At the start of the 20th century, streets belonged as much to pedestrians and children at play as to cars. By the end of it, stepping into the street in the wrong place was a crime. How did jaywalking become a crime? And how do we decriminalize it?

As Congress votes to cut funding for public transit in favor of more traffic-snarled sprawl, they'd do well to look to Guadalajara for an example of what happens when you make transit awesome. (Hint: People love it!)

From stylish new designs in Miami Beach to simple retrofits in Puerto Vallarta, parking garages, long the enemies of enlightened urban design, are being turned into mixed-use models of sustainable street life.

A couple of recent, high-profile news stories seem to indicate dark days ahead for solar energy. Dig beneath the headlines, though, and it turns out that 2011 was a banner year for PV and the gloom is a media invention.