Alan Durning
Sightline Institute
Seattle, WA, United States
Contact Alan
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Past articles by Alan:
Sightline Institute’s Giving Tuesday Spotlights
Staff share their picks to support a brighter tomorrow. → Read More
The Contradiction at the Heart of Housing Policy
Is a new left-right realignment possible? → Read More
A Green Voter's Guide to Cascadia's 2020 Election Results
2020 election results related to sustainability that we're watching in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Alaska and elsewhere. → Read More
Five Steps to Prevent Displacement
Why and how abundant-housing advocates should fight displacement. → Read More
Things I Hope Never Come Back After the Pandemic #3: The Hegemony of Fossil Fuels
Their economic power is crumbling. How soon will their political power follow? → Read More
Know Thine NIMBY
Residential lockdown---the near absence of new homebuilding in existing neighborhoods---is the norm across most of the metropolitan landscape of... → Read More
Residential Lockdown
Most pro-housing advocacy focuses on city hall. But a generation of such advocacy, most of it centered on the principles of "smart growth," has yet to... → Read More
The Climate Clock Is Running Out
What would affordable, post-carbon cities look like? → Read More
Yes, We Can Make Cities Affordable and Low-Carbon. It Requires Smart Strategy
What’s the best political blueprint for making housing abundant in walkable neighborhoods? It's a long play that requres smart strategy. → Read More
What Would Our Cities Look like If We Took Our Climate Change Values Seriously?
Vienna, Paris, and Barcelona are more than an allusion to the 2008 Woody Allen movie "Vicky Christina Barcelona." They are cities worth emulating. → Read More
Yes, You Can Build Your Way to Affordable Housing
“You can’t build your way out of a housing affordability problem.” That’s conventional wisdom. I hear it all the time: Prosperous, growing, tech-rich cities from Seattle to the Bay Area and from Austin to Boston... → Read More
Going to Court for Housing Choices?
Might a handful of lawsuits in the Northwest states open existing bedrooms to roommates, houses to in-law apartments, and neighborhoods to new rooming houses? It’s a question Sightline has long pondered. Today, we have part... → Read More
We are a community-sponsored resource and we can’t do this work without you!
Fifteen pounds. Thanks to Catalog Choice, Seattle’s phone book opt-out, and vigilance against Red Plum and other advertisers, I have purged and pinched my annual junk mail tally down to 15 pounds. Last time I weighed... → Read More
Inclusionary Zoning: The Most Promising—or Counter-productive—of All Housing Policies
Imagine two towns, both committed to helping their low-income residents but short on funding for social services. Both decide to require retailers to sell 5 or 10 percent of their wares at steeply discounted prices... → Read More
2016 Democracy Reform Ballot Initiatives Roundup
This election, voters in nine states and one province saw a total of 17 democracy reform initiatives on their ballots. The initiatives gave voters a chance to weigh in on issues ranging from voter registration... → Read More
Washington Candidates, Meet Democracy Credits
At a recent town hall-style meeting about money in politics, a speaker asked the audience how many of them thought they themselves could run for political office. Absolutely no one raised their hand. Then the... → Read More
Washington Voters, Meet Democracy Credits
How I-1464 would empower everyday citizens in state elections. → Read More
Will Seattle Suppress a Key Parking Fix?
A case study in boring, no-name reports meaning a whole lot for a city’s smart growth plans. → Read More
Green Stamps: A Climate Equity Proposal for the Pacific Northwest
A homegrown climate solution could power all Northwest families to a carbon-free future. → Read More
We are a community-sponsored resource and we can’t do this work without you!
Three points of contention in Washington’s fight for a carbon-free future. → Read More