The Option of Urbanism

The Option of Urbanism
Author: Christopher B. Leinberger
Publsiher: Island Press
Total Pages: 231
Release: 2010-03-18
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 9781597267762

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Americans are voting with their feet to abandon strip malls and suburban sprawl, embracing instead a new type of community where they can live, work, shop, and play within easy walking distance. In The Option of Urbanism visionary developer and strategist Christopher B. Leinberger explains why government policies have tilted the playing field toward one form of development over the last sixty years: the drivable suburb. Rooted in the driving forces of the economy—car manufacturing and the oil industry—this type of growth has fostered the decline of community, contributed to urban decay, increased greenhouse gas emissions, and contributed to the rise in obesity and asthma. Highlighting both the challenges and the opportunities for this type of development, The Option of Urbanism shows how the American Dream is shifting to include cities as well as suburbs and how the financial and real estate communities need to respond to build communities that are more environmentally, socially, and financially sustainable.

Greening Our Built World

Greening Our Built World
Author: Greg Kats
Publsiher: Island Press
Total Pages: 280
Release: 2013-03-05
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 9781610910798

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“Green” buildings—buildings that use fewer resources to build and to sustain—are commonly thought to be too expensive to attract builders and buyers. But are they? The answer to this question has enormous consequences, since residential and commercial buildings together account for nearly 50% of American energy consumption—including at least 75% of electricity usage—according to recent government statistics. This eye-opening book reports the results of a large-scale study based on extensive financial and technical analyses of more than 150 green buildings in the U.S. and ten other countries. It provides detailed findings on the costs and financial benefits of building green. According to the study, green buildings cost roughly 2% more to build than conventional buildings—far less than previously assumed—and provide a wide range of financial, health and social benefits. In addition, green buildings reduce energy use by an average of 33%, resulting in significant cost savings. Greening Our Built World also evaluates the cost effectiveness of “green community development” and presents the results of the first-ever survey of green buildings constructed by faith-based organizations. Throughout the book, leading practitioners in green design—including architects, developers, and property owners—share their own experiences in building green. A compelling combination of rock-solid facts and specific examples, this book proves that green design is both cost-effective and earth-friendly.

New Urbanism and American Planning

New Urbanism and American Planning
Author: Emily Talen
Publsiher: Routledge
Total Pages: 332
Release: 2005-11-16
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 9781135992613

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New Urbanism and American Planning presents the history of American planners’ quest for good cities and shows how New Urbanism is a culmination of ideas that have been evolving since the nineteenth century. In her survey of the last hundred or so years of urbanist ideals, Emily Talen identifies four approaches to city-making, which she terms ‘cultures’: incrementalism, plan-making, planned communities, and regionalism. She shows how these cultures connect, overlap, and conflict and how most of the ideas about building better settlements are recurrent. In the first part of the book Talen sets her theoretical framework and in the second part provides detailed analysis of her four ‘cultures’.She concludes with an assessment of the successes and failures of the four cultures and the need to integrate these ideas as a means to promoting good urbanism in America.

Urbanism Without Effort

Urbanism Without Effort
Author: Charles R. Wolfe
Publsiher: Unknown
Total Pages: 155
Release: 2019
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 1642830356

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"A plea for a renewed commitment to authentic urbanism and an invitation to learn from history as our cities enter a future of unprecedented change." Alex Steffen, author of "Carbon Zero: Imagining Cities that Can Save the Planet" "One of Chuck Wolfe's great gifts is an extraordinary photographer's eye for capturing visual images of everyday, but evocative, city life. Another is an uncommonly strong intellectual grounding in urban planning theory. In Urbanism Without Effort, he combines the two in unique fashion to show us how unplanned places can often teach us more about great placemaking than planned ones." Kaid Benfield, senior counsel, environmental strategies at PlaceMakers, LLC, and former director for sustainable communities, NRDC "Chuck's work is what happens when art meets science in placemaking. His talent for capturing places being themselves is so important in the placemaker's toolkit, yet can be missed if we are not paying attention. Lucky for us, Chuck is always paying attention and this book is the proof." Dr. Katherine Loflin, The City Doctor "This is a must read for those who want to understand in words and pictures what stands behind great cities. We're proud to see a Seattle native son helping to show the way." Mike McGinn, Mayor of Seattle, founding Executive Director, Seattle Great City Initiative "Wolfe provides something rare in contemporary urbanist writing--rich illustrations and examples from real life--both historical and current. His writing about the past and the future of urban form offers readers inspiration, historical context, and a better understanding of how a sustainable, inviting urban environment is created." Eco-Libris "Nicely put. If you like thinking about the intersection of people and place, you may like this attractively priced book a great deal." NRDC's The Switchboard blog "Readers will come away motivated to find, experience and document their own favourite places and find ways to apply effortless urbanism in their o wn neighbourhood." Spacing " ... a book of inspiration and aspiration. It makes the reader yearn for places with soul." Better Cities & Towns " ... a great ground-level look at how neighborhoods and communities can foster flourishing life in the city." Can't Catch My Breath "The jargon-free text makes this book a good option for anyone, but the substance of the message could make for academic reading as well. I enjoyed reading this book for its vignettes of urban living from around the world." Global Site Plans.

