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Ron Nyren

Ron Nyren is a freelance architecture, urban planning, and real estate writer based in the San Francisco Bay area.

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Resilience and Sustainability
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Attainable Housing
UL10: Ten Conversions to Residential Use
Multifamily buildings occupy structures with storied pasts. The rise of remote work and the continued housing shortage have led to a surge in the number of apartments being carved out of former office space—70,700 in 2025 compared to 23,100 in 2022, according to RentCafe. Developers are increasingly turning to structures with former lives—as offices or industrial or commercial buildings—to create multifamily housing that gives residents dwelling spaces that feel rooted in place and connected to the broader narrative of their communities.
December 1, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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Capital Markets and Finance
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Universities and Educational Facilities
How University/Developer Urban Partnerships Are Evolving Amid Uncertainty
Molly Maybrun, chief development officer of local developer Fifth Space, and Wallace Whittier, senior real estate officer for University of California, San Francisco, spoke at the 2025 ULI Fall Meeting about their collaboration to build a new proton therapy cancer center at Fifth Space’s Dogpatch Power Station, a multiphase master-planned mixed-use development on the waterfront at the southern edge of San Francisco’s Mission Bay.
December 1, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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Development and Construction
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Multifamily
Offsite Evolved: Realizing the Promise of Prefab, Modular, and 3D-Printing Construction
“The primary advantage every modular project has, if you do it right, is time savings,” said Mark Donahue—principal, design, for Lowney Architecture—during the “Offsite Evolved: How Today’s Prefab, Modular, and 3D-Printing Solutions Deliver Proven Speed, Savings, and Scale” panel at the ULI Fall Meeting in San Francisco. “You can, on a, say, 24-month construction project, save six to eight weeks.”
November 18, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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Design and Planning
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San Francisco
Canva Chief Evangelist Guy Kawasaki: 10 Principles for Innovation
Guy Kawasaki—chief evangelist at Canva, former chief evangelist for Apple, and bestselling author—summed up insights gleaned from his years in tech and as host of the Remarkable People podcast, interviewing such luminaries as Margaret Atwood, Tony Fauci, Jane Goodall, and Steve Wozniak.
November 17, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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Development and Construction
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San Francisco
Building Urban Strength in the San Francisco Bay Region: Insights from the 2025 Lewis Center Sustainability Forum
The 2025 Lewis Center Sustainability Forum, held during the ULI Fall Meeting in San Francisco, explored ways that local leaders in planning, policy, and development are advancing urban strength and adaptability amid increasing climate and social stresses.
November 17, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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Capital Markets and Finance
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Finance & Investment
The New Landscape of Commercial Real Estate Lending: Debt, Downtowns, and Data
While the full impact of the pandemic has yet to be realized, commercial real estate faces new uncertainties, including questions about the AI boom’s longevity, the spending strength of the U.S. consumer, and debt sustainability. In response to increased competition for quality deals, commercial real estate firms are restructuring their operations, using diverse data sources, accessing new capital, and forming new partnerships.
November 10, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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Capital Markets and Finance
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Dallas-Fort Worth
PwC and ULI Report Reveals the 2026 Real Estate Trends Transforming Where We Live, Work and Invest
Drawing on insights from more than 1,700 leading real estate investors, developers, lenders and advisors across the U.S. and Canada, the report identifies key opportunities, risks and market shifts that will shape the industry in the coming year.
November 6, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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Design and Planning
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San Francisco
Reviving Market Street: Fresh ideas spark new hope for San Francisco’s historic corridor
For decades, civic leaders have tried to revitalize Market Street, San Francisco’s central thoroughfare, only to see their efforts founder. “I sometimes call it the great white whale of San Francisco,” says Eric Tao, managing partner at L37 Development in San Francisco and co-chair of ULI San Francisco. “Every new mayor, every new planning director, every new economic development director has chased that white whale.” This year, however, an international competition of ideas hosted and run by ULI San Francisco, with support from the ULI Foundation, generated fresh momentum for reimagining the boulevard. The competition drew 173 submissions from nine countries and sparked new conversations about the future of downtown San Francisco.
October 31, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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Resilience and Sustainability
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Data Centers
ULI Award Winners: EcoDataCenter 1 Powers Its Servers with 100 Percent Renewable Energy in Sweden
Data centers have a reputation for high energy use. EcoDataCenter 1 in Falun, Sweden, offers an alternate model: its two data centers, DCA and DCB, derive all of their power from nearby renewable energy sources; 75 percent comes from hydropower and 25 percent from wind.
October 22, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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Design and Planning
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Asia Pacific
ULI Award Winners: Upper House’s “Dancing Balconies” Reshape Brisbane’s Skyline
Across the Brisbane River from Brisbane, Australia’s central business district, the 33-story Upper House residential tower stands out in the city’s skyline with its “dancing balconies” and curving timber ribbons inspired by the prominent roots of Queensland’s native Moreton Bay fig tree.
October 6, 2025
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Ron Nyren
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