Showing posts with label Planning Magazine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Planning Magazine. Show all posts

Sunday, March 22, 2020

MICROMOBILITY HAS THE POTENTIAL TO BE AN URBAN ASSET --


BUT PLANNERS MUST ACT QUICKLY TO ENSURE PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES ARE NOT LEFT BEHIND


I am so proud to be the go-to journalist on matters of planning and urban design for people with disabilities.

I have had a half dozen cover and center spread stories published already in this young year.



Thanks to the wonderful and exacting editors at Planning Magazine for publishing the first comprehensive report in the world on micromobility and its impact on people with disabilities.



And thanks to my wonderful clients -- in the town planning, urban design, landscape architecture, transportation engineering, architecture, mobility, sustainability, non-profit and urban infill development fields -- for supporting my storytelling about universal design, inclusive mobility and access for all.

Read Planning Magazine's major March feature story here:




Sunday, February 18, 2018

THIS BLOG CELEBRATES 160,000 READERS

A TOTAL READERSHIP THAT EQUALS OR SURPASSES
THE SUNDAY CIRCULATION OF THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH



Today, we passed 160,000 unique visitors to this blog.

We have made more than 1,800 original posts.

We have shared more than 1,500 original images from all over the world.

We were the photographer for more than 1,000 of those images.

Our blog items have a cumulative word count above 140,000 -- enough to fill three books.

We promise to continue posting daily, on issues such as:

Urban Design

Wheelchair Access

Mobility

Universal Design

Travel

Sustainability

Town Planning

Inclusive Mobility

Barrier-free Design

Fine Art Photography

Human Rights

Monday, December 25, 2017

THANKS SANTA, FOR 155,000 READERS...

...AND A GREAT 2017


Today, we passed 155,000 unique visitors to this blog.

We have made more than 1,700 original posts.

We have shared more than 1,000 original images from all over the world.

Our blog items had a word count above 120,000 -- enough to fill at least two large books.

We are thankful for a great 2017, including:

January -- I learned that PlusUrbia Design would be honored in May with the American Planning Association's  Economic Development Planning Gold Standard for the Wynwood Neighborhood Revitalization District.

February -- We celebrated Valentine's Day with our beautiful Siamese cat Honeybear.

March -- I learned that PlusUrbia Design would be honored in September with the American Planning Association Florida's Award of Merit in Neighborhood Planning for the Hialeah Transit Oriented Development.

April -- I went on a writing assignment to New Orleans and made friends with some jazz musicians.

May -- I observed Ramazan in Istanbul and made friends with legendary Armenian-Turkish photographer Ara Guler.

June -- Heidi Johnson-Wright was one of the very few non licensed architects to make a major presentation at the American Institute of Architects (AIA) National Conference in Orlando.

August -- I drew an assignment to co-author a major feature article on for Planning Magazine on Inclusive Mobility.

September -- We survived Hurricane Irma, only losing a fence along with some other outside damage.

October -- I went on a photo assignment to Oaxaca, Mexico and stayed through Dia de los Muertos.

November -- Heidi Johnson-Wright won the Pen 2 Paper writing contest for Crip Cargo.


December -- PlusUrbia Design moved to its new Coral Way studio office, after years in the Grove produced 10 awards and proclamations in the span of three years and the firm worked on key plans for Little Havana, Coconut Grove, El Portal, 395 and the SMART Plan of Miami-Dade County.


Wednesday, March 23, 2016

DESIGN FOR EVERYBODY


SIMPLE APPROACHES — AND THINKING HOLISTICALLY — 
CAN MAKE FOR A MORE ACCESSIBLE BUILT ENVIRONMENT.


By Steve Wright and Heidi Johnson-Wright

Planning Magazine published our 8-page, center piece feature on Universal Design. The highly-illustrated piece begins:


Whether it’s a corridor plan for two blocks in small-town USA or a blockbuster master plan worthy of a national award, planners have to design for all users of the public realm. Yet planning for people with disabilities seems to flummox even the best of urban designers.

Add in the challenges of planning in harmony with historic buildings, difficult topography, waterfront access, or the severe geometry of modernist architecture, and some planners think the answer is to seek a waiver to release them from what they view as the constraints of serving wheelchair users and folks with other disabilities.

