The 1993 regulation (Part 503 Rule) governing the land application of biosolids was established to protect public health and the environment from reasonably anticipated adverse effects. Included in the regulation are chemical pollutant limits, operational standards designed to reduce pathogens and the attraction of disease vectors, and management practices. This report from the Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology evaluates the technical methods and approaches used by EPA to establish those standards and practices, focusing specifically on human health protection. The report examines improvements in risk-assessment practices and advances in the scientific database since promulgation of the regulation, and makes recommendations for addressing public health concerns, uncertainties, and data gaps about the technical basis of the biosolids standards.
Urban water management has to take an integrated approach that prioritizes sustainable drainage systems (SuDS) over gray infrastructure. This book elaborates on the planning and evaluation of pipework drainage systems with a focus on modern-day constraints to deliver a solution that favors sustainability as the overarching goal. The book includes a technical section on design of gray and green infrastructure, considering the total lifecycle costs of drainage systems. Advanced computer simulation techniques are discussed after covering the derivation of both standard and empirical equations for appropriate hydrology and hydraulics. The book provides an incorporation of reliability analyses for both green and gray infrastructure starting with techniques for forecasting flows, hydraulic performance, and lifecycle costs. The work also involves 3-D modeling, geospatial and big data analysis, and how these techniques are applied into city management—particularly beneficial to municipal engineers who are increasingly becoming involved in mapping the underground. Soil mechanics and subsurface drainage systems are analyzed and structural aspects of sewers are included. Finally, soil behavior in shear, retaining wall structures, and tunneling is briefly featured in the book. This book will be of interest to (under)graduate and postgraduate engineering students, drainage engineers, urban planners, architects, water engineers, developers, construction contractors, and municipal engineers.
This book introduces community planning as practiced in the United States, focusing on the comprehensive plan. Sometimes known by other names—especially master plan or general plan—the type of plan described here is the predominant form of general governmental planning in the U.S. Although many government agencies make plans for their own programs or facilities, the comprehensive plan is the only planning document that considers multiple programs and that accounts for activities on all land located within the planning area, including both public and private property. Written by a former president of the American Planning Association, Community Planning is thorough, specific, and timely. It addresses such important contemporary issues as sustainability, walkable communities, the role of urban design in public safety, changes in housing needs for a changing population, and multi-modal transportation planning. Unlike competing books, it addresses all of these topics in the context of the local comprehensive plan. There is a broad audience for this book: planning students, practicing planners, and individual citizens who want to better understand local planning and land use controls. Boxes at the end of each chapter explain how professional planners and individual citizens, respectively, typically engage the issues addressed in the chapter. For all readers, Community Planning provides a pragmatic view of the comprehensive plan, clearly explained by a respected authority.