The movement towards creating sustainable communities has gained increased prominence with approaches such as New Urbanism, yet there are few examples of the successes. This text offers an analysis of one such example: Village Homes outside Davis, California. The area offers features including extensive common areas and green space; community gardens, orchards and vineyeards; narrow streets; pedestrian and bike paths; solar homes; and an innovative ecological drainage system.
A new way forward for sustainable quality of life in cities of all sizes Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Build American Prosperity is a book of forward-thinking ideas that breaks with modern wisdom to present a new vision of urban development in the United States. Presenting the foundational ideas of the Strong Towns movement he co-founded, Charles Marohn explains why cities of all sizes continue to struggle to meet their basic needs, and reveals the new paradigm that can solve this longstanding problem. Inside, you’ll learn why inducing growth and development has been the conventional response to urban financial struggles—and why it just doesn’t work. New development and high-risk investing don’t generate enough wealth to support itself, and cities continue to struggle. Read this book to find out how cities large and small can focus on bottom-up investments to minimize risk and maximize their ability to strengthen the community financially and improve citizens’ quality of life. Develop in-depth knowledge of the underlying logic behind the “traditional” search for never-ending urban growth Learn practical solutions for ameliorating financial struggles through low-risk investment and a grassroots focus Gain insights and tools that can stop the vicious cycle of budget shortfalls and unexpected downturns Become a part of the Strong Towns revolution by shifting the focus away from top-down growth toward rebuilding American prosperity Strong Towns acknowledges that there is a problem with the American approach to growth and shows community leaders a new way forward. The Strong Towns response is a revolution in how we assemble the places we live.
"Designing Planned Communities is a clear statement of the design issues that are critical to creating livable and well-designed planned communities. Professor Mandelker draws on his long experience with planned community and land use regulation to explain the meaning of good design for planned communities. He shows how design concepts for planned communities can be translated into effective design guidance by local governments. Examples of design standards are provided from comprehensive plans, design guidelines, design manuals, and planned community regulations. Throughout Designing Planned Communities, the reader is taken through the complex problems of design regulation to an effective design program that can create planned communities in which we want to live. Planners and lawyers will be interested in what Mandelker has to say about the design issues facing a growing number of planned communities throughout the country. Planning and local government attorneys will find the information about the legality of innovative design plans most interesting and helpful. Mandelker provides examples of localities that have experimented with a variety of design approaches and explores case law that will have an impact on these innovations." -Michael Allan Wolf, Professor & Richard E. Nelson Chair in Local Government Law, University of Florida, Fredric G. Levin College of Law
The "new community" movement of the 1960s and 1970s attempted a grand experiment in housing. It inspired the construction of innovative communities that were designed to counter suburbia's cultural conformity, social isolation, ugliness, and environmental problems. This richly documented book examines the results of those experiments in three of the most successful new communities: Irvine Ranch in Southern California, Columbia in Maryland, and The Woodlands in the suburbs of Houston, Texas. Based on new research and interviews with developers, designers, and residents, Ann Forsyth traces the evolution, the successes, and the shortcomings of these experiments in urban innovation. Where they succeeded, in areas such as community identity and open space preservation, they provide support for current "smart growth" proposals. Where they did not, in areas such as housing affordability and transportation choices, they offer important insights for today's planners, designers, developers, civic leaders, and others interested in incorporating new forms of development into their designs.
