By Welcome to The Black Urbanist Weekly. I’m Kristen Jeffers and I’m currently producing this weekly digital newsletter on my site and via email to share my thoughts, my Black, Spiritual, Southern, Working-Class, Educated, Queer, Femme thoughts on how places and communities work. Think of this as my weekly column, sitting
Sportsball as Community Ball as My Ball
We are all Royal. At least we are in Kansas City right now. In both the spirit of the World Series win, me being nostalgic over different pieces of my writing and the fact that IT IS NOW BASKETBALL SEASON, I’m re-working this piece and adding a bit more context
Five Ways to Do Urban Stadiums and Arenas Right
A major battle going on in placemaking circles is that of sports teams and sports venues. How should they be financed? Should they be in open fields or should they take up blocks of downtown districts? What happens to the displaced homeowners and renters? What happens when they fall
How to Make a Men’s NCAA Basketball Bracket, if You Are a Tobacco Road Urbanist
Sports build community. From pride-of-their-suburb Little League teams, to pulse-of-their-city World Series pendant holders to that proud handful of farmhouses who raised that NASCAR driver, sports makes a community. I grew up in a pre-Carolina Panthers, original Charlotte Hornets, retiring Richard Petty, saying hello to Stormy, but never to a
Placebook: Tournament Town
There’s this thing that grips Greensboro every March and it’s called Tournament Town. Banners are posted along light posts downtown and down the side of the coliseum, whether we are actually hosting an ACC Tournament. In recent years, we’ve also had NCAA first and second round games and of
