Land and Natural Development (LAND) Code: Guidelines for Sustainable Land Development (Wiley Series in Sustainable Design)

Book Description

Sustainable land development strategies based on scientific information

Land and Natural Development (LAND) Code offers a pioneering method to develop sites in harmony with natural processes that is solidly based on peer-reviewed scientific findings. While the LAND Code can be readily used in conjunction with LEED, EPA, and other guidelines, it features several unique characteristics, including:

Recommendations based on peer-reviewed scientific research
Rating scheme that weights each development and land use practice based on its environmental benefit and difficulty of implementation
Straightforward, step-by-step system that is accessible to non-experts
Focus on land rather than buildings
Extensive use of photographs and diagrams to illustrate practices and procedures

After an introduction, the book begins with chapters covering water, soil, air, living resources, energy, and materials. Throughout these chapters, the authors recommend tested and proven strategies that minimize disruption of the natural processes. Each chapter provides background, describes benefits for both developers and ecosystems, and recommends protective strategies in simple, non-technical language (a glossary is provided explaining all terms not in common usage). A toolbox of environmental engineering methods to implement the strategies follows, and the final chapter of the book provides a series of examples of actual development projects in which a variety of approaches have successfully attained sustainable development. With its emphasis on scientific understanding, the LAND Code offers you the information needed to make and implement decisions for ecologically sound land development.

Customer Reviews:

every developer should be given a copy of this book.......2007-08-04

Balmori and Benoit are visionaries on the all-important issue of land development. Their commonsensical approach should guide the behavior of all land policy people--real estate agents, bankers, regional and local zoning commissions AND developers. Doing the "green" thing is cheaper and better, always.

The Living Landscape: An Ecological Approach to Landscape Planning

Average customer rating:

The Living Landscape
A Unique and Useful Contribution
From a landscape for living to a living landscape
Ecological plannnig has a future with this effort .
Book fails to make the connection

The Living Landscape: An Ecological Approach to Landscape Planning
Frederick Steiner
Manufacturer: McGraw-Hill Professional
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0070793980

Book Description

Award-winning guide to ecologically-sound landscapes!
The first edition of Frederick Steiner's The Living Landscape: An Ecological Approach to Landscape Planning, won a coveted ASLA merit award. This revised Second Edition's strong design-oriented approach meets the needs of today's professionals, focusing on how to create a plan and explains each major step with examples from various localities. The new edition links each step to current planning practice and to new theory in landscape ecology and sustainable development.You'll find:

More than 20 case studies covering urban, suburban, rural, domestic and international environments
Scores of checklists and step-by-step procedures
Details for conducting environmental impact assessments
Full coverage of zoning, land use, and other regulatory issues
Much more

Customer Reviews:

The Living Landscape.......2002-10-14

The Living Landscape has made a lasting contribution to ecological planning through its detailed documentation of this planning process and thoughtful comparison of the process's application in case studies. Dr. Steiner demonstrates in his book that ecological planning is just not a static plan-making process, but rather a dynamic process that requires consistent and meaningful input from stakeholders. In addition, he sees plan-making as a process that has implications for different scales of the environment, from the nation to the neighborhood. He stresses that the ecological planning process does not end when the plan is finished, but rather the process continues through the linkage of planning concepts to physical design. Given the strengths of this book, it is an essential volume for the library of any professional or student in the disciplines of the built environment and environmental management.

A Unique and Useful Contribution.......2002-05-06

It is a rare planning book that outlines a detailed process for guiding landscape change in a deliberate and ecologically sound manner. The Living Landscape accomplishes this in a robust, clear and convincing way. The second edition improves on the first by including more landscape design information, updating case studies, and deepening the planning method (for instance, by including more on the use of Geographic Information Systems). The liberal use of cases is a strong asset of the book; each step in the ecological planning process is illustrated and explained by way of 'stories' from real places around North America. The Living Landscape is useful reading for students and practitioners in landscape architecture, architecture, environmental planning and natural resource management.

