by Jonathan Hiskes. Progress toward a sustainable future may be stalled in the Senate , but there’s a ton of news and interesting research happening at the local level on the broad topic of improving built spaces — cities, towns, buildings, transportation systems, etc. A quick roundup from the local solutions beat: PlanIT Valley : Portugal’s planning to build a new green city and tech innovation center (“a new Silicon Valley”) from the ground up, with the help of networking giant Cisco. The $10 billion project is designed to hold 225,000 people and produce “negligible” greenhouse gas emissions with the help of ubiquitous smart grid technology. And yes, planned cities like ” PlanIT Valley ” have a terrible track record, so it makes sense to be skeptical. The best way to understand PlanIT Valley, oddly enough, is to read about a totally different Cisco city, South Korea’s New Songdo, in Greg Lindsey’s excellent Fast Company story from February. Los Angeles invests in transit-oriented development , breaking ground on a $690 million, 11.3-mile light-rail extension that planners hope will inspire compact development. “There’s something about rail that creates an anchor for economic development,” Michael Cano, county transportation deputy, tells the L.A. Times . In Seattle , Amazon gets slammed for its hulking, monolithic new headquarters: Architecturally, in a word: ugh. Amazon.com is an international icon, a world-renowned success story of the Internet Age. Given Amazon’s stature and wealth, one might expect a world HQ design that was daring, or fun, or unconventional in some inspiring, creative way.

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