Sustainable Communities Design Handbook

Sustainable Communities Design Handbook
Author: Woodrow W. Clark II
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 441
Release: 2010-07-03
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0080963366

The objective of Sustainable Communities Design Handbook is to ensure a better quality of life for everyone, both now and for generations to come. This means creating a better and safer environment internationally through the sustainable use of natural resources, encouraging sustainable development which supports a strong economy, and ensuring a high quality environment that can be enjoyed by all. Sustainable Development Partnerships brings together in one reference today's most cutting edge technologies and methods for creating sustainable communities. With this book, Environmental Engineers, Civil Engineers, Architects, Mechanical Engineers, and Energy Engineers find a common approach to building environmental friendly communities which are energy efficient. The five part treatment starts with a clear and rigorous exposition of sustainable development in practice, followed by self-contained chapters concerning applications. Methods for the sustainable use of natural resources in built communities Clearly explains the most cutting edge sustainable technologies Provides a common approach to building sustainable communities Coverage of sustainable practices from architecture to construction

Roadmap for Global Sustainability — Rise of the Green Communities

Roadmap for Global Sustainability — Rise of the Green Communities
Author: Salah El-Haggar
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 203
Release: 2019-05-08
Genre: Science
ISBN: 3030145840

Progressive increases in consumer demands along with aggressive industrial consumption led the world to proximate resource depletion, weather changes, soil and air degradation and water quality deterioration. We now know that the paradigm of production at the expense of human condition is not sustainable. This book briefly explains how we reached this situation and offers suggestions as to what can be done to overcome it. It invites the best entrepreneurial talent and scientific and technological know-how to develop a sustainable economy around sustainable communities, services, and sectors. A major obstacle previously identified by involved parties was the ability of accommodating for the emerging economic growth without causing harm to the environment, especially with resource depletion. This book provides the solution by creating a need to bring on a new revolution that preserves the rights of next generations to live in a healthy environment This Sustainability Revolution requires the integration of economic, environmental, and social factor as well as the practical aspects of implementing sustainability through green activities, which are discussed throughout the book. In this book, a globalization is proposed that encourages creativity and innovation towards sustainability. With this global sustainability approach (real globalization) both rich and poor will benefit from the global sustainability approach. This will close the gap between rich and poor. Developing countries could reap the benefit of current technology without undergoing many of the growing pains associated with development of these technologies. Governments are able to better work together towards common goals now that there is an advantage in cooperation, an improved ability to interact and coordinate, and a global awareness of issues. The book presents a sustainability roadmap to bring together various concepts, that have been dealt with independently by previous authors, and link them to establish the fundamental practical steps. The flow path and the direction for successful implementation of a sustainability roadmap are also discussed in detail in the book. For the first time, the authors use sustainable communities to create a better quality of life for residents while minimizing the use of the resources to meet current needs and ensure adequate resources for future generations. These green communities create new industries for the local economy and improve public health, which offers more hope for their citizens. Sustainable transportation, renewable energy, recycling, clean water, and urban forests help to make a more livable community and help to control the global climate change. They involve all citizens and incorporate local values into decision-making.

Pathways to Urban Sustainability

Pathways to Urban Sustainability
Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 193
Release: 2016-11-11
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 0309444535

Cities have experienced an unprecedented rate of growth in the last decade. More than half the world's population lives in urban areas, with the U.S. percentage at 80 percent. Cities have captured more than 80 percent of the globe's economic activity and offered social mobility and economic prosperity to millions by clustering creative, innovative, and educated individuals and organizations. Clustering populations, however, can compound both positive and negative conditions, with many modern urban areas experiencing growing inequality, debility, and environmental degradation. The spread and continued growth of urban areas presents a number of concerns for a sustainable future, particularly if cities cannot adequately address the rise of poverty, hunger, resource consumption, and biodiversity loss in their borders. Intended as a comparative illustration of the types of urban sustainability pathways and subsequent lessons learned existing in urban areas, this study examines specific examples that cut across geographies and scales and that feature a range of urban sustainability challenges and opportunities for collaborative learning across metropolitan regions. It focuses on nine cities across the United States and Canada (Los Angeles, CA, New York City, NY, Philadelphia, PA, Pittsburgh, PA, Grand Rapids, MI, Flint, MI, Cedar Rapids, IA, Chattanooga, TN, and Vancouver, Canada), chosen to represent a variety of metropolitan regions, with consideration given to city size, proximity to coastal and other waterways, susceptibility to hazards, primary industry, and several other factors.

Urban Recycling and the Search for Sustainable Community Development

Urban Recycling and the Search for Sustainable Community Development
Author: Adam S. Weinberg
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2000-07-24
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1400823897

More Americans recycle than vote. And most do so to improve their communities and the environment. But do recycling programs advance social, economic, and environmental goals? To answer this, three sociologists with expertise in urban and environmental planning have conducted the first major study of urban recycling. They compare four types of programs in the Chicago metropolitan area: a community-based drop-off center, a municipal curbside program, a recycling industrial park, and a linkage program. Their conclusion, admirably elaborated, is that recycling can realize sustainable community development, but that current programs achieve few benefits for the communities in which they are located. The authors discover that the history of recycling mirrors many other urban reforms. What began in the 1960s as a sustainable community enterprise has become a commodity-based, profit-driven industry. Large private firms, using public dollars, have chased out smaller nonprofit and family-owned efforts. Perhaps most troubling is that this process was not born of economic necessity. Rather, as the authors show, socially oriented programs are actually more viable than profit-focused systems. This finding raises unsettling questions about the prospects for any sort of sustainable local development in the globalizing economy. Based on a decade of research, this is the first book to fully explore the range of impacts that recycling generates in our communities. It presents recycling as a tantalizing case study of the promises and pitfalls of community development. It also serves as a rich account of how the state and private interests linked to the global economy alter the terrain of local neighborhoods.

