I thought it was Charade. Confused by the actual processes, a charade. But Charette sounds so boutique-ish. It just feels good. My brain hurts, it's the cognitive dissonance.

Thanks for keeping us on the radar. Charette means "little cart". That is pretty funny because the charette is always used to force cart before the horse planning. This charette relates directly to forcing newurban "Form Based Codes"(also called-by me-Dorm Shaped Codes) onto the Fairmount neighborhood. This will streamline and expedite UO and the city of Eugene (and their public/private property speculating friends)plans for expansion into the area to develop a multiway boulevard (150 million) and a sport themed entertainment district to surround the no bid contract Nike arena. Essentially it is the SoWhat neighborhood masterplan on steroids. The "vision" comes complete with the usual suspect firms and organizations:TVA/Robert Thompson, Farkas Group, C.N.U., and Hoffman. Some of my research related to this regional planning mess is posted here: www.youtube.com/luddite333

I live right near the proposed site for this whole thing (well, while the university is in session), and I think that, like the new basketball stadium, it's a ridiculous waste of money and isn't going to really improve anything.

I'll admit, Franklin Blvd is not the prettiest sight in the world, but do we really need to spend $150 million dollars to Samadamize it? What really amazed me was that Jim Torrey actually voiced support for the thing, and he's often vilified among the stereotypical Eugenean enviro-socialists for "supporting sprawl".

It's already actually fairly walkable and there's tons of bicyclists around, though I think they actually made things worse when they put the EMX in.

If they want to spend money to fix some "walkability", they need to take a serious look at the 13th/Kincaid intersection. That area already has a lot going on, but that intersection is just a fiasco, with cars, pedestrians, bicyclists and buses going every which way and providing a poor LOS for all four modalities.

Thank you Alex. These Kool-aid drinking planners will ruin everything with their "visions" if not for citizens with common sense like you.

"Careful with that ask, Eugene." -- Prof. Floyd