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What's New July 2008 Built Environment / Case Studies Building from the Best of the Northern Rockies This collection of best practices and case studies from Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming includes vivid photographs, statistics, and informative write-ups on notable rural, in-town, and "edge" community projects. The closing chapters provide useful policy recommendations, a "lessons learned" section, and glossary of key terms.
Anderson, Kristen. Planning for Child Care in California. Point Arena, Calif.: Solano Press, 2006. ISBN 0923956-719 Though focused on California, this important book offers a comprehensive picture of child care as a planning issue. Anderson's book explains the importance of child care to communities, provides guidance to planners about how to craft local land use policies and regulations in support of child care, and explores the links between child care and other uses such as housing, transportation, and transit oriented development. Interesting appendices include a sample child care policy from the City of San Diego, a child care impact fee ordinance from the City of South San Francisco, and the child care section from the General Plan of the City of West Sacramento.
Condon, Patrick M. Design Charrettes for Sustainable Communities. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 2007. ISBN 9781597260534. Talk, doodle, draw ... Condon applies charrette methods to sustainable planning and design. He outlines steps for conducting visioning and design charrettes that enable communities to collaborate and propose sustainable solutions to planning problems. Condon offers nine rules for a good charrette. The short, readable, and practical book includes case studies from East Clayton, Surrey, B.C. and Damascus Area, Portland, Oregon, as well a model schedule for a four-day implementation charrette.
Squires, Gregory D., and Chester Hartman, editors. There is No Such Thing as a Natural Disaster: Race, Class, and Hurricane Katrina. New York: Routledge, 2006. ISBN 9780415954877. Reviewed in Spring 2008 JAPA. Fourteen essays critique the social, political, and environmental implications of the damage wrought upon the Gulf Coast by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The essays examine a broad range of topics including poverty, racial segregation, education and housing policy, aging populations, hospital services, and infrastructure development. Together, the authors pose a question that challenges citizens, planners and public officials alike. "... [S]ince Katrina is in fact a shorthand for a set of economic, social, and political conditions that characterize most of metropolitan America, what lessons and models does this provide for the nation as a whole?" The book provides a compelling examination of the role of race and class in shaping disaster planning and response in urban America.
Howard, J. Myrick. Buying Ttime for Heritage: How to Save an Endangered Historic Property. Chapel Hill, N. Carolina.: University of North Carolina Press, 2007. ISBN 9780807858684. Reviewed in March 2008 Planning magazine Executive director of Preservation North Carolina and teacher of historic preservation at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Howard explains how nonprofit organizations can work to preserve historic properties in their communities. Focusing on PNC's work in North Carolina, the book demystifies real estate and provides practical guidance to nonprofit managers who want to muster their organization's resources to protect endangered buildings. Howard also addresses project marketing, use of easements, moving properties, and how to pursue partnerships.
Daniels, Thomas L. Small Town Planning Handbook. 3rd edition. Chicago: Planners Press, 2007. ISBN 9781932364347 Intended for use in communities of 1,000 to 10,000, this title remains the "go-to" source for small town planners interested in creating a town plan and putting it into action. The newest edition of a planning classic recognizes GIS technology and the Internet as important planning tools. The book's third section, Sustainable Small Towns, explores what "smart growth" and sustainability initiatives — whether economic, social, or environmental — mean for small towns. As small towns feel the effects of federal-level budget cuts and increasing global competition, the authors promote effective planning as a survival strategy.
Ewing, Reid. Growing Cooler: The Evidence on Urban Development and Climate Change. Washington, D.C.: Urban Land Institute, 2008. ISBN 9780874200829 This compelling new book ties the science of climate change to a specific set of transit planning issues. Ewing and his coauthors advocate a shift to "compact development" in order to combat urban sprawl and reduce CO2 emissions. They present the case for reducing VMT by increasing the supply of homes in walkable, dense communities easily served by transit. As promised, the book provides evidence connecting VMT and CO2 emissions to climate change as well as research linking patterns of urban development to VMT. It closes with policy recommendations to guide decision makers and planners on the federal, regional, and local levels.
Elliott, Donald L. A Better Way to Zone: Ten Principles to Create More Livable Cites. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 2008. ISBN 9781597261807. City planner, attorney, and senior consultant at Clarion Associates, Elliott has written a book that challenges planners to think differently about the practice of zoning. He advises planners to "take the old zoning machinery apart" in order to craft ordinances that best shape livable communities. His book's critique of current zoning practice is organized around three central questions: Are the assumptions that ground current zoning practice true? Does zoning really address the forces that currently shape the development of American cities? Whatever happened to the sometimes-lost art of governance? Elliott offers 10 principles for reinventing local zoning practice and five starting points to guide planners who want to start implementing change.
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