Transparent Urban Development

This book studies both the tangible benefits and substantial barriers to sustainable development in the city of Phoenix, Arizona. Utilizing mixed research methods to probe downtown Phoenix’s political economy of development, this study illustrates how non-local property ownership and land speculation negatively impacted a concerted public-private effort to encourage infill construction on vacant land. The book elaborates urban sustainability not only as a set of ecological and design prescriptions, but as a field needing increased engagement with the growth-based impetus, structural economic forces, and political details behind American urban land policy. Demonstrating how land use policies evolved in relation to Phoenix’s historical dependence on outside investment, and are now interwoven across jurisdictional scales, the book concludes by identifying policy intervention points to increase the sustainability of Phoenix’s development trajectory.

This edited collection examines the multi-faceted phenomenon of transparency, especially in its relation to social movements, from a range of multi-disciplinary viewpoints. Over the past few decades, transparency has become an omnipresent catch phrase in public and scientific debates. The volume tracks developments of ideas and practices of transparency from the eighteenth century to the current day, as well as their semantic, cultural and social preconditions. It connects analyses of the ideological implications of transparency concepts and transparency claims with their impact on the public sphere in general and on social movements in particular. In doing so, the book contributes to a better understanding of social conflicts and power relations in modern societies. The chapters are organized into four parts, covering the concept and ideology of transparency, historical and recent developments of the public sphere and media, the role of the state as an agent of surveillance, and conflicts over transparency and participation connected to social movements.

This book examines three vital issues in urbanization and democratization: the institutional structures and processes of urban local governance to improve access to urban services; their outcomes in relation to low-income groups’ access to services, citizen participation in local governance, accountability of local leaders and officials, and transparency in local governance; and the factors that influence access to urban services, especially for the poor and marginalized groups. Further, it describes decentralization policies, views of the residents of slums on the effectiveness of government programs, and innovations in inclusive local governance and access to urban services.

This compilation of work by Architect Gordon Gilbert explores the idea of transparency in architecture, ranging from an open physical transparency, to clarity of structure, to the dematerialization of the physical object, and further to evolving and expanding states of architectural awareness. This exploration is facilitated through a revealing juxtaposition of experimental drawing, subliminal texts, and constructed work.With essays by Michael Sorkin, Zvi Hecker, Lebbeus Woods, and Christian W. Thomsen.

Traditionally, the public sector has been responsible for the provision of all public goods necessary to support sustainable urban development, including public infrastructure such as roads, parks, social facilities, climate mitigation and adaptation, and affordable housing. With the shift in recent years towards public infrastructure being financed by private stakeholders, the demand for transparent guidance to ensure accountability for the responsibilities held by developers has risen. Within planning practice and urban development, the shift towards private financing of public infrastructure has translated into new tools being implemented to provide joint responsibility for upholding requirements. Developer obligations are contributions made by property developers and landowners towards public infrastructure in exchange for decisions on land-use regulations which increase the economic value of their land. This book presents insight into the design and practical results of these obligations in different countries and their effects on municipal financial health, demonstrating the increasing importance of efficient bargaining processes and the institutional design of developer obligations in modern urban planning. Primarily written for academics in land-use planning, real estate, urban development, law, and economics, it will additionally be useful to policy makers and practitioners pursuing the improvement of public infrastructure financing.

This book analyzes the mechanism of transnational private regulations (TPRs) in the global property investment market and the conditions of their effectiveness for sustainable urban development. In the present economy, with control over national legislation alone, state policymakers have been challenged to regulate transnational investors, markets, and issues such as global warming, financial crises, food safety risks, deforestation, and cross-border business transactions. Transgovernmental networks of regulators have assembled representatives and technical experts from national regulatory agencies, nongovernmental organizations, private firms, and business organizations. As private corporations become increasingly globalized, many forms of TPRs have emerged since the 1990s for legislation, standard-setting, monitoring of compliance, and implementation of transnational rules, to respond to challenges posed by the transformation of domestic and international regulatory environments. TPRs are self-regulated, non-state, market-driven regulations. Since the emergence of TPRs, the global rule-making landscape has become dynamic. Urban development and property investment have been viewed historically as local phenomena: The regulations and standards in this field have been established and enforced by governments, local associations, and national professional bodies. However, as urban development and property investment increasingly have been globalized, the services, transactions, and investments by private firms have transcended national boundaries. For this reason, it has become difficult for states to regulate global activities through existing national legislation or international regulatory systems. As the management of new transnational issues through collaborations between various actors is unpredictable, it is necessary to examine the mechanism of TPRs in global property investment and their effectiveness for sustainable urban development.

"This book covers theoretical, thematic, and country-specific issues of knowledge cities to underline the growing importance of KBUD all around the world, providing substantive research on the decisive lineaments of urban development for knowledge-based production (drawing attention to new planning processes to foster such development), and worldwide best practices and case studies in the field of urban development"--Provided by publisher.