Newsroom

Dec 6, 2010

Unless you’ve been under a rock for the past year or so you know there’s been a lot of talk recently on the deficit. It’s everywhere. And everyone seems to have an idea for how to reduce it. So what does this have to do with RF? Well the panel of experts commissioned by President Obama to look at ways to cut the deficit released its report last week. It contains some of the typically-cited measures – raising the retirement age cuts to social spending tax increases etc. – as well as some not​

Dec 3, 2010

Much of the attention regarding Europe at the moment is undoubtedly focused on the crisis facing some euro-zone countries. However much more positive news is emerging from the continent on the environmental and climate front. As reported at Switchboard European nations have taken the lead at climate talks in Cancun Mexico by making good on their promises to help developing countries reduce their emissions and adapt to some inevitable climate change as laid out in last year’s Copenhagen acco​

Dec 1, 2010

Planners economic development officials policy makers and general enthusiasts have an obsession with lists and rankings of metro areas. That’s the charge from Vincent Valk of Next American City . In “List-o-mania” Valk argues that this obsession is largely insignificant at the megacity level. Whether Los Angeles or Washington is ranked as the country’s most congested area is not likely to be enough of a factor in changing someone’s mind to move to a particular region.

Nov 30, 2010

A couple of interesting articles have popped up recently both centered on the idea that the size of a city is important to its success and the nature of its economy. The first titled “The Rise of the Efficient City” is written by suburban-enthusiast Joel Kotkin who argues that mid-sized cities like Austin and Raleigh are better positioned to thrive in the 21 st century than are megacities like New York or Chicago. Kotkin argues that the U.S. and the world are embracing mid-sized cities eve​

Nov 29, 2010

Building a more inclusive region is one of the primary goals of RF. We’ve blogged on multiple occasions about the need to reduce disparities in the region particularly in education to meet RF targets and to help more of the region’s residents share in metro Washington’s relative prosperity. ​

Nov 24, 2010

Scrambling to put together some last minute Thanksgiving travel plans? Planning ahead for the winter holidays? Consider taking the train. Matt Yglesias from Think Progress blogged recently about the environmental benefits of traveling by train which this graphic from the U.S. DOT demonstrates:

Nov 23, 2010

An interesting piece today over at Next American City discusses how the proliferation of “hyperlocal” blogs and web sites is impacting urban planning. Highlighting a number of sites focused on the metro Washington region the piece argues that urban planning a field sometimes perceived as unapproachable by the general public (either by design or by the wonkish nature of the discipline) is becoming more connected to the people it affects – a positive development.

Nov 22, 2010

Leaders in the metropolitan Washington region have embarked on an unprecedented regional effort to develop the most competitive workforce in the country.

Nov 22, 2010

As the transformative nature of the technological revolution of the past few decades became obvious to folks around the world much of the conventional wisdom argued that location would become an obsolete factor in our daily lives. If we can tweet and meet online from practically anywhere in the world why does it matter if you’re in San Francisco or South Dakota?

Nov 18, 2010

The facts on the table are as such: most scientists believe that the earth’s climate is changing and that humanity’s actions are the cause of this change. Even accepting that at least for this post there are still difficult hurdles to cross before effective policies can be put in place to prevent (or at least reduce) the consequences of climate change.