Land Lines February 2017
South Star
As Chile prepares to receive the world's largest land donation from a single owner—Kris Tompkins, former CEO of the Patagonia label—it stands poised to offer the world a model for large landscape finance in the age of climate change: bringing business leaders and environmentalists together to leverage the enormous sums of funding required to save the planet.
Money on the Table
Federal grants are a critical funding stream for cash-strapped state and local governments in the United States, yet hundreds of millions of dollars are going unspent every year. This article examines this complex problem and ways to improve grant program design and help fiscally distressed cities build capacity to absorb capital.
Planning for Social Equity
Planners around the United States are revising policy to distribute resources more equitably in the built environment. Here's how two cities with a history of segregation are dispelling concentrated poverty by providing transportation options, safe street networks, affordable housing, and access to jobs, good schools, health care, healthy food, and green space.
This issue features content on planning for greater social equity, the mystery of unspent federal grants, the future of conservation finance in Chile, the challenge of transplanting urban innovations, and the growing market for app-activated bike-shares in China.