One would be hard pressed to find any real estate development firms firmly committed to investing in crowdsourced placemaking yet… except one. See Renaissance Downtowns’ recent press release below:

July 20, 2010

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Looks like your typical highway map doesn’t it? Except this isn’t for cars, this is the map for London’s new bicycle superhighway system. Check out the full size map with legend here.

From London Mayor Boris Johnson, “These radial routes are set to transform our great city into one where cycling is the first choice for many thousands of Londoners. As well as being good for your health and wallet, encouraging more people to commute to work by bike will in turn help us improve air quality, cut

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You know what it was like with commuting by bike in the 20th century… you may as well wear a tie-dye as well.

When bicycle advertising campaigns are featured in business magazines, you know the times are a changin’. Check out the logos, gear, posters and website behind People for Bikes: Uniting a Million Voices to Improve the Future of Biking at the Fast Company article, Finally, Bike Branding Moves Beyond Hipster Ghetto. People may even want to choose their bike from the icons above and make

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If all continues to go well, San Francisco’s business and resident groups (ie the crowd) will be able to trade parking spaces for revenue and quality-of-life generating spaces instead. The City’s Pavement to Parks trial program is experimenting with repurposing underutilized street space into pedestrian-only parks and plazas. Their first project, the 17th Street Plaza has already become a favorite local destination.

The positive reception has lead to its ‘Parklet‘ program, where a pedestrian

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It just keeps getting better in Oak Cliff, Texas for its Better Block project. First their two-day demonstration of a pedestrian-oriented destination on 7th Street spurred city council action to work on making it permanent, now the team is ready to tackle something bigger… a three-month demonstration of a pedestrian-only plaza.

Less than three months after the 7th Street demonstration, Dallas’ city council, led by council member Delia Jasso, told Better Block founder Jason Roberts that he and

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Ah, the effectiveness of graphics, from the socially innovative folks at GOOD.

Top diagram: The number of pedestrian and biking trips, with each, uh, person representing a billion trips. That last image representing 2009 is starting to represent Manhattan.

Lower diagram: DOT (U.S. Department of Transportation) budget for pedestrian and bicycling programs. More evidence that government (and private sector) investment will follow the crowd, especially when the crowd makes itself known. The

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So, you’re South Africa and hosting the biggest event in the world, throwing the biggest party in the world via its Fan Fest... what kind of destination do you provide to embrace it all? That’s the Fan Walk, a 1.6 mile/2.6 km pedestrian promenade linking downtown Cape Town to its Green Point Stadium (pictured). In fact, it’s so successful, city leaders are looking to make it permanent.

You can’t ask for a more entertaining walk, or rather, experience. What’s more, it’ll be a cultural showcase

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Wouldn’t cities be a lot greener (literally and figuratively) with more trees and solar energy? Those are two very big ticket items, and exactly the kind of scope where purpose-driven collaborative crowdsourcing is most effective.

One Block Off the Grid tackles the solar energy Catch 22 where solar panels are too expensive to install for one home, and significantly more affordable only if produced for hundreds. They aggregate interested buyers. Notice the chart above is a long tail diagram,

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Like anything in business, coworking is evolving. Here’s where coworking stands today, and it’s looking good:

Definition. Wikipedia’s definition has gone from a cafe-like community/collaboration space for developers, writers and independents to
a style of work which involves a shared working environment; the social gathering of a group of people, who are still working independently, but who share values, and who are interested in the synergy that can happen from working with talented people

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It’s no longer cool to be in a mobile device as much as it is to be on a mobile device.

To understand this evolution from (auto)mobile to mobile (device), it may help to quote someone who is playing a large role in it…

At the All Things Digital ‘D8’ conference on June 1, 2010, Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple (now the second largest company based on market value next to Exxon) talked about the passing of the torch from the PC (desktop to laptop) to mobile devices, ironically using the auto industry

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