ProGov21 Policy Library

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2021

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Democracy & Governance

Regulation and government programs are supposed to protect the consumers, but too often, they favor big, incumbent businesses at the expense of small consumers and small businesses. A permit fee that is the same for one house or a hundred will fall a hundred times harder on the builder...

House Hacking Catalog

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2019

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Democracy & Governance, Community Development, Housing

Missing Middle Housing is a term that refers to the types of residential buildings — those in the “middle” between single- family detached homes and large apartment buildings — that once were built in cities and towns across the country but are mostly outlawed today, and missing from...

Lean Financing: Alternatives to Institutional Capital

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2021

Level City or Town, Other Boards and Agencies

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Community Development

Financing Lean Development requires non-institutional sources of capital. This paper focuses on project equity, specifically from those sources. Lean Development is coming of age, but it has significant hurdles to realizing its potential, and financing is among the more difficult...

Low-Fat Vanilla Finance: A Simple Financial Model

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2021

Level City or Town, Other Boards and Agencies

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Community Development

New developers should create their own financial models. Only by doing so will they truly understand the variables and how each affects financial performance. This paper attempts to walk new developers through a financial model that includes development budget, annual return, and...

The Lean Business of Place-Based Enterprise

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2014

Level City or Town

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Civil Rights, Community Development

While big businesses dominate global markets, command the entrenched financial and banking powers and are incentivized by misguided government policy, emerging startups can disrupt the status quo and prove that local economies can compete successfully if they connect with their customer...

The Lean Scan: Activating Community Assets

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2015

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Community Development, Public Spaces, Community Development

Most communities have assets hidden within that are not utilized or underutilized. A Lean Scan identifies these assets and determines the reasons that they are not used efficiently. The Lean Scan helps to reveal possible partnerships between built, financial, social, and natural resources...

Localism in England Lessons for Lean Urbanism

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2021

Level City or Town

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Democracy & Governance, Community Development

This is a case study of the Localism Act of 2011 in England, which affords a series of community rights to localities that self-organize. Rights include formulation of a separate development plan and building community facilities outside of the mandate of the federal government. This...

Regulatory Barriers to Home Construction and Rehab

Type -

Year 2021

Level -

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Democracy & Governance, Community Development, Housing

Regulatory barriers make housing less affordable to millions of households in the US and abroad. If regulatory barriers were reduced, small developers could provide housing at more affordable prices. This article assesses the current state of knowledge about the effects of federal,...

Lean Governing

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2014

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Democracy & Governance, Community Development

Lean Governing is an action-focused exercise of collective will by local elected officials and citizens. It is a process of discovery, of robust experimentation and learning by doing. Lean Governing works through a network of distributed leadership among public entities, citizens...

The Pink Zone - Where Small is Possible

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2018

Level City or Town

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Community Development, Economic Justice

One barrier to economic development can be the overwhelming and expensive process of compliance with regulatory requirements for small businesses. A Pink Zone — an area where the red tape is lightened — is the locus for implementation of lean strategies and improvements, and it identifies...

Pilot Projects Testing Tools, Building Platforms

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2021

Level City or Town

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Democracy & Governance, Community Development

Lean Urbanism uses Pilot Projects to improve communities through incremental, reflexive processes that utilize Lean Urbanism tools to identify existing underutilized assets. Pilot projects can provide valuable information to refine and adjust tools, and to identify common obstacles...

Lean Development Codes: Pink, Pocket, and Smart

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2018

Level City or Town, County, Other Boards and Agencies

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Democracy & Governance, Community Development

Lean Codes have compact formats, bare-bones standards, and lighter (pink) red tape, in contrast to the excessive controls, redundancies, contradictions, delays, and unintended consequences created by conventional codes (and some form-based codes, for that matter). Lean Development...

Lean Urbanism for Greenfield Development: Seaside Case Study

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2014

Level City or Town

State(s) All States, Florida

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Environment & Natural Resources, Community Development, Public Spaces

Seaside, the resort town in the Florida Panhandle, is best known for being a compact, walkable and diverse community, but it has also become known as one of the first environmentally designed new towns. It is now time for it to be recognized as a model for Lean Urbanism, particularly...

The Problems with LEED

Type -

Year 2014

Level -

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Environment & Natural Resources, Energy, Housing

Analysis suggests LEED buildings perform no better, and in fact perform worse, than non-LEED buildings. Many recommended actions, especially those selected by users, have little to no effect. Too few of its standards are results-driven, with high pay-back in areas other than environmental...

Lean, Energy-Efficient Buildings: Seven Principles

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2021

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Environment & Natural Resources, Energy, Community Development, Housing

The built environment accounts for approximately half the energy use and carbon footprint of the United States. Lean Buildings reduce energy flows by tapping basic natural heating and cooling techniques and renewable energy sources in ways that are region-specific and climate-sensitive....

From Landlord to Leanlord

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2015

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Housing

Small residential and commercial rental properties owned by individual landlords are important to the diversity and adaptability of cities as a whole. The owners of small rental properties face challenges, many due to economies of scale, in areas like energy efficiency and building...

Leaning Toward Live-Work Units

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2021

Level City or Town, County, Other Boards and Agencies

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Community Development, Housing

Strong economic, demographic and household trends reveal a tremendous pent-up demand to use homes for employment, pressuring the marketplace to accommodate all types of live-work units. Yet for the past half-century, live-work units have essentially been made illegal or discouraged...

Lean Charrettes

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2014

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Democracy & Governance, Community Development, Public Spaces, Finance & Procurement

Charrettes are collaborative meetings where all project stakeholders come together for a period of focused planning activity in order to resolve conflicts and map solutions. Charrettes are highly effective tools for planning and public engagement, but may be too expensive to fit into...

Lean Exercise: Open Gyms

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2014

Level City or Town

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Health, Community Development, Public Spaces

We've done a great job developing technology and labor saving machines, which unfortunately has produced a population that is disconnected from nature and sedentary. Our fondness of sitting is reflected in growing rates of obesity, diabetes, and chronic pain. One of the best things...

Lean Infrastructure: Better than Gold Plating

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2014

Level City or Town

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Environment & Natural Resources, Community Development, Public Spaces

Gold plating is when we make changes to projects that are outside the scope of the original plan, resulting in increased time, expenses, and waste. Gold-plating presents barriers to accomplishing good urbanism in the form of initial financial costs that can completely block growth....

Lessons from PHX: Embracing Lean Urbanism

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2021

Level City or Town

State(s) All States, Arizona

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Democracy & Governance, Community Development, Public Spaces

The City of Phoenix has become a model of Lean Governing, demonstrating the benefits of community revitalization when a municipality enables and encourages the work of creative entrepreneurs, small developers, neighborhood leaders, and community organizations. Along the way, it has...

Lean Interpretations from Philippine Vernacular Architecture

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2014

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source The Project For Lean Urbanism

Policy Areas Energy, Community Development, Housing

The U.S. housing market has seen significant transformation in the last few years, calling for a return of smaller, more efficient dwellings. Design and construction principles from places like the Philippines, where pragmatic building practices employing simple construction methods...

ProGov21 Policy Library

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