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The few LAs in Western Colorado are pretty idle. We could know the state of the profession by the attendance numbers at this year’s ASLA conference in Washington, DC. I have an architect friend who is a principal of a Pacific NW firm. He said his firm had two offices, 27 employees and 7 partners last year. Now they have one office, 5 employes and…[Read more]

* Of the LAs you know, how many lost their jobs after the economy went bad?

I could only throw out a guesstimate of maybe 50% or more. I know a lot of LA’s. Maybe 1 or 2 are working from my graduating class. It seems like it went for months where I’d hear of layoffs by the tens almost weekly just in the Denver/Front Range area. I have no ide how…[Read more]

I know, but I figured that for potentially qualified unemployed peeps, 35g is better than a big fat 0.

Thanks Mike. Hey – aren’t we LAs put on this earth to solve unsolveable problems? ha! Seriously – I was walking on the sidewalk next to the highway (35 mph, downtown 25 mph) and a semi with a pup flew past. I thought ‘if he looses a tire, I will be toast!’
The DOT here is trying, but they put marked (striped) UNCONTROLLED pedestrian crossings in…[Read more]

Thanks for the reference to the Hamptons! I’ll check it out. It kind of sounds like they did what Palm Springs / Indian Wells / Palm Desert did.
This won’t be the ordinance and it will be ‘suggestions’ rather than law, but it will have tons of graphics, historic photos, etc. At least thats the plan.

Yes. Really pop 1,860! Everyone thinks SD is the great plains, but we have this amazing little mountina town. Here’s the problem – and you and I have discussed this thoroughly – its not exactly crawling with jobs!
Nonetheless, I do absolutely love it here and I’ve lived in some pretty righteous places, which is why I am volunteering to write the…[Read more]

Plenty of precedent, Tanya..Plenty of precedent..I would say this problem has occurred in most hamptons towns..

Look for ways to safely bring peds through the traffic. Medians to slow the traffic, Mid block crossings, extra pedestrian cross lights, wider sidewalks, bump-outs at the intersections (narrowing the travel lanes to minimum width), etc. You are asking to solve a problem that you may not be able to solve. The highway moves traffic most efficiently…[Read more]

Holy Moly..$35,000 with an advanced degree..I think I am going over to the dark side, to go work for Goldman Sachs..!!

Good conversation going on. One thing that was not discussed is how many still employed la professional have taken a salary cut. I know of few firms that opted for this option rather than laying off people, some that went half time too. I believe that that was a good move unfortunately there hasn’t been any recovery and thus such firms have had to…[Read more]

Does that sign realy say Population 1,860?? Are you really a member of the tourist board, trying to show how gorgeous SD is? It really looks NICE!! But I am wondering if you had the design consideration we had to deal with in the Hamptons – for each site, “where do you pile the snow in the winter?”

hee hee..

The Highway Commercial in the Hamptons had a successful development with, like you say, a huge buffer setback from the road that was all really attractive landscape. The businesses should not be visible from the street, but give them one nice sign, also attractively landscaped, and as previous poster said, limit points of entry to the site…The…[Read more]

Thanks so much Mike. Your response is very helpful.

The design guidelines I’m working on are part of a 6-year effort by an ad-hoc committee formed at the request of the mayor which has resulted in the renovation of our ‘town square’ park, and a giant TIF project described below. The committee was formed to respond to requests by the community for…[Read more]

Hi Tom,

To answer you questions from personal experience:

* Of the LAs you know, how many lost their jobs after the economy went bad?

I would say that about 15-18% of the LAs I know have lost their job at some point in 2 years.

* How many were practicing before the downturn, but are not right now? / * How many of those who are practicing today…[Read more]

@James ivy – Thanks for the response. Your answer is very helpful. It is also the closest to what I was after in starting this discussion. I wonder though, would it be possible for you to estimate totals for the questions in my post? I’m sorry if I’m imposing.

@ Nick Aceto – It’s unfortunate that they seem like rhetorical questions. I’m reall…[Read more]

Tanya, We work on rural downtowns in Colorado and I’d be happy to help you as much as I can.

What you have is a downtown with a 5 lane highway (4 travel lanes and turn lane) and diagonal parking on each side. That’s probably 100′ of asphalt for the pedestrians to cross in the “downtown proper” and frankly that “downtown” is not a pedestrian…[Read more]