From a landscape for living to a living landscape.......2002-05-05

The second edition of The Living Landscape has came out nine years after the first. The first, in fact, was published in 1991, it received an ASLA Merit Award for Communications in 1993, and then it was translated into Italian in 1994, where it was very well received among scholars and students of planning as well as in the schools of architecture throughout the country.
The very first difference between the two editions is the publishing series. The first did not form part of a series while the second is now in the McGraw-Hill "Professional Architecture" series. The Professional Architecture series is devoted to giving helpful tools to practitioners who are on the field and The Living Landscape provides a very wide set of how-to and why-to-do-it instructions, where-to-keep information, and best practices examples to learn from, organized around an eleven-step Ecological Planning Model. I consider The Living Landscape a refined, high-level professional handbook devoted to enhance the toolbox of any present or future planning practitioners.
The Living Landscape II edition, as was the first, is built around a scheme of eleven steps called "Ecological Planning Method" briefly presented in the first chapter and used as a step-by-step pattern to guide readers into the organization of a planning process. The "Ecological Planning Method" is a framework for presenting information to decision-makers, and to display "a common language, a common method among all those concerned about social equity and ecological parity" (p. 9). The approach to planning presented by Steiner is innovative for two reasons. The first is the incorporation of ecology in planning - briefly "the use of biophysical and sociocultural information to suggest opportunities and constraints for decision making about the use of the landscape" (pp. 9-10). The second reason is the author's stress on the citizen's involvement in almost every step of his method. These two issues, even if they are the prime themes of the book, are prudently embedded into the body of the full text. Ecology and citizen involvement are the leitmotif of the entire book which is composed of a precise combination of techniques and tools presentation, useful references to literature, light - but effective - revocations of the theoretical frameworks on the issues, and application examples deriving from real plans or projects.
The eleven-step Ecological Planning Model goes from the identification of problems and opportunities (step 1) and the establishment of goals (2) to inventories and analysis at regional (3) and local level (4). It proceeds with the realization of detailed studies (5) and the definition of planning concepts (6). The landscape plan (7) follows and it is directly assessed and criticized by citizens (8), who are involved and educated along the whole process-phasing. Design exploration (9) comes next and the study of the implementation of the plan and projects (10) precedes the administration (11) that is the last step of the model. The Ecological Planning Model is linear in its descriptions (the book chapters - excluding the introduction and the conclusion - are devoted to deepen every single step, with some minor exceptions), but the steps are strongly interactive. In the graphic scheme of the model (p. 11), solid and dashed arrows between the steps emphasize the necessity and the opportunity of feedback and retroactions in order to monitor the previous results.
Citizen involvement is the center of the model. Almost every step is addressed to inhabitants and a systematic educational and citizen involvement effort occurs throughout the process. The model, between the last step - administration - and the first - problem and/or opportunity identification -, presents a dashed arrow in order to accent that problems and opportunities facing the region and the goals addressed that may be altered by time, occurrences and circumstances.
Compared to the first edition, the structure of the Ecological Planning Model and of the book contents remains unchanged in the second, but the book has some 120 more pages. Graphic design of tables and figures has been enhanced - a four-color page section was added to present the GIS maps of the Desert View Tri-Villages Area (Arizona) and of the Camp Pendleton study area (California), two of the many new examples used along the entire book. New photographs, mostly authored by Steiner, follow the entire text. Sources and references have been updated including recent books and articles on the matters. New examples, as said before, have been included in this edition to present more recent application of techniques and tools explained and illustrated along the text. The final glossary, one of the many useful tools of the book, has been enlarged with 46 new entries bringing the total to 350.

Ecological plannnig has a future with this effort ........2002-04-14

I am a graduate student in landscape ecological planning. I would recommend Dr. Steiner's book for students, professionals and the lay leaders interested in making a difference in their community. The idea of planning is sometimes hard to grasp by communities that are ruled by economics and development,not ecology. Dr. Steiner shows us step by step how to include ecology into communities and how that may give us other alternatives that we may not have considered.

The use of case studies in this book enhances the practical application of ecological planning in real world situations.

I would recommend this book for anyone interested in ecology, planning or being part of your community's future.

Book fails to make the connection.......2002-01-23

I picked up a copy of "the living landscape" at the local library thinking I was on to something interesting. Instead, I found the book to be a rehash of old, simple ideas under the cloak of a "sexy", progressive title. I am a practicing environmental planner and must admit that I was even fooled by the picture on the cover--How in the world is a linear mono-cultural hedgerow of trees that line an walkway even remotely a just symbol of "ecological planning"? The picture seems to satisfy the landscape architect's need to have order-- Ecology is anything but linear or orderly.

