• Robert Crease, The ethical dilemmas of renaming scientific principles that honour fallen idols
• Robert Jensen, Cancel War Stories
• Vimal Patel, A Lecturer Showed a Painting of the Prophet Muhammad. She Lost Her Job.
• Jesse Singal, What if Diversity Trainings Are Doing More Harm Than Good?
• Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò, It never existed (The idea of a ‘precolonial’ Africa is theoretically vacuous, racist and plain wrong about the continent’s actual history)
• Dr. Howard Tucker, I’m a 100-Year-Old Doctor. I’m Not Too Old to Work.
• Mary Yang, America needs carpenters and plumbers. Gen Z doesn’t seem interested. [Ed.:  Not a “Young people these days don’t want to work.” piece.]
• Daniel Herriges, Walkable? Check. Urban? Check. Rural? Also Check.

I find [the term “urbanism”] a useful shorthand for a set of ideas about how places ought to be built and laid out, one which roughly translates to the traditional, pre-automobile development pattern. “Urbanism” to me means the following:

• Places are built to the human scale, and around the needs of people who walk.

• The development pattern is compact, without a lot of wasted space, and streets are places for human activity, not high-speed traffic.

• There are 15-minute neighborhoods where you can meet your needs on foot.

• There are welcoming streets and third places that encourage people to live a large chunk of their lives in public, with the serendipitous social interaction that that entails.

The word “urban” has a bunch of unhelpful connotations here, associated with big cities and their noise and impersonality. And, while I adore the energy and diversity and the world-at-your-fingertips sense of freedom you can attain in a big city, it’s not for everyone, or for anyone all of the time.

So let’s be clear about where the principles of “urbanism,” as I defined it above, apply. Here are some photos of the village of Dingle on the west coast of Ireland, population about 2,000… It’s not just Ireland: you’ll find a similar template—tightly-packed rows of buildings with storefronts on the ground floor and residences above—in towns throughout Europe, Asia, South America, et cetera. The architecture will vary, but the pattern won’t: some of the best urbanism in the world is in tiny villages. These places are, inherently, 15-minute communities with a vital public realm. And looking at these villages gives the lie to common myths about urbanism. Foremost among those myths is the idea that compact, walkable development is incompatible with a love of nature and green space…