Ecologically Based Municipal Land Use Planning

In the decades following the first Earth Day in 1970, a generation has been enlightened about the unspeakable damage done to our planet. Federal, state, and local governments generated laws and regulations to control development and protect the environment. Local governments have developed environmental standards addressing their needs. The result-an ecologically incongruous pattern of land development known as urban sprawl. Local land use planners can have a greater effect on the quality of our environment than all of the federal and state regulators combined. Historically, they have existed on the periphery of land management. The author suggests that federal and state environmental regulators need to incorporate local governments into their environmental protection plans. Ecologically Based Municipal Land Use Planning provides easily understood, nuts and bolts solutions for controlling urban sprawl, emphasizing the integration of federal, state, and local land use plans. The book discusses ecological resources and provides practical solutions that municipal planners can implement immediately. It discusses the most recent scientific data, how to extract what is important, and how to apply it to the local land planning process. The author includes the application of the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to problem solving. Despite compelling evidence and sound arguments favoring the implementation of an ecologically sensitive approach to land use planning, municipal planners, in general, remain skeptical. It will take considerably more encouragement and education to win them over completely. Ecologically Based Municipal Land Use Planning makes the case for sound land use policies that will reduce sprawl.

This book reconciles competing and sometimes contradictory forms of land use, while also promoting sustainable land use options. It highlights land use planning, spatial planning, territorial (or regional) planning, and ecosystem-based or environmental land use planning as tools that strengthen land governance. Further, it demonstrates how to use these types of land-use planning to improve economic opportunities based on sustainable management of land resources, and to develop land use options that strike a balance between conservation and development objectives. Competition for land is increasing as demand for multiple land uses and ecosystem services rises. Food security issues, renewable energy and emerging carbon markets are creating pressures for the conversion of agricultural land to other uses such as reforestation and biofuels. At the same time, there is a growing demand for land in connection with urbanization and recreation, mining, food production, and biodiversity conservation. Managing the increasing competition between these services, and balancing different stakeholders’ interests, requires efficient allocation of land resources.

The need for sustainability of our region requires that we strive to find some common ground, however modest. Given that existing processes cannot cope with the current environment and development pressures - to say nothing of the pressures to come - all the current talk of the mutual interdependence of environment and the economy will remain that - just talk - unless we can find ways to better integrate environmental and land-use planning. The main objective of this report is to provoke informed discussion on this important subject.

In a coherent and comprehensive set of chapters, a team of leading scientists describe the present state-of-the-art in spatial conservation planning methodology with a focus on operational definitions and methods, supported by the latest technological details and applications of publicly available software.

Thirteen years ago, the first edition of Land-Use Planning for Sustainable Development examined the question: is the environmental doomsday scenario inevitable? It then presented the underlying concepts of sustainable land-use planning and an array of alternatives for modifying conventional planning for and regulation of the development of land. This second edition captures current success stories, showcasing creative, resilient strategies for fundamentally changing the way we alter our landscape. See What’s New in the Second Edition: Explains the relationship between innovative land-use planning and nature’s impartial, inviolate biophysical principles that govern the outcome of all planning Focuses on how decision making that flows from and aligns with nature’s biophysical principles benefits all generations by consciously protecting and maintaining social-environmental sustainability Proposes an alternative framework for municipal comprehensive plans framing the community as a living system Written by two experienced professionals in sustainable development planning, the second edition revisits the successes as well as barriers to progress associated with establishing new community development models, such as EcoMunicipalities. The authors emphasize the necessity and potency of citizen involvement and initiatives. They provide proposals for alternative approaches that rest on lessons from history as well as the research, wisdom, and vision of many individuals and communities whose work they have studied. The book supplies a sturdy platform on which to continually build and innovate progress in sustainable land use planning.