Roman Urbanism

Roman Urbanism
Author: Helen Parkins
Publsiher: Routledge
Total Pages: 248
Release: 2005-08-18
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781134828135

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The contributors to this volume provide an accessible and jargon-free insight into the notion of the Roman city; what shaped it, and how it both structured and reflected Roman society. Roman Urbanism challenges the established economic model for the Roman city and instead offers original and diverse approaches for examining Roman urbanization, bringing the Roman city into the nineties. Roman Urbanism is a lively and informative volume, particularly valuable in an age dominated by urban development.

Politics of Urbanism

Politics of Urbanism
Author: Warren Magnusson
Publsiher: Routledge
Total Pages: 317
Release: 2013-07-03
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9781136671715

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To see like a city, rather than seeing like a state, is the key to understanding modern politics. In this book, Magnusson draws from theorists such as Weber, Wirth, Hayek, Jacobs, Sennett, and Foucault to articulate some of the ideas that we need to make sense of the city as a form of political order. Locally and globally, the city exists by virtue of complicated patterns of government and self-government, prompted by proximate diversity. A multiplicity of authorities in different registers is typical. Sovereignty, although often claimed, is infinitely deferred. What emerges by virtue of self-organization is not susceptible to control by any central authority, and so we are impelled to engage politically in a world that does not match our expectations of sovereignty. How then are we are to engage realistically and creatively? We have to begin from where we are if we are to understand the possibilities. Building on traditions of political and urban theory in order to advance a new interpretation of the role of cities/urbanism in contemporary political life, this work will be of great interest to scholars of political theory and urban theory, international relations theory and international relations.

Now Urbanism

Now Urbanism
Author: Jeffrey Hou,Benjamin Spencer,Thaisa Way,Ken Yocom
Publsiher: Routledge
Total Pages: 314
Release: 2014-10-10
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 9781317619918

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After more than a century of heroic urban visions, urban dwellers today live in suburban subdivisions, gated communities, edge cities, apartment towers, and slums. The contemporary cities we know are more often the embodiment of unexpected outcomes and unintended consequences rather than visionary planning. As an alternative approach for rethinking and remaking today’s cities and regions, this book explores the intersections of critical inquiry and immediate, substantive actions. The contributions inside recognize the rich complexities of the present city not as barriers or obstacles but as grounds for uncovering opportunity and unleashing potential. Now Urbanism asserts that the future city is already here. It views city making as grounded in the imperfect, messy, yet rich reality of the existing city and the everyday purposeful agency of its dwellers. Through a framework of situating, grounding, performing, distributing, instigating, and enduring, these contributions written by a multidisciplinary group of practitioners and scholars illustrate specificity, context, agency, and networks of actors and actions in the re-making of the contemporary city.

Splintering Urbanism

Splintering Urbanism
Author: Steve Graham,Simon Marvin
Publsiher: Routledge
Total Pages: 512
Release: 2002-09-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781134656981

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Splintering Urbanism makes an international and interdisciplinary analysis of the complex interactions between infrastructure networks and urban spaces. It delivers a new and powerful way of understanding contemporary urban change, bringing together discussions about: *globalization and the city *technology and society *urban space and urban networks *infrastructure and the built environment *developed, developing and post-communist worlds. With a range of case studies, illustrations and boxed examples, from New York to Jakarta, Johannesberg to Manila and Sao Paolo to Melbourne, Splintering Urbanism demonstrates the latest social, urban and technological theories, which give us an understanding of our contemporary metropolis.