The Strong Towns Podcast cover art

The Strong Towns Podcast

The Strong Towns Podcast

By: Strong Towns
Listen for free

The Strong Towns Podcast is a weekly conversation on the Strong Towns movement, hosted by Strong Towns Founder and President Charles Marohn and frequently featuring special guests. The podcast explores how we can financially strengthen our cities, towns, and neighborhoods and, in the process, make them better places to live. Join Chuck in examining how everything from urban design to economics to systems theory to psychology helps inform this core question.

Copyright 2018 All rights reserved.
Political Science Politics & Government
Episodes
  • The Neighborhood Outside the Church Doors
    May 18 2026

    A trip to Italy left Chuck surprised by how ordinary Catholic life felt in a country filled with churches. A later visit to Hasidic Brooklyn stayed with him for a different reason: families living under intense physical constraints, yet ordering their lives around faith and community. Those memories frame this talk at a Catholic church in Minnesota, where Chuck turns from faraway examples to a more personal question: what would it mean for a parish to care not only for the sanctuary, but for the blocks around it?

    Additional Show Notes
    • Chuck Marohn (Substack)

    This podcast is made possible by Strong Towns members. Thank you! Join fellow members discussing this episode in The Commons.

    Show More Show Less
    47 mins
  • Illinois Housing Reform Gets Practical
    May 28 2026

    Illinois is short roughly 130,000 homes today and needs about 240,000 more by 2030. The state can’t change mortgage rates or material costs, so Governor JB Pritzker of Illinois is targeting something else: the rules that make homes hard to build. He walks through the Build Initiative, a set of bills to legalize more ADUs and small multifamily buildings, relax some parking and stairway requirements, standardize impact fees, and put limits on permit delays. He also talks about local pushback, bipartisan support, and why these modest changes could mean more housing choices without the sense that neighborhoods are being upended.

    Additional Show Notes
    • Governor JB Pritzker (LinkedIn)
    • Chuck Marohn (Substack)

    This podcast is made possible by Strong Towns members. Thank you! Join fellow members discussing this episode in The Commons.

    Show More Show Less
    39 mins
  • A Congressman Makes the Case for Local Power
    May 11 2026

    Congressman Jake Auchincloss joins the the Strong Towns podcast with a case for localism that takes it seriously without treating it as a cure-all. He explains why localism deserves a bigger role in national politics, not as a slogan, but as a way to rebuild trust and solve problems closer to the ground. That idea gets tested against some of the hardest problems facing cities today: transportation systems that reward expansion over maintenance, a housing market that has lost its entry-level rung, and federal policies that often struggle to match local realities. The conversation closes with a warning about digital life and a defense of face-to-face community.

    Additional Show Notes
    • Jake Auchincloss (LinkedIn, Substack, Site)
    • "Digital Dopamine is Consuming America. It's Time to Fight for IRL.", (Article)
    • Chuck Marohn (Substack)

    This podcast is made possible by Strong Towns members. Thank you! Join fellow members discussing this episode in The Commons.

    Show More Show Less
    41 mins
adbl_web_anon_alc_button_suppression_c
No reviews yet