Tourism is a critical factor in the U.S. and world economies. “The impacts of tourism on a community can be beneficial if planned and managed, or extremely damaging if left without controls,” says Michael Kelly, former chairman of the APA’s tourism planning division.

Technology and changing travel habits are checking in as long-term guests.

The “fear of missing out” is a major motivator for today’s most affluent millennials who want every travel moment to be memorable—and tweetable.

FutureBuild 2016, hosted in January by ULI Los Angeles in partnership with VerdeXchange, offered a look at urban growth challenges in Los Angeles that are illustrative of issues faced by cities everywhere as they aspire to become more livable, prosperous, and sustainable.

Over the next decade, 20 markets worldwide—including south Florida; Santiago, Chile; El Bajío, Mexico; and Philadelphia—are set to emerge as global logistics hubs, according to a new report from CBRE Group Inc.

Advanced manufacturing, which uses high levels of technology in addition to innovative materials and processes, is replacing traditional production in many locations and creating new industrial centers in others. A panel at ULI’s Fall Meeting addressed the changes in manufacturing and how they will affect urban centers.

Voted one of TimeOutmagazine’s “Coolest 40 Neighborhoods in the World,” Uptown is a diverse community on the North Side of Chicago. ULI Fall Meeting attendees got the opportunity to tour the neighborhood, which offers spectacular lakeside views, a growing entertainment district, and a thriving food and cultural scene.

Those who attend the 2021 ULI Fall Meeting in Chicago will have the opportunity to tour mixed-use development near Wrigley Field.

At the 2021 ULI Carolinas meeting, held as a virtual/in-person hybrid event in March, the annual Crane Watch session showcased projects under construction in North and South Carolina that use innovative planning and design in their placemaking efforts, creating iconic projects that help shape the neighborhoods that surround them. The projects this year included a historic storefront restoration, a shipping container–based food yard, and a massive nine-block development.

After a quiet first half of 2024, CMBS originations increased 59 percent in Q3 on a year-over-year basis, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s Quarterly Survey.

Conversions of office buildings for residential uses are becoming increasingly viable in some regions. According to Steven Paynter, a principal at Gensler who leads the firm’s global building transformation and adaptive use practice, office-to-residential conversions are viable in 25–30 percent of the buildings his team analyzes.

The ULI Terwilliger Center for Housing has announced two winners for this year’s Jack Kemp Excellence in Affordable and Workforce Housing Award, as well as two winners for the Terwilliger Center Award for Innovation in Attainable Housing.

Supertall creates a “palpable energy” that speaks to New York’s resilience and the future of cities

Berkeley, California, is emerging as a hub for life sciences and technology firms, with new developments opening in the West Berkeley neighborhood. In June, ULI San Francisco hosted a walking tour through two campuses targeting life sciences research and development tenants at the eastern edge of the San Francisco Bay: theLAB Berkeley and Berkeley Commons.

A close look at trends shaping today’s best economic and talent hubs that offers valuable clues into how to create equitable, sustainable innovation districts that prosper.

Demonstrating the connections among health, social equity, and living environments, ULI Arizona is offering solutions to boost housing affordability.

The segregation of urban neighborhoods across the United States since the Great Depression was largely created by policies and practices established and enforced by local and federal authorities, Richard Rothstein, author of the bestselling book The Color of Law, said during a group discussion with ULI members at the 2020 ULI Building Healthy Places Forum.

ULI MEMBER–ONLY CONTENT: Health is not just a trend in real estate development but an important factor that differentiates projects and benefits people and communities, Randall Lewis, ULI Foundation governor and executive vice president of Lewis Management Corp., said at a 2020 ULI Virtual Fall Meeting product council session he moderated on healthy living principles.

Consumers have kept a steady foot on the gas this year. A record-high 197 million consumers shopped in stores or online over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, according to the National Retail Federation (NRF). The NRF forecasts that holiday sales will grow between 2.5 percent and 3.5 percent, with total retail spending in the United States falling between $979.5 billion and $989 billion during November and December. That forecast also is consistent with NRF’s annual U.S. sales growth—between 2.5 percent and 3.5 percent—for 2024.

Northern Mexico has experienced a significant expansion in the Mexican industrial real estate sector since its major decline from the late 1990s to the early 2000s, due, in part, to low-cost production in China. During the pandemic, that trend began to shift.

The National Retail Federation’s Hot 25 Retailers ranks the nation’s fastest-growing retail companies. Rankings are determined by increases in domestic sales between 2022 and 2023; all retail companies with global sales in excess of $2 billion, and key format leaders were eligible.