The Americans with Disabilities Act, which celebrated its 25th anniversary last year, is federal civil rights legislation. As such, there is no “grandfathering” of inaccessible public buildings, plazas, or streetscapes. The ADA is not a building or zoning code, so it cannot be waived.

Despite good intentions, planners and architects tend to design for the mythical five-foot-10, 175-pound, nondisabled male. Accessibility features — seen as a necessary evil — are tacked on at the end to meet ADA requirements.

Rather than obsessing on door widths and ramp slopes in a vacuum, designing projects for everyone from the start simply makes more sense. Universal design is not about designing separate but equal spaces but about design equality. Projects that comply with the letter rather than the spirit of the law mean missed opportunities to design for everyone.

Experts in the field — planners, architects, disability consultants, and educators around the nation —  agree that the best approach to serving people with mobility, visual, hearing, and other disabilities is to apply universal design principles to redevelopment districts, complete streets, plazas, parks, buildings, and more.

The full story is at: 

https://www.planning.org/planning/2016/mar/designforeverybody


Thanks to our editors, mentors, colleagues and wonderful sources for this successful collaboration.  

We hope to share the message of Universal Design with cities, non profits, universities, planning organizations and others who shape our built environment.



Wednesday, November 4, 2015

TIME FOR TOOT YOUR OWN HORN WEDNESDAY

PLUS URBIA DESIGN FEATURED IN PLANNING MAGAZINE'S MAIN STORY

Every marketer knows that positioning is the key to developing more business for his/her firm, studio, client, etc.

But there are dozens of social media platforms, trade magazines, general interest publications, English and Spanish media (very relevant in Miami), newspapers, radio programs, blogs, etc.

How on earth do you separate your company from all the noise?

Is a small story in a large, but circulation-bleeding daily newspaper better than being the top article in a snarky but popular blog? Or is it vice versa?

In Miami, do you want to be the lead story on a Spanish language TV station with low ratings, or the last little throw in story on the second ranked English Language TV news program?

There are too many variables to say which is best for each unique situation.

What I do know is that you do need to toot your own horn to separate yourself from the competition.
But unless you’re an echo maniac with no shame, you better play some darn pretty be bop notes when you sound your trumpet to your clients, competitors and the public.

In other words, don’t create a blog, press release, story pitch, smoke signal, branded sand castle, you tube post, Facebook update or other self-promotion – that is based on all sizzle and no steak.

For more than a year of serving as Communications Manager at PlusUrbia Design in Miami, I have found that flashy attempts at media attention get you nowhere.

Storytelling, based on facts, trends, innovations and relevancy to everyday life get tens of thousands of dollars in free media.

Take this thumbnail case study on the Wynwood Neighborhood Revitalization District created by PlusUrbia.

It took dozens of email and phone calls, with dozens of different angles, to get an editor I know to assign a Planning Magazine expert contributor to a story on planning for Arts Districts.

Today, the story posted – and it’s the main feature in the prestigious monthly magazine published by the American Planning Association.

Here's a link to a Planning Magazine story that dedicates 450+ words and the story-ending memorable quote block to PlusUrbia Design:

https://www.planning.org/planning/open/2015/artsculture.htm

PlusUrbia is an amazing collaborative that has gotten tons of local work in the past year, not to mention an APA award for its collaborative work in Wynwood with the City of Miami, Wynwood BID and Akerman firm.

PlusUrbia’s “Cabin in the Grove” design studio is the perfect place for me to work as a teammate with brilliant designers while we: earn media, focus RFPs, sharpen writing, streamline contest entries, clarify web content, expand brand and share success on social media.

Including the prestigious main feature story in Planning Magazine, PlusUrbia has become quite the global, national and local media darling.

In the past 90 days, my work with this firm has gotten lead television stories in Spanish and English, nearly two dozen major blog stories (including Curbed), more than one dozen print feature stories (Herald, SOFLA Biz Journal, Miami Today) and NPR multiple interviews.

We have also placed a pair of expert op-ed pieces on essential urban design issues that are important in Miami, but relevant to hundreds of cities around the nation and beyond.

If PlusUrbia’s designers didn’t create great work, there would be no story to tell.

Thanks PlusUrbia. The partnership has been amazing.

WWW.PLUSURBIA.COM