ENERGY: News.com.au: Adelaide would become Australia's first solar city with initiatives to save residents up to $200 a year on their power bills, Prime Minster John Howard said today. Mr Howard said the Federal Government would provide $15 million for the trial project which would involve installing solar panels and smart electricity metres in about 1700 homes in Adelaide's northern suburbs. Read more...

Comment: Nice to see such an environmentally aware move by a Government. Then again, most governments are aware that energy costs are becoming more expensive, and that further efforts to use carbon-based or nuclear fuels to expand generating capacity are a political quagmire. While the Green left may take credit for this move, it is more likely a result of hard economic realities as concern increases over our reliance on expensive oil from unreliable sources and the political and economic costs of using even more carbon-based fuels to meet our increasing need for electrical energy.

INFRASTRUCTURE: International Herald Tribune: The biggest question mark hanging over the rise of manufacturing in India lies in whether the country has enough roads, ports and power plants to move huge quantities of goods and to power the factories that manufacture them. Read more...

Comment: India seems to be addressing some of its more pressing urban problems at the national level rather effectively. Implementation will tell. It seems likely in this context that a significant national effort to boost its inter-city infrastructure will be dealt with in the same way.

Dubai, UAE

Comment: Nice to see local consultants being sought for a dynamic growth area. The South Australian planning system works very well, by international standards, and provides a solid and robust foundation to guide urban growth, even in extreme cases. However the SA system is supported by decades of strategic planning and innovative thinking on the future of the Adelaide. Planners in the UAE would be wise to keep this in mind, and underpin Adelaide's lessons with rigorous thinking on what they need to achieve, how they want to achieve it, and what they are prepared to sacrifice/forego to create a working city through coming decades.

COMMUNITY BUILDING: Guardian Unlimited: When George Cadbury created the now famous Bournville village, a leafy suburb of Birmingham located close to the chocolate factory, he was a century ahead of his time. Built on a clear understanding of the enduring strength of community spirit combined with more than a little philanthropy, Bournville was probably one of the first sustainable communities ever created and remains a hugely popular location for home owners and tenants today. Read more...

Comment: Are today's communities based on the same factors as they were 100 years ago?

URBAN POLICING: Guardian Unlimited: Police are pressing ministers for radical new powers to dispense instant justice, including the immediate exclusion of "yobs" from town centres at night, and bans on street gang members associating with each other, the Guardian has learned. Senior officers say the powers would be the "modern equivalent of a clip round the ear from the local bobby" and would ensure the introduction of neighbourhood policing across England and Wales has "bite" and meets public expectations. Read more...

Comment: Is this Zero tolerance in practice or another measure to alienate kids? It may well have an impact in the short term, but it doesn't seem to address the original problem – kids with big attitude, little hope, and time on their hands. Government and charities have had little success with inspiring socially-acceptable or morals-based behaviour, probably because they are acting too late in the process and trying to impose essentially alien values. The lack of hope for a good personal future on the kids' terms may be an essential element to address, but who really understands where the kids are and what in their lives really needs to be changed? The recent discovery of a period after puberty, when kids are in a state of “adult-lite”, before further neurological changes around 20/21 may hold some answers.

TRANSPORT PLANNING: Gulf Times (Qatar): Work is underway to prepare a comprehensive Transportation Master Plan for Qatar that might include a rapid rail transit system. The idea is to have a plan for the next 20 years, officials of the Urban Planning and Development Authority (UPDA) told a press conference yesterday. Read more...

LAND ECONOMICS: Eprop.co.za (South Africa): Supported by the UK’s Department for International Development, the Urban Land Markets Programme (or ‘Urban LandMark’) is committed to an evidence-based process of discovery and advocacy around making urban land markets work better for (and with) the poor.  Urban LandMark aims to influence policies and practices in South Africa to improve poor people’s access to well-located urban land by making markets, and land planning and management systems work better, giving effect and meaning to the idea of people having a right to land. Read more...

Comment: May be worth watching.

URBAN REGENERATION: Guardian Unlimited: The twin-policy mantra of "sustainable development" and "brownfield regeneration" has therefore dominated the debate on urban redevelopment in the UK. Despite the evidence of a number of successful schemes on some sites, research conducted by the Oxford Institute for Sustainable Development at Oxford Brookes University shows there is a danger that we are creating "transient" communities, where predominantly "singleton" residents commute long distances to work, and may end up only staying in the area for a short period. Read more...

Comment: With “traditional families”becoming a minority, this concept of urban transients is likely to become the norm in many areas. Maybe its time to reorient services and community building efforts to recognize this, and leave “old school” traditional communities to the New Urbanists?

URBAN POLICY: New Straits Times (Malaysia): It's official - the Cabinet has approved the National Urbanisation Policy (NUP), an ambitious plan with specific measures and policies to drive and streamline the urbanisation and development of cities in the country."This policy will be our reference plan to drive, synchronise, and manage the development of cities to become more efficient, modern, safe, attractive and systematic - in short it is an essential guide to help us achieve the status of a developed nation by 2020," Ong said today. Read more...

Comment: National urban planning is catching on in Asia. Not surprising considering the enormous pressures on cities in the region. Maybe some of the developed countries could learn a lesson from this. Granted, the western economies are wary of too much centralization, but there are a number of national governments that do not even have urban policies, e.g., Australia.

URBAN RENEWAL: Transitions Online: Pitched battles involving Molotov cocktail–wielding protestors and police are a rare sight in Kazakhstan, which has enjoyed a remarkable degree of stability in the post-Soviet era. However, such a spasm of violence erupted recently in an Almaty suburb when authorities attempted to enforce a slum clearance plan. Read more...

Comment: Slum clearance or greed? That and some uncertain record keeping makes for an incendiary situation. Good time for some real public consultation?