Designing Healthy Communities, the companion book to the acclaimed public television documentary, highlights how we design the built environment and its potential for addressing and preventing many of the nation's devastating childhood and adult health concerns. Dr. Richard Jackson looks at the root causes of our malaise and highlights healthy community designs achieved by planners, designers, and community leaders working together. Ultimately, Dr. Jackson encourages all of us to make the kinds of positive changes highlighted in this book. 2012 Nautilus Silver Award Winning Title in category of “Social Change” "In this book Dr. Jackson inhabits the frontier between public health and urban planning, offering us hopeful examples of innovative transformation, and ends with a prescription for individual action. This book is a must read for anyone who cares about how we shape the communities and the world that shapes us." —Will Rogers, president and CEO, The Trust for Public Land "While debates continue over how to design cities to promote public health, this book highlights the profound health challenges that face urban residents and the ways in which certain aspects of the built environment are implicated in their etiology. Jackson then offers up a set of compelling cases showing how local activists are working to fight obesity, limit pollution exposure, reduce auto-dependence, rebuild economies, and promote community and sustainability. Every city planner and urban designer should read these cases and use them to inform their everyday practice." —Jennifer Wolch, dean, College of Environmental Design, William W. Wurster Professor, City and Regional Planning, UC Berkeley "Dr. Jackson has written a thoughtful text that illustrates how and why building healthy communities is the right prescription for America." —Georges C. Benjamin, MD, executive director, American Public Health Association Publisher Companion Web site: www.josseybass.com/go/jackson Additional media and content: http://dhc.mediapolicycenter.org/
Describing a wide range of communities, this record offers practical information for sustainability-oriented developers and urban-design professionals. Packed with outstanding photography, this overview of projects developed over the past 50 years discusses the importance of open space, mixed housing types, connectivity, and other smart-growth features in master-planned communities. This book is a must read for those in the real estate industry, including developers, planners, architects, and consultants.
New towns—large, comprehensively planned developments on newly urbanized land—boast a mix of spaces that, in their ideal form, provide opportunities for all of the activities of daily life. From garden cities to science cities, new capitals to large military facilities, hundreds were built in the twentieth century and their approaches to planning and development were influential far beyond the new towns themselves. Although new towns are notoriously difficult to execute and their popularity has waxed and waned, major new town initiatives are increasing around the globe, notably in East Asia, South Asia, and Africa. New Towns for the Twenty-First Century considers the ideals behind new-town development, the practice of building them, and their outcomes. A roster of international and interdisciplinary contributors examines their design, planning, finances, management, governance, quality of life, and sustainability. Case studies provide histories of new towns in the United States, Asia, Africa, and Europe and impart lessons learned from practitioners. The volume identifies opportunities afforded by new towns for confronting future challenges related to climate change, urban population growth, affordable housing, economic development, and quality of life. Featuring inventories of classic new towns, twentieth-century new towns with populations over 30,000, and twenty-first-century new towns, the volume is a valuable resource for governments, policy makers, and real estate developers as well as planners, designers, and educators. Contributors: Sandy Apgar, Sai Balakrishnan, JaapJan Berg, Paul Buckhurst, Felipe Correa, Carl Duke, Reid Ewing, Ann Forsyth, Robert Freestone, Shikyo Fu, Pascaline Gaborit, Elie Gamburg, Alexander Garvin, David R. Godschalk, Tony Green, ChengHe Guan, Rachel Keeton, Steven Kellenberg, Kyung-Min Kim, Gene Kohn, Todd Mansfield, Robert W. Marans, Robert Nelson, Pike Oliver, Richard Peiser, Michelle Provoost, Peter G. Rowe, Jongpil Ryu, Andrew Stokols, Adam Tanaka, Jamie von Klemperer, Fulong Wu, Ying Xu, Anthony Gar-On Yeh, Chaobin Zhou.
"Urban development sites can become battlegrounds as a result of the conflicting interests of developers and communities. In the USA, design charrettes are often used as a means of bringing people together, using detailed design exercises to establish agreement around a development masterplan. However, despite the increasing frequency of their use, charrettes are widely misunderstood and can be misapplied. This book provides detailed guidance on the proper and most effective ways to use this helpful tool."-BOOK JACKET.
How can we design places that fulfill urgent needs of the community, achieve environmental justice, and inspire long-term stewardship? By bringing community members to the table with designers to collectively create vibrant, important places in cities and neighborhoods. For decades, participatory design practices have helped enliven neighborhoods and promote cultural understanding. Yet, many designers still rely on the same techniques that were developed in the 1950s and 60s. These approaches offer predictability, but hold waning promise for addressing current and future design challenges. Design as Democracy is written to reinvigorate democratic design, providing inspiration, techniques, and case stories for a wide range of contexts. Edited by six leading practitioners and academics in the field of participatory design, with nearly 50 contributors from around the world, it offers fresh insights for creating meaningful dialogue between designers and communities and for transforming places with justice and democracy in mind.
