Photo courtesy of Culdesac

Welcome to PeopleForBikes’ Building Better Communities series, where we highlight the people building great communities throughout the U.S. — with bikes in mind. Meet the developers building to meet the growing demand for walkable, bikeable neighborhoods, alongside a breakdown of the approaches these visionaries have adopted and their key takeaways on how other communities and developers can build better for bikes and the people who ride them. 

Ryan Johnson can see the future — and it's in the past. 

On his first trip to Europe as part of a scholarship program, he landed in Budapest and was inspired by the ancient streets he saw humming with the inevitable vibrancy of concentrated human activity. It offered a sharp contrast from his hometown of Phoenix, Arizona, where sprawl and distance too often diluted connections between neighbors, community, and commerce. The scholarship sent Johnson around Europe, where he saw how Budapest’s sister cities offered their own flavors of the same kind of energy. "People were happier, they were healthier, they knew their neighbors, they were more connected to their place, even to themselves,” he says. “I wanted to bring that back." 

When Johnson later joined the founding team at real estate startup OpenDoor, he almost immediately noticed how consistently American neighborhoods most like those in Europe outperformed others in the market, commanding premium prices. “Walkable” wasn’t yet a buzzword, but Johnson heard customers asking for it again and again, just in different words. "They were saying, 'I want to live somewhere cute and where I know my neighbors and there's a coffee shop and there's thoughtful architecture." Johnson saw how that translated to a place that was walkable, bikeable, and, almost always, allowed the freedom of not needing to own a car. 

The Opportunity: An Untapped Market for Active, Connected Communities

What those OpenDoor customers wanted either didn't exist, or was too expensive, and interest was only growing. “The demand for walkable neighborhoods is impossible to ignore,” Johnson says. “A National Association of Realtors' [NAR] recent study found that 92% of Gen Z would pay more to live in a walkable neighborhood, and that demand extends to every generation, including Boomers and the Silent Generation. But the U.S. is not building nearly enough opportunities for them.” NAR surveys have consistently reflected this shift since the first one in 2013. “We need to build millions of units. Every generation wants it."

And so, Johnson decided to build some of those units. He sold his stake in OpenDoor to found Culdesac, a developer dedicated to building car-free (and car-lite) housing. Johnson called the developer’s first and flagship project, Culdesac Tempe, “America’s first car-free community built from scratch.” 

The Return on Investment

Culdesac Tempe stands as a national model for real estate development, showing how bikeable urban planning can generate strong residential and commercial demand. Culdesac Tempe broke ground in 2021. As of March 2025, almost 90% of its 288 completed units were leased.  When all phases are completed in 2028, Culdesac Tempe will offer 760 units. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the decade-plus of industry data reflecting increased demand for close-knit walkable communities across generations comes to life in Culdesac’s demographics. "Sometimes people will assume it's one [age] demographic, because we're near ASU [Arizona State University]. Actually, it's quite broad,” Johnson says. 

Many residents enjoy a lower cost of living or more discretionary income, freed up from the demands of owning a personal car. The development makes it an exceptionally easy choice in part by offering a slate of transportation options, including unlimited Valley Metro passes, e-bikes and bikes, rideshare, AV ride hail, and carshare on demand. The cycling amenities are first-rate. Two miles of internal bike paths are complemented by bike repair stations, more than 1,000 bike parking spots, and ample secure bike storage throughout the neighborhood. The first 200 residents received free e-bikes that included service perks from the local e-bike shop. The e-bike premium resulted from a partnership with Lectric, a Phoenix-based e-bike company, celebrated by the naming of Culdesac's primary bike path, Lectric Avenue.

Other returns are less tangible but equally valuable. Residents report knowing their neighbors better, enjoying the ability to be outside and more active more often, easy access to so much of what they need and want from the retail shops just steps from home, and enjoying Culdesac’s plaza, designed to allow kids to recreate safely away from cars and in the company of neighbors.  "You’ll often see groups gathering or children playing in the plaza on their balance bikes as their parents supervise while sitting and talking,” Johnson says. “Culdesac’s open space allows for more varied play spaces and easier-to-organize social play for both kids and adults."

Retail success mirrors residential success, and Johnson attributes this largely to Culdesac’s courting of local retailers, whose familiarity with the region he thinks better positions them to appreciate the development’s promise. "We thought it would take years for there to be enough people living in our project and in the surrounding area to support that retail," he says. The half dozen initial shops have mushroomed to 22, offering everything from necessities like groceries to specialty services like aesthetics. 

Culdesac Tempe is a rental development, but Johnson is confident that an ownership offering is just as viable. The developer’s next ventures have broken ground on townhouses in Mesa, AZ, and Atlanta, GA.

Lessons for Developers and Local Governments

1. Build Relationships Early On

“Building great relationships with the city and our transportation partners is a key reason Culdesac Tempe has been so successful,” Johnson says. “It’s why we were able to reach the historic agreement to build with zero residential parking so we could focus on people-centered design.” 

The city and the developer recognized their common interests early on and built on that foundation — and it was a two-way street. For example, Johnson's team wanted to show how transformational protected bike lanes can be. "So we focused on the thing that would be the most catalytic," he says. The team looked around the corner to Smith Road, where a protected lane would link to a light rail line and a nearby shopping center and the adjacent Tempe Town Lake Trail, a regional bike/walk path. “We knew it was in an area where people would support it, it would get lots of use and show the city how many bikers [sic] they have already if they just create safe infrastructure." Culdesac worked with Tempe to win a federal grant that went toward building a protected bike lane on Smith as part of a street improvement project. 

2. Reconsider Zoning Regulations

“Helping more people be able to live a walkable, [bikeable] lifestyle is the best thing we can do for health, happiness, climate, lower cost of living, and lower taxes, but the problem is that developers aren’t allowed to build them,” Johnson says. Local leadership came in the form of forward-looking elected officials who welcomed growth and, crucially, were willing to negotiate zoning regulations, like an agreement to forego any residential parking requirement. “In most of the U.S., outdated policies force developers to have parking minimums instead of allowing the spaces to be used for people, vibrant community gatherings, and green spaces,” Johnson says.  “Getting rid of parking minimums would make it possible for developers to build in people-centric ways.”  

There is some parking, but it’s a small lot to accommodate retail customers. The high cost of parking  — both financially and in the opportunity cost of crowding out space for other amenities — make them a priority for reconsideration. Each spot can add anywhere from $20,000 to near $100,000 to the cost of construction, depending on the local market and whether parking occupies a surface lot or a garage. 

Additional key zoning reforms needed include allowing mixed-use developments, higher density, lower setback requirements (setbacks are minimum distances structures can be built from property lines, streets, sidewalks, and similar features), and prioritizing these for proximity to transit stations. 

3. Speed Up the Approval Process

Tempe’s flexibility was undoubtedly a benefit for the project. But, negotiating each of those many exemptions ate up valuable time, and with it, money. Shortening the timeline for decision making and permitting and streamlining these processes to reduce uncertainty would meaningfully decrease the cost of housing, Johnson says. By extension, streamlining these processes could reduce costs for local governments.

Johnson emphasizes that new development must be driven by local context and is not meant to be replicated identically to the Tempe project. But he does intend Culdesac to be both inspiration and proof of concept that reduces risks for other developers by showing that walkable, bikeable neighborhoods can work in the U.S. today. "Now, it's a lot easier because we're now the model," Johnson says, and he expects more to come.  “When you create places where people actually want to be — where the streets are alive with life, not traffic — it works. This isn’t just a one-off. It’s a blueprint.”