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Headway

Exploring the world’s challenges through the lens of progress.

Highlights

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    CreditPhoto Illustration by Tonje Thilesen for The New York Times
    Headway

    Recyclable? Try Refillable. The Quest For a Greener Cleaner

    As more consumers try to cut down on plastic waste, both start-ups and big brands like Clorox are hoping to usher in a new age of refillable cleaners.

     By Susan Shain

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    When food is composted, it releases less of the potent greenhouse gas methane than when it decomposes in landfills.
    CreditCaroline Tompkins for The New York Times
    Headway

    How Central Ohio Got People to Eat Their Leftovers

    The average U.S. household wastes nearly a third of the food it buys. This community is nudging its residents to change their habits.

     By Susan Shain

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    An emerging group of architects believe in designing not just for the life of a building, but for its afterlife, too.
    CreditMax Pinckers for The New York Times
    Headway

    How to Recycle a 14-Story Office Tower

    Buildings are responsible for nearly 40 percent of the world’s carbon emissions. In Amsterdam, they are trying to create a blueprint to do something about it.

     By Jessica Camille Aguirre

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    CreditLauren Tamaki

    30 People Tell Us What Homelessness Is Really Like

    Packing groceries, bathing in fountains, finding comfort in an orange blanket. Explore people's stories and their answers to common questions.

     Interviews by Susan Shain and Aidan Gardiner

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    CreditAbdul Kircher for The New York Times

    What Don’t You Know About Homelessness?

    Most experiences of homelessness are hidden by design, but they reveal much about how communities work, or don’t.

     By Matthew Thompson and Abdul Kircher

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    CreditChristopher Lee for The New York Times

    How Houston Moved 25,000 People From the Streets Into Homes of Their Own

    The nation’s fourth-largest city hasn’t solved homelessness, but its remarkable progress can suggest a way forward.

     By Michael Kimmelman, Lucy Tompkins and Christopher Lee

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    CreditElliot Ross for The New York Times

    Three Years in Shelters. Ten Months to Find a Home.

    Scenes from one woman’s journey out of homelessness in Houston.

     By Elliot Ross and Lucy Tompkins

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    CreditNanna Heitmann for The New York Times

    What Do the Protectors of Congo’s Peatlands Get in Return?

    The world is suddenly focused on a huge natural carbon store in the Congo Basin. Its guardians are asking what they're owed for keeping it intact.

     By Ruth Maclean

Hindsight

More in Hindsight ›
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    CreditMike Haddad

    Dear People of 2021: What Can We Learn From Hindsight?

    For the first series from the Headway initiative, we followed up on forecasts from decades past to ask what the passage of time has revealed.

     By Matthew Thompson

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    CreditMike Haddad

    Millions More People Got Access to Water. Can They Drink It?

    The U.N. pledged to halve the proportion of the world without access to clean drinking water by 2015.

     By Lucy Tompkins

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    CreditMike Haddad

    What Can One Life Tell Us About the Battle Against H.I.V.?

    In 2001, U.N. estimates suggested 150 million people would be infected with H.I.V. by 2021. That preceded an ambitious global campaign to curb the virus. How well did it work?

     By Sarika Bansal

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    CreditMike Haddad

    Europe Met a Climate Target. But Is It Burning Less Carbon?

    The European Union promised to reduce its emissions 20 percent by 2020. Did it happen?

     By Lois Parshley

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    CreditMike Haddad

    Extreme Poverty Has Been Sharply Cut. What Has Changed?

    The U.N. pledged to cut by half the proportion of people living in the worst conditions around the world.

     By Lucy Tompkins

Headway and The New York Times Magazine

More in Headway and The New York Times Magazine ›
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    CreditAdali Schell for The New York Times

    Remaking the River That Remade L.A.

    Over the past century it has been channeled, subdued, blighted. Is it time for the Los Angeles River to serve the city in a new way?

     By Michael Kimmelman

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    Seventh graders plowing land in Ciales that they will later sow.
    CreditMaridelis Morales Rosado for The New York Times

    Can an Island Feed Itself?

    After years of destructive weather that have disrupted Puerto Rico’s food supplies, new visions of local agriculture are taking root.

     By Moises Velasquez-Manoff

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    The destroyed Irpin bridge in September.
    CreditMichal Siarek for The New York Times

    Architects Plan a City for the Future in Ukraine, While Bombs Still Fall

    Irpin was one of the first Ukrainian cities to be destroyed and liberated. Now it’s becoming a laboratory for rebuilding.

     By Linda Kinstler

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    Valdomiro Osvaldo Aquino, a Guarani-Kaiowá leader, in Mato Grosso do Sul.
    CreditLuisa Dörr for The New York Times

    Can a National Museum Rebuild Its Collection Without Colonialism?

    After a fire destroyed thousands of Indigenous artifacts, the curators of this Brazilian museum are adopting a radical new approach.

     By Mariana Lenharo and Meghie Rodrigues

  1. The Tech and Design Issue

    In an Age of Constant Disaster, What Does It Mean to Rebuild?

    Each catastrophe is a test of what kind of society we’ve built. And each recovery offers a chance, however fleeting, to build another.

    By Matthew Thompson

     
  2. Headway

    What Are Your Stories of Rebuilding After Disaster? Tell Us.

    Headway wants to learn more about the people affected by this issue and the stories we should tell.

    By Matthew Thompson

     
  3. Climate event series

    There’s a Crucial Climate Summit in Egypt. Our Event Tells You What to Expect.

    Hear from Boris Johnson, the former British prime minister, and other global leaders in a livestream of the New York Times Climate Forward event during COP27 from Egypt.

    By The New York Times

     

  4. Can Anacostia Build a Bridge Without Displacing Its People?

    A decade in the works, the 11th Street Bridge Park in Washington, D.C., has yet to be built. But it could be a model for how to create public space while lessening the effects of gentrification.

    By Megan Kimble and Andre D. Wagner

     

  5. How Houston Is Fixing Homelessness

    Homelessness bundles together so many problems: a broken mental health system, racial inequity, the affordable housing crisis. The headlines can be overwhelming. Last year I started talking with experts. They had a different view. They told me about Houston.

    By Michael Kimmelman

     

  6. From Homeless to Home

    I met Wendy Marcum last summer at The Beacon, a homeless shelter in downtown Houston. Wendy told me she was 56 years old and had been homeless for three years. I asked for her number so we could stay in touch

    LUCY TOMPKINS

     
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    The Long Emergency of Homelessness

    If we understood the loss of housing as a collective challenge engulfing our communities, how would it guide our response?

    By Matthew Thompson

     
  8. HEADWAY

    If Housing Is a Health Care Issue, Should Medicaid Pay the Rent?

    With federal housing money in short supply, state and local authorities are looking to health dollars to help tackle homelessness.

    By Lucy Tompkins

     
  9. Headway

    What Do You Know About Homelessness and Housing Insecurity? Tell us.

    Headway wants to learn more about the people affected by this issue and the stories we should tell.

    By Lucy Tompkins and Terry Parris Jr.

     

  10. Obsessed With Peatlands

    Dozens of scientists, academics and writers have spent their lives thinking about peatlands. But why are they so obsessed? Our “Bog Squad” has answers.

    By Terry Parris Jr.