Strong Towns. In his career as a travel journalist with The Washington Post and USA TODAY, Ben has visited many destinations that show how Americans were once world-class at building appealing, prosperous places at a human scale. He has also seen the worst of the suburban development pattern, and joined Strong Towns because of its unique way of framing the problems we can all see and intuit, and focusing on local, achievable solutions. A native of Washington, DC, Ben lives in Venice, Florida; summers in Atlantic Canada; and loves hiking, biking, kayaking, and beachcombing.