Good morning all from Greensboro, where it’s been Christmas for several hours now. Tomorrow we start the Kwanzaa and the extended Christmas season.
We welcome 2013 in a few days.

It’s that notion of 2013  that I want to meditate on right now. In 2012, I celebrated two years of putting together this blog, which has now grown into a full-fledged website. As you will see if you are reading this on the website, I’ve done another redesign. With this redesign, I will be expanding my editorial content, adding more audio, video, book reviews, and even more of the placemaking commentary you’ve come here to enjoy, learn, and share.

I’m also looking to hear from you! If you have something that you think would be a good fit for the page, such as an urbanist commentary on a place in North Carolina, where people of color stand in the new urbanism, or the story of how you created a better block with barely any capital besides sweat equity, I want to hear it! Email me at theblackurbanist@gmail.com.

I am once again grateful to The Atlantic Cities, The Congress for New Urbanism, Piedmont Together, Sustainable Cities Collective, my undergraduate alma mater, my current employer ,and many others who have shared my work this year. I am also thankful to the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, for conferring on me the status of being a Master of Public Affairs with a concentration in community and economic development. Were it not for my course in urban political systems, this blog website would not exist.

I’ll be on Facebook and Twitter throughout the holiday as well as working out the kinks on this page. I’m still working on getting the podcast so it can be downloaded, but in the meantime, please share the stream with others.

Merry Christmas! Happy Kwanzaa! Happy New Year! Happy anything else I forgot! Let’s celebrate in the community today and everyday!