Book Description

An overview of environmental topics as applied to problems of development, land use, and various environmental problems of the landscape. This book addresses several key topics of concern—flooding wetlands, species conservation, groundwater—in both public and private sectors and provides easy access to the concepts, problems, and analytic techniques of the field.

Customer Reviews:

Wetlands overview.......2007-03-29

Clearly explained wetland designations and issues. Good in preparation for the LARE exams part B.

Where Physical Geography & Env. Planning share common ground.......2004-12-17

This may be one of the best introductions to environmental planning for geography students interested in the application of physical geographic techniques. When inquiring minds ask how a Geography major like myself ended up doing septic plan review as a county Environmental Health Specialist I simply point to Marsh's chapter on waste disposal and describe the necessary physical parameters familiar to physical geographers (soil types and percolation rates, groundwater levels, slopes and topography, surface water, geohazards, mapping, etc). There is something for everybody in this book and you don't have to be a geography major to benefit. A very practical text.

Environmental Planning.......2003-11-26

I am a student in environmental planning and have found this book to be extremely useful. It address a variey of things such as watershed, storm discharge, streamflow, etc. It really gives the reader an idea of how to design with nature.

Great book.......1999-12-26

This book was a great tool for the beginning landscape architect. Many great tools for land planning including equations and tables and charts to determine various things like water runoff, erosion, sun exposure, and much more.

Cities in the Wilderness: A New Vision of Land Use in America

Average customer rating:

babbitt always knows best
Rational Thoughts on a Typically Irrational Topic
A good prescription for a "realistic" 21st century environmentalism
Book Review
Excellent Read About Land Use

Cities in the Wilderness: A New Vision of Land Use in America
Bruce Babbitt
Manufacturer: Island Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1559630930

Book Description

In this brilliant, gracefully written, and important new book, former Secretary of the Interior and Governor of Arizona Bruce Babbitt brings fresh thought to questions of how we can build a future we want to live in.

We've all experienced America's changing natural landscape as the integrity of our forests, seacoasts, and river valleys succumbs to strip malls, new roads, and subdivisions. Too often, we assume that when land is developed it is forever lost to the natural world--or hope that a patchwork of local conservation strategies can somehow hold up against further large-scale development.

In Cities in the Wilderness, Bruce Babbitt makes the case for why we need a national vision of land use. We may have a space program, he points out, but here at home we don't have an open-space policy that can balance the needs for human settlement and community with those for preservation of the natural world upon which life depends. Yet such a balance, the author demonstrates, is as remarkably achievable as it is necessary. This is no call for developing a new federal bureaucracy; Babbitt shows instead how much can be--and has been--done by making thoughtful and beneficial use of laws and institutions already in place.

Babbitt draws on his extensive experience to take us behind the scenes negotiating the Florida Everglades restoration project, the largest ever authorized by Congress. In California, we discover how the Endangered Species Act has been employed to restore regional habitat. In the Midwest, we see how new World Trade Organization regulations might be used to help restore Iowa's farmlands and rivers. As a key architect of many environmental success stories, Babbitt reveals how broad restoration projects have thrived through federal- state partnerships and how their principles can be extended to other parts of the country.

In this inspiring and informative book, Babbitt offers a vision of land use as grand as the country's natural heritage.

Customer Reviews:

babbitt always knows best.......2007-01-10

Bruce Babbitt continues to labor under the self deception that he know best in determining the future of the "common people" his ideas always consume like serfs found to be useless in the feifdom. Read it for the future it suggests of an end to private property and a beginning of the sort of Stalinism and federal tyranny that Babbitt favors. Don't think it was written by any true westerner who "grew up on a ranch." It was written by a political lackey and opportunist who was kicked off his grandfather's spread in Arizona and has always yearned for power--especially power over what he calls the "agricultural apparatchiks."

Rational Thoughts on a Typically Irrational Topic.......2006-06-23

Babbitt begins by telling us that relentless building of highways have spearheaded landscape destruction as land speculators and developers follow. Local governments generally have neither the political will, expertise, nor financial resources to stand up to well-financed developers and their political contributions. Babbitt then goes on to make the case for federal leadership in making land use regulation more effective, and uses examples from his experience involving the Everglades, Southern California, and the Chesapeake Bay to make the point.

