Cary Lowe

Embers are blown off of a burning tree as the Eaton fire burns in Altadena on Jan. 8. (AP Photo/Nic Coury, File)

Opinion: California must adapt to new climate era to limit wildfire threat

January 14, 2025 at 5:18 p.m.

The fires devastating Los Angeles neighborhoods are just the latest reminder of Southern California’s vulnerability to climate change. Where wildfires once were a periodic phenomenon, the region now faces a...

San Diego, California - January 23: Heavy rains flood five homes on Paradise Valley Road and 8th St. Residents deal with aftermath a day after the storm in National City on Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2024 in San Diego, California. (Alejandro Tamayo / The San Diego Union-Tribune)

Recent infrastructure failures exposed San Diego’s systemic neglect of poor neighborhoods

February 14, 2024 at 8:55 p.m.

Lowe, Ph.D., is a retired land use lawyer and a member of the College of Fellows of the American Institute of Certified Planners. He lives in Point Loma.Recent events remind...

Chula Vista, CA_4/20/15_ |Apartment homes are being constructed on Artisan Street in Chula Vista's Otay Ranch neighborhood showing the density of construction as San Diego neighborhoods are more and more built out.Photo by John Gastaldo/U-T San Diego/Zuma Press|

Caption: Apartment and condo construction increased enough in October to bring the year-to-date figure ahead of 2014's.

Guest Commentary: San Diego needs more housing, but the ‘shotgun approach’ is doing more harm than good

November 5, 2023 at 9:01 p.m.

In the rush to address California’s severe housing shortage, we are abandoning fundamental principles of sound urban planning. From the governor and the state Legislature down to city and county...

Chula Vista, CA - April 24:
On Saturday, April 24, 2021 in Chula Vista, CA., volunteers painted the roof rafters and sheets of plywood that will be used in building pre-fabricated homes. Volunteers over the next few days are building pre-fabricated homes that will be delivered to Tijuana, Mexico and assembled for needy families. Left-to-right, Erika Solomonson, Colleen Montgomery, Zoe Montgomery, Jill Johnson and Mindy Bugaj. (Nelvin C. Cepeda / The San Diego Union-Tribune)

San Diego needs more housing, but city’s ‘shotgun approach’ is doing more harm than good

October 24, 2023 at 1:11 a.m.

Stepner is the former San Diego city architect and taught at the New School of Architecture and Design and lives in Mission Hills. Lowe, Ph.D., is a retired land use...

FILE - In this Aug. 10, 2018 file photo, homes destroyed by a wildfire are seen from an aerial view in the Mary Lake Subdivision in Redding, Calif. A financial tug-of-war is emerging over the $13.5 billion that Pacific Gas & Electric, the nation's largest utility, has agreed to pay to victims of recent California wildfires, as government agencies jockey for more than half the money to cover the costs of their response to the catastrophes. (AP Photo/Michael Burke, File)

Wildfire hazards are growing exponentially. Here’s what we should do to reduce the risk.

June 23, 2023 at 8:48 p.m.

Lowe, Ph.D., is a retired land use attorney and planning consultant who has written widely on environmental issues. He lives in Point Loma.Wildfire has become a year-round hazard throughout California...

Perhaps it’s time to it that San Diego will always be an expensive place to live

December 28, 2022 at 2:25 a.m.

Lowe, Ph.D., is a planning consultant and retired land-use lawyer who taught urban planning at UC San Diego and lives in San Diego. The contrast between two stories on the...

Rescuers work at the scene of a building that was damaged by a deadly Russian missile attack in Vinnytsia, Ukraine, Thursday, July 14, 2022. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

Images of Ukraine’s destruction remind me of growing up amid the ruins of post-WWII Europe

July 28, 2022 at 1:01 p.m.

Lowe is a writer and retired lawyer who lives in Point Loma.News photos of collapsed buildings, bombed bridges and refugee encampments in Kyiv, Severodonetsk and other Ukrainian cities take me...

After several days of continues rain through out San Diego County, Wednesday’s dry and cold temperatures didn’t hinder this group from exploring along the jetty in Imperial Beach.

To fight climate change, we must redesign San Diego communities

January 11, 2022 at 8:27 p.m.

Leiter is former director of land use and transportation planning for the San Diego Association of Governments and lives in Poway. Kalansky, Ph.D., is a climate scientist at Scripps Institution of...

SAN YSIDRO, CALIFORNIA - JULY 30: The 10 San Diego County ZIP codes with the most cases have been atop the list of local COVID hotspots since early May. Commuters coming off the San Diego Trolley at San Ysidro Border area on Thursday, July 30, 2020 in San Ysidro, California. (Alejandro Tamayo / The San Diego Union-Tribune)

COVID-19 pandemic offers San Diego a chance to rethink our workforce, housing, transit and more

January 9, 2021 at 1:42 a.m.

Lowe is a retired land-use lawyer and urban planner. He lives in Point Loma.With municipal revenues in free fall and the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic still escalating, San Diego’s new...

State workers take down a Confederate national flag on the grounds of the state Capitol, Wednesday, June 24, 2015, in Montgomery, Ala. Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley ordered Confederate flags taken down from a monument at the state Capitol. (AP Photo/Martin Swant)

Recent protests in Alabama remind me of my visit in 1968, when racism was in full view

June 30, 2020 at 12:27 a.m.

Amid the nationwide demonstrations against police brutality and demands for removal of Confederate symbols, a particularly striking image showed demonstrators and police officers tly rallying on the steps of the...

Cary D. Lowe, attorney and author of "Becoming American"

How COVID-19 upended the literary world

June 15, 2020 at 2:12 a.m.

April 30 should have been one of the most exciting days of my life. My publisher had set that as the release date for my book "Becoming American." I have...

Dancers of all ages makes their way around the procession during the grand entry at Cuyamaca College's third annual powwow.

Why California’s Native Americans deserve more than an apology

June 28, 2019 at 12:01 a.m.

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s executive order apologizing to California’s Native American population for nearly two centuries of “violence, exploitation, dispossession and the attempted destruction of tribal communities” is a welcome first...

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