Urban Development and Civil Society

Urban Development and Civil Society
Author: Michael Carley
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 247
Release: 2013-11-05
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1134200501

The world's population is rapidly urbanizing but the affluence and development often associated with cities are far from equitably or sustainably distributed. Where it was once taken for granted that responsibility for urban development lay with the state, increasingly the emphasis has shifted to market-driven and public-private sector initiatives, which can marginalize the intended beneficiaries - the urban poor - from decision making and implementation. This text outlines the essential conditions for effective urban planning and management by placing bottom-up community initiatives at the heart of the push for equitable and sustainable development in cities. Crucially, the state must engage with both the market and civil society in pursuit of sustainable cities. Presenting a wide-ranging selection of case studies in rapidly urbanizing and transitional countries, from the poorest parts of Africa and Asia to the relatively developed United Kingdom, the authors describe and analyze innovations in how globally disadvantaged urban communities can be engaged in improving their living environments.

Planning, Development and Management of Sustainable Cities

Planning, Development and Management of Sustainable Cities
Author: Tan Yigitcanlar
Publisher: MDPI
Total Pages: 440
Release: 2019-04-30
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 3038979066

The concept of ‘sustainable urban development’ has been pushed to the forefront of policymaking and politics as the world wakes up to the impacts of climate change and the destructive effects of the Anthropocene. Climate change has emerged to be one of the biggest challenges faced by our planet today, threatening both built and natural systems with long-term consequences, which may be irreversible. While there is a vast body of literature on sustainability and sustainable urban development, there is currently limited focus on how to cohesively bring together the vital issues of the planning, development, and management of sustainable cities. Moreover, it has been widely stated that current practices and lifestyles cannot continue if we are to leave a healthy living planet to not only the next generation, but also to the generations beyond. The current global school strikes for climate action (known as Fridays for Future) evidences this. The book advocates the view that the focus needs to rest on ways in which our cities and industries can become green enough to avoid urban ecocide. This book fills a gap in the literature by bringing together issues related to the planning, development, and management of cities and focusing on a triple-bottom-line approach to sustainability.

Sustainable Urban Development and Globalization

Sustainable Urban Development and Globalization
Author: Agostino Petrillo
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 489
Release: 2017-11-24
Genre: Science
ISBN: 3319619888

This book equips readers with a deeper understanding of the challenges posed by radical socioeconomic, environmental, and cultural changes due to globalization and describes effective, sustainable solutions to these challenges. The focus is especially on the rapid urbanization processes in countries of the Global South, which are giving rise to dramatic new problems of spatial and social inequality and difficult environmental challenges in relation to climate change. Readers will gain skills and knowledge that will help them to develop an integrated, multidisciplinary approach to planning, design, and management of urban settlements and territories in contexts with a high level of social, economic, territorial, and landscape vulnerability. The coverage includes, for example, strategies to promote social inclusion, improve housing quality, ensure adequate education, protect cultural heritage, enhance risk management, and address issues in the food-energy-water nexus. Among the authors are leading experts from the Polytechnic University of Milan, where a multidisciplinary set of studies and research projects in the field have been undertaken in recent years.

Alternative Urban Futures

Alternative Urban Futures
Author: Raquel Pinderhughes
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 292
Release: 2004
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780742523678

Alternative Urban Futures challenges existing models of urban development and promotes alternative paradigms, processes, and technologies designed to fulfill human needs and limit the harmful impacts of human activities on the environment. The book focuses on how planners and policy makers can develop and manage essential urban infrastructures in ways that support sustainable development in the areas of waste management, water supply and management, energy production and use, building design and construction, land-use, transportation, and food systems. Each chapter features case studies that provide concrete examples of how ecologically and socially responsible urban and sustainable development planning and policy approaches have been successfully implemented in cities around the world. The book is especially effective in its emphasis on recently published statistics and writing supporting new planning and policy recommendations. Each chapter ends with a summary, accompanied by a list of questions that can be addressed with information provided in the text.

Seven Rules for Sustainable Communities

Seven Rules for Sustainable Communities
Author: Patrick M. Condon
Publisher: Island Press
Total Pages: 215
Release: 2012-02-13
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 1597268208

Questions of how the design of cities can respond to the challenge of climate change dominate the thoughts of urban planners and designers across the U.S. and Canada. With admirable clarity, Patrick Condon responds to these questions. He addresses transportation, housing equity, job distribution, economic development, and ecological systems issues and synthesizes his knowledge and research into a simple-to-understand set of urban design recommendations. No other book so clearly connects the form of our cities to their ecological, economic, and social consequences. No other book takes on this breadth of complex and contentious issues and distills them down to such convincing and practical solutions.