Never in my career would I have dreamed up a senior housing project for artists, but indeed one exists in lovely Burbank, California. It is pretty cool, too. The Burbank Senior Artists Colony is a fairly typical, albeit attractive four story senior housing development on the outside. On the inside are community rooms, art studios, a lawn for yoga and meditation, and a stage for playacting or video productions.

The artists colony is a partnership between Meta Housing, the developer, and Engaged Aging, a services provider that strongly believes that BINGO is not the answer for elderly activity. If you ask me, BINGO is what residents at the colony do in their down time when they are not sculpting, acting, painting or learning an instrument. Forever young. For more on the colony and other exciting developments, visit the ULI Case Studies website.

The latest round of ULI case studies includes Sara Conner Court, located in Hayward, California, which is across the bay from San Francisco. Sara Conner Court is a 57-unit affordable housing project developed by Eden Housing that incorporates several green features.

To me, however, the thing that is most impressive about this project is the community outreach. Besides offering after school programs and computer courses to residents, Sara Conner Court sponsors the neighborhood watch for the area. With community outreach programs at Sara Conner Court, Eden Housing reminds us that affordable housing, when done well, can do more than simply house people. It can improve communities.

To be completely honest, attending CNU in Austin was hard to pass up. I really like the city - the climate, the food, the music. But I am doubly happy I attended. CNU gave me a shot in the arm. I learned a lot, heard great speakers, met wonderful people, took good tours, ate well, got to know the city better than I hoped, and well, the Saturday night party was a damn good time.

One highlight of the conference was listening to Robert Caro give a speech about his book, the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Power Broker, about the legacy of Robert Moses in New York. I figured hearing Caro speak would save me the trouble of reading the entire 1,100 page tome, until I realized his talk covered only a tiny section of the book. Let’s just say it is still on my “to do” list!

We were graced by several other important figures in the planning and development world. Henry Cisneros, or as he has been called, “Cheese nachos,” eloquently presented some of the many successes of HOPE VI. Allan Jacobs cautioned against letting awards received at a young age go to your head. James Howard Kunstler, while predicting doom and gloom for cities as oil runs out and the climate warms, implored us to interpret signals coming at us and provide hope for the built environment. And John Norquist reminded us that doing good things makes you happy.

Maybe the most fiery speech was given by Geoff Anderson, formerly at the EPA and now the new President of Smart Growth America. The most important part of his message was that we are not winning yet, those of us that believe in new urbanism. He implored us to be not just technicians, which CNU has proven to be quite good at. We must communicate our mission better - get our messaging right and make connections to people’s values. And instead of finding an answer then fragmenting in to our little silos, we need to come together and make our message stronger.

A word to the organizers of CNU in Denver next year, and to any other urban conference planners - do more biking tours. I rented a bike for the entire time in Austin, have done so in Amsterdam and San Francisco, and may I say again and again that it is a great way to see and learn about a city. This is particularly so when you are given a tour by a group of knowledgeable professionals in the planning/design industry.

Attending the Congress for the New Urbanism conference in Austin reinvigorated me. I had forgotten how passionate new urbanists are. As a result, I was challenged and inspired, particularly when I arrived at home and got back to the grind only to realize how much work there is to do.

Who are all these people with bright yellow bags walking around taking pictures of buildings and sidewalks!? The good people of Austin must think we are crazy. We were given yellow tote bags as part of registration, and everywhere I go I see someone with their bag and camera, standing in a median of a road or some awkward place, taking just the right photo that shows the perfect example of a transect zone, mixed-use, or simply an appropriately-sized sidewalk. Guilty, your honor. Such is the life of an urbanist.

About 40 of us camera and bag toting new urbanists got a tour of Austin’s gentrifying east side. For years a working class area, the east side is home to a significant African American and Hispanic population. Being largely cut off from downtown by Interstate 35 didn’t help the economic conditions of the area.

This is slowly changing, as the availability of inexpensive sites has drawn developers of condos, apartments and live/work units. Several projects have been built or are underway in the area of the east side that is less than a mile away from downtown. Early projects bought land for $5 per square foot and sold units for just $90,000 - not too long ago, either!

Among the stops along the way were the 501 Studios and 6th + Brushy, an office/retail renovation and a mixed-use loft and commercial project, both developed by Richard Kooris, 1111 E. 11th Street and the East Village Lofts, a commercial buildng and a mixed-use project developed by Esperanza Development, and the Pedernales, Este, TwentyOne24, and Saltillo Lofts, all developed by Constructive Ventures. Saltillo Lofts was also featured in a ULI case study that I wrote in 2007.

With gentrification comes tension, as existing residents deal with rising home prices. A very good article in the New York Times in December of 2006 spells out the issues.

Frankly, I really like the neighborhood for its character. It has some neat old homes, good restaurants, including Cisco’s, complete with its picture of Willie Nelson on the wall (tell me, what Austin restaurant, bar or club doesn’t have a picture of Willie Nelson hanging on the wall?). I think the new development and renovations have a lot of character. Although I understand the issues of gentrification there, I applaud the city and residents of East Austin for trying to keep the character of the neighborhood intact while allowing development to occur.

Commuter rail service starts later this year, with a stop in East Austin. The area west of the station at Saltillo Plaza is planned to be a significant TOD. It will be very interesting to see how the neighborhood changes in the coming years.

You may call yourself a new urbanist, but are you living the charter? Do you live within walking distance of neighborhood retail and services? Do you ever use transit? Is your neighborhood mixed-income? Perhaps you don’t even think of yourself as a new urbanist, but you are indeed one by virtue of your location and lifestyle.

A quiz created by several young CNU members was rolled out at the conference in Austin, designed to challenge assumptions and allow members to assess their choices. Click here to find out if you indeed are living the charter.

(I actually got a score of 96 of 100, losing out on four points because our local park is not within a five minute walk - it is 10 minutes away and has a playground, lake and trail connections to the entire park system!)