The shrinking Everglades problem was caused by farms, canals, dikes, housing developments; its solution began during the early '90s, and moved forward despite Congress' tilting towards reduced spending. The first step occurred when then Interior Secretary Babbitt met with the Army Corps of Engineers, and reached agreement with them to develop a study and proposal on changing the drainage system. There was also a problem with excess fertilizer draining from sugar plantations into the Everglades - causing cattails to displace natural saw grass. They agreed to cut their fertilizer applications in half (were using too much - at the chemical companies behest), and to plant cattails at the draining end of their fields to soak up the rest of the excess. (Babbitt points out that the "ideal" solution would have been to simply end expensive sugar subsidies, allow foreign sugar into the U.S. at much lower price, and allow the sugar plantations to revert to the Everglades.) Another requirement was buying out landowners "suckered" into buying swampland that were clamoring for more levees so they could use their land. The happy outcome was a proposal backed by all sides that was enacted by Congress in 2000. (Side Note: Everglade bog land used for sugar growing has a limited life anyway - it had already dried out, was blowing away, and sunk 12 feet, and had not much further to sink before reaching limestone.)

Babbitt learned in other efforts that it was much simpler to work on a project limited to a single state, and the importance of using sound science in administering the Endangered Species Act.

Babbitt points out that the federal government has always been involved in land-use planning - improving river navigability, surveying, staking out, and subsidizing transcontinental railroad routes, flood control projects, dams, interstate highways. While these efforts were all aimed at land development, he believes that it now time to also boost land conservation as well.

A good prescription for a "realistic" 21st century environmentalism.......2006-04-11

I use "realistic" in scare quotes as an alternative to "idealistic" environmentalism without commenting on the moral value or desirability of either approach.

Babbitt, Clinton's sole Secretary of the Interior, and governor of Arizona before that, is a career politician with a non-extractive industries Westerner's love of nature of his native land.

Those two come together in his thoughts for how the Endangered Species Act and the 1906 Antiquities Act, used in new ways, can be two of the cornerstones of a 21st century environmentalism, primarily in the West, but indeed nationally.

The other cornerstones are state lead-taking in land-use planning, in conjunction with federal support, and a new day in federal-state environmental cooperation in general.

More obvious observations about the anti-environmentalism of people like President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Congressman Richard Pombo aside, Babbitt offers a moderate amount, but not a great deal, of prescriptive specifics on how to do this.

His own success as Interior Secretary was constrained by the change of administrations.

Babbitt pushed Clinton into "new-style" national monuments remaining outside National Park Service control, such as Grand Staircase-Escalante NM in Utah and Giant Sequoia NM in California (not to be confused with Sequoia NP). The idea was that the landholding federal agency of record (the Bureau of Land Management in Utah and the National Forest Service in California) would develop a better conservationist ethic through being committed to national monument management of a monument that retained multi-use characteristics.

While this might be true to some degree of the BLM, it certainly isn't of the Forest Service, and likely won't be unless that agency sees a MAJOR shake-up. (My prescription: Move the Forest Service out of Agriculture and into Interior.)

That, and the book's relative slimness, keep it from a better rating, as it barely hits 4 stars.

Book Review.......2006-03-24

Cities in the Wilderness
By Bruce Babbitt

Book Review
By Dan Warren

In today's republican political arena with the Bush administrations compelling interest in land expansion the outlook for Environmental causes let along protection would appear to have a dark and gloomy cloud atop any progress. However, Bruce Babbitt the author of Cities in the Wilderness has some new innovative ideas about land use in America. As the U.S. Secretary of the Interior from 1993 to 2001, governor of Arizona from 1978 to 1987 and as Arizona's Attorney General for three years he brings with him experience and a most impressive track record of success in an effort that is largely opposed and unsuccessful; Environmental land preservation efforts and even restoration.
Within the pages of his book Babbitt gives illustrations of success and of failure. He provides detailed rational in each instance drawing on history, public opinion, media, legal requirements, county state and federal involvements, as well as a plethora of other mitigation factors that explain the success or failure. From these Babbitt pieces together an extraordinary working illustration of how we can be better stewards of our land in America.
Furthermore, whether directly or indirectly Babbitt addresses the political climate and gives examples of how to over come the counter movements that oppose his unique vision of land use. Within the confines of his five short easy to read straight forward chapters Babbitt is clear, concise, and well structured in order to piece his ideology together followed by appropriate explanation. His thesis is essentially a parallel, contrary to much of his opposition's belief, as will be detailed later in this review, that our country has historically viewed land development not as a local, county, or even State matter, but as a Federal matter. As such Babbitt will contend that we need to continue to have a Federal interest in land use and development while making a joining effort with more localities but still governed by Federal legislation and direction.
As a native Floridian the everglades are a state treasure. Anyone who has ever driven route one through this magnificent area will feel immersed in nature. For anyone who has not experienced this, all you have to do is watch CBS's hit show CSI: Miami and in most of the episodes as well as in the shows introduction can get a glimpse of what the everglades are from viewing it across their television sets. However, this schema that will be created by this in no way gives justice to the real thing. While either which way will introduce you to the Florida Everglades, it will not reveal its unique history.
In Babbitt's first chapter he uses his experience with the preservation of the Everglades as an introduction to his idea. The devastation caused by hurricane Andrew in the early 1990's also included the destruction of Homestead Air force base in Florida. In the aftermath the government came to the decision to not to rebuild this base, but rather to sell the property commercially for redevelopment. The proposed plan was initially to make the property into a jet port thus generating jobs and commerce. While at first glance this idea makes serves to help the many who became jobless with the closure of the Air force base, it was highly controversial because the proposed site was only miles from the entrance to the everglades.
The balancing of these two conflicting interests: land preservation and development for the sake of commerce is the first conflict that Babbitt faces. It is within these conflicts that are the heart of his book and subsequently in looking at each of these that the most benefit for policy and future decision can be justified on. In this particular issue Babbitt allied with the Army Core of Engineers, a most unexpected partnership. The Army Core who wants to build and Babbitt whose interests are to protect creates a uniquely original idea; the two can actually achieve preservation by essentially constructing preservation.
As pointed out by Babbitt, in earlier years it was the Army Core of Engineers who by direct engineering was in-directly causing devastating affects to the Everglades. As such the remedy was to undo that which was previously done by the efforts of the Army Core of Engineers. While this sounds simple in concept it was very costly and took great effort before it would be later approved for its application. So what exactly would this "undoing" so to speak entail? It would set a new precedent, we would actually spend money not to development but essentially to UN-develop already developed land and for what cause, to preserve the Everglades. This is essentially a step in a new direction in favor of environmental preservation. However, this did not come easily or without coincidence. It was a project that took over eight years, had an eight billion dollar price tag, and according to Babbitt, "the everglades success was an aberration, a case of being in the right place when in came to make a down payment on a presidential election" .
So what is there to be learned from this experience and success in the Everglades? Babbitt goes on to say,
"is there an urgent lesson to be derived from the Florida Everglades, it is that we must invent new federal-state partnerships for managing and restoring our lands, partnerships that have sufficient charisma and public support to withstand destructive efforts by later administrations. Which leads us back to the central question posed: could the Everglades effort mark the beginning of a national commitment to large-scale restoration of degraded ecosystems" ?
The answer to Babbitt's question is two fold. In law when a case is decided the decision is called stare decisis which essentially equates to a precedent that other cases can be decided upon. In the same this narrowly tailored example does in its most simplistic form create a sort of precedent that may act as a catalyst or at least a reference to which other matters related to land conservation can be decided upon.
As Babbitt moves on in his book he provides another success story in California however this is contrasted with a failure Mississippi. In a later chapter Babbitt faces a new conflict of interests. The issue at essence here is a legal one, it involves the interpretation of what constitutes an endangered species and how exactly the Endangered Species Act is used in conjuncture with the rights of landowners. The discussion centers on an endangered bird. What is truly interesting in this example drawn from Babbitt's personal experience is that it utilized a scientific research study in order to investigate the natural habitat of the endangered species so as to have an information base to which decisions can be based off rather then guestimating. Again Babbitt's efforts were successful; however he cited that this is due to good press and public support.
The Endangered Species Act was the legal key to success according to the author. It provided the legal authority to act and to protect in this case. What seems difficult about this is the actually application of the act itself. From the text it does not appear that there is a guideline as to how to implement the acts authority and for the most part serves as a guideline that is to be implemented on the local level and the only Federal participation is to create the act itself but does not provide any governing agency to enforce the act. Rather it relies on its compliance at the local level who it seems in most instances are the ones opposing the act as it in most cases reduces expansion and thus tax revenues for that city, county, or even state.
An interesting remark made by the author is that when it comes to The Endangered Species Act, it is not proactive in protecting but rather reactive in that it does not take affect until after the damage is done. What is gained from this is the ideology that perhaps we need to be proactive with our environment, land use, and species conservation. As with youth we try to teach intervention programs that seek to solve the problem of juvenile delinquency before it starts, in the same we need to solve environmental concerns before they start. Again with this parallel prevention programs cost far less and have much less damage when successful with juveniles as this applies to our environment. We spent 8 billion to undo land development that we had already paid to have developed. Here if we add the research and science base before we make a decision we can avoid these types of environmental concerns before they even exist.
In subsequent chapters Babbitt applies the concepts thus far discussed to the Midwest in regional restoration. He does a great job of finding money in already current budgets to use towards restoration efforts. For instance he mentions a fifteen million dollar account used for a farm program account. Babbitt also explains that all that needs to occur for this to work is to make it into the farmer's best interests to embrace this program and with the requirements of the global economy they will be more then willing.
One molecule of oxygen and two of hydrogen create the world's universal solvent and the substance that sustains life on earth: water. The tragedy is that we are wasting it. Again returning to the argument that we need not leave matters to a localized government, but rather we must make them a federal concern, water with all of its importance needs be a chief central concern. As brought up by Buttell, one avenue in promoting environmentalism is a global view point. Babbitt does a good job emphasizing the importance of making water a Federal matter in the U.S. (as his book's title contains the phrase "Land use in America", I feel that on a matter as internationally important as water it only makes sense to start at the top being Federally regulated and then enforced on each level. Again how we Federally regulate it is just as important but I think we can take this a step further and Internationally regulate water as it is more important then any petroleum based resource, everyone globally needs it to survive and I think more emphasis should be given to this concern, not specifically to this text as again it seeks to speak out about U.S. policy, but rather in other avenues.
While Babbitt's text has a feel good syntax to it, his conclusion brings reality back into play. He finishes up by giving an impressive history and emphasizes the importance of our land. He goes so far as to call it an "American Treasure". Despite this he ends his text with
"Today, however, our public land institutions are under unprecedented attack from both the president and the Congress. This is a season for all Americans to take renewed interest in defending their heritage- the freedom and glory of wide open public spaces."
This call to action that he ends with is a powerful one. However, I am doubtful that with the low voting rates of my generation and the ignorance we as a country have towards our Environment I am weary of our future. Will we use the powerful tools that Babbitt has empowered us with; will we be proactive and preventative rather then responsive after the fact before we have done irreversible harm to our Continent? These questions are serious and meaningful and will affect later generations of Americans.

Excellent Read About Land Use.......2006-03-18

I enjoyed reading about bruce Babbit's interpretation of where land use should focus in the years to come. He also laid the groundwork for the development process for several urban areas and national parks. I found it to be a very worthwhile read and I would recommend it to othere.

Average customer rating:

Great overview
A no-nonsense guide to understanding what zoning is
Great Book
A Great Insiders Look at Zoning

The Complete Guide to Zoning
Dwight Merriam
Manufacturer: McGraw-Hill
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0071443797

Book Description

The only consumer's guide to making sense of land-use laws and regulations

Many property owners have no idea what their rights are when it comes to altering their properties, or protecting themselves from encroachment by developers and the misguided building and renovation plans of neighbors. Written by a leading national expert on land-use law, The Complete Guide to Zoning tells home owners, developers, and investors nationwide everything you need to know about getting approvals and protecting your property rights.

In plain English, Dwight Merriam explains how to:

Get fast approvals for building and renovation plans
Obtain building permits and variances
Fight development projects
Use land-use laws to protect and increase property values
Identify and work around laws that limit building and renovation plans
Deal with environmental-protection laws

Download Description

The only consumers guide to making sense of land-use laws and regulations

In plain English, Dwight Merriam explains how to:

Get fast approvals for building and renovation plans
Obtain building permits and variances
Fight development projects
Use land-use laws to protect and increase property values
Identify and work around laws that limit building and renovation plans
Deal with environmental-protection laws

Customer Reviews:

Great overview.......2007-01-12

This book is a great overview of zoning. It gives you the basics -- all of them, but it is definitely for people who know very little about zoning. If you are finding yourself in your first zoning battle, make this your first book. If you already have a general understanding of zoning and its processes, then you already know everything in this book.

Whether or not you will absolutely love this book or find it a waste of money is dependent entirely on your level of knowledge and what you are looking for. This is perfect for those who are just learning about zoning or those who need to brush up.

A no-nonsense guide to understanding what zoning is .......2005-02-03

The Complete Guide To Zoning: How Real Estate Owners and Developers Can Create and Preserve Property Value is a no-nonsense guide to understanding what zoning is and how to use it to protect one's property rights and interests. Zoning and Land-Use Law controls what can be done with land and how it can be developed; The Complete Guide To Zoning offers the lay reader a very short course in the law, the importance of knowing what one has, what one wants, and how to get it, the value of creating and leveraging relationships, when to reach out for support, preparing winning applications and making successful presentations, strategies for winning zoning battles, and much more. Chapters give equal focus to pursuing one's desire to develop land commercially, or the desire to see that adjoining lands to one's residential area are not developed commercially. Written in plain terms, The Complete Guide To Zoning is highly accessible regardless of the reader's legal background, and a "must-read" for property owners everywhere.

Great Book.......2005-01-27

As the Director of Planning and Development for a mid sized city in CT for the last 16 years, I highly reccomend this book. All planners and developers should read it.

A Great Insiders Look at Zoning.......2005-01-12

The Complete Guide to Zoning
By Dwight H. Merriam, FAICP, CRE
Review by Donald J. Poland, AICP

As planners, we tend to take the complexities of zoning and the land-use approval process for granted. Zoning is complicated system of government regulations that impact property rights and property values and more importantly the lives of any person who owns real estate. Dwight H. Merriam, in his new book, "The Complete Guide to Zoning" has successfully written a comprehensive account of zoning and the zoning game. Similar to Chris Matthews' book, Hardball, an insider's look at how the game of politics in played inside the Washington beltway, The Complete Guide to Zoning provides insiders look at how the zoning game is played. With over 25 year's experiences in planning and land use law, Dwight provides many lessons learned through his own experiences.

The Complete Guide to Zoning is formatted into six sections, "What is Zoning and Land-Use Law," "Getting Ready to Make Your Move," "Putting On Your Case," "Posthearing Follow-Up," "Winning Strategies," and "Protecting Your Property Rights." In a plain English and conversational voice, the book walks the reader through the basic law associated with zoning, the complex land-use approval process, and how to get what you want need out of zoning. From a variance for a backyard pool to developing a major expansion to a regional mall, The Complete Guide to Zoning shows the reader how zoning works and how to get the most out of your property and/or project.

While the book provides mostly a developer's perspective (the applicant seeking an approval), it also provides a unique insight and lessons to be learned by the neighbors or opposition groups who want to protect their properties and their rights. Most importantly, The Complete Guide to Zoning emphasizes the important of good communication between all parties, realizing that all or none approaches may not get either party what they want, and that all efforts should be made to avoid litigation.

Dwight's experience and perspective provides insight and understanding to the neophyte or layman, while reaffirming what the seasoned planner, engineer, or land-use attorney knows. We have all been involved in those applications that appear bigger than life and become more than just a job or an approval, but personal parts of ourselves. Be it as the developer who wants the 12-lot subdivision approval, the neighborhood who is fearful of increased traffic on their street, or the planner who has assisted the commission in drafting a new regulation, we all have been personally vested in the outcome of a zoning decision. Dwight reminds us that, "To be successful in resolving these disputes, you need to leave your ego at home. Whether you are the developer, the property owner, the leader of the neighborhood group, the lawyer, or the engineer, it is never about you. It is about land, the objective is developing or saving it, and zoning."

The Complete Guide to Zoning is a must read for anyone who owns real property or is involved in zoning. From the neighbor to the developer, the engineer to the architect, the commission member to the zoning official, the planning student to the veteran planner, this book should be on your desk, night table and available in the planning office and/or local library for applicants to read. The time spent reading "The Complete Guide to Zoning" will save any applicant from many frustrating hours of trying to figure out the land use approval process and weeks if not months of time in gaining a zoning approval. As we all know, saving time saves money and when it comes to development and zoning, time is money.

And last, I assure anyone who reads this book, when you are done reading it you will want to say, "Dwight, you magnificent bastard!" (An inside joke you'll get in reading the book.)

Growing Greener: Putting Conservation Into Local Plans And Ordinances

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Growing Greener: Putting Conservation Into Local Plans And Ordinances
Randall G. Arendt
Manufacturer: Island Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1559637420

Book Description

Growing Greener is an illustrated workbook that presents a new look at designing subdivisions while preserving green space and creating open space networks. Randall Arendt explains how to design residential developments that maximize land conservation without reducing overall building density, thus avoiding the political and legal problems often associated with "down-zoning."

The author offers a three-pronged strategy for shaping growth around a community's special natural and cultural features, demonstrating ways of establishing or modifying the municipal comprehensive plan, zoning ordinance, and subdivision ordinance to include a strong conservation focus. Open space protection becomes the central organizing principle for new residential development, and the open space that is protected is laid out to form an interconnected system of protected lands running across a community.

The book offers:

detailed information on how to conduct a community resource inventory
a four-step approach to designing conservation subdivisions
extensive model language for comprehensive plans, subdivision ordinances, and zoning ordinances
illustrated design principles for hamlets, villages, and traditional small town neighborhoods

In addition, Growing Greener includes eleven case studies of actual conservation developments in nine states, and two exercises suitable for group participation. Case studies include: Ringfield, Chadds Ford Township, Pennsylvania; The Fields of St. Croix, City of Lake Elmo, Minnesota; Prairie Crossing, Grayslake, Illinois; The Meadows at Dolly Gordon Brook, York, Maine; Farmcolony, Standsville, Virginia; The Ranch at Roaring Fork, Carbondale, Colorado; and others.

Book Description

For more than 30 years, John Tillman Lyle (1934-1998) was one of the leading thinkers in the field of ecological design. Design for Human Ecosystems, originally published in 1985, is his classic text that explores methods of designing landscapes that function in the sustainable ways of natural ecosystems.The book provides a framework for thinking about and understanding ecological design, along with a wealth of real-world examples that bring to life Lyle's key ideas. Lyle traces the historical growth of design approaches involving natural processes, and presents an introduction to the principles, methods, and techniques that can be used to shape landscape, land use, and natural resources in an ecologically sensitive and sustainable manner. Lyle argues that careful design of human ecosystems recognizes three fundamental concerns: scale (the relative size of the landscape and its connections with larger and smaller systems), the design process itself, and the underlying order that binds ecosystems together and makes them work. He discusses the importance of each of these concerns, and presents a workable approach to designing systems that effectively accounts for all of them. The theory presented is supported throughout by numerous case studies that illustrate its practical applications.This new edition features a foreword by Joan Woodward, noted landscape architecture professor and colleague of Lyle, that places the book in the context of current ecological design thinking and discusses Lyle's contributions to the field. It will be a valuable resource for landscape architects, planners, students of ecological design, and anyone interested in creating landscapes that meet the needs of all an area's inhabitants-human and nonhuman alike.

Customer Reviews:

Another classic for future generations.......2001-04-02

John Lyle continues his seminal work presented in "Regenerative Design for Sustainable Development". Any one interested in designing deep structures of urban spaces into sustainable environments would benefit greatly from reading this book. This book also covers rural development as well. Propagation of water flows for maximum beneficial inter-relationships is one particula r topic of interest for me.

Book Description

The most practical, up-to-date guide for turning Brownfields into Greenfields

This ready-to-use, how-to manual--edited by active developers who have bought, remediated, and sold brownfields--gives you a commanding look at one of today's leading environmental issues. Filled with the latest hands-on tools, Harold and Robert Rafson's step-by-step book simplifies the task of removing the barriers to redevelopment that plague environmentally distressed properties.

Brownfields goes beyond the legal and technical issues that preoccupy other current books, to focus on all the critical aspects of putting together a successful brownfields project--mortgages, marketing, and more. Complete with case studies drawn from the authors' own experience, this guide is required reading not just for owners or developers, but for every stakeholder--from environmental regulators, to bankers, realtors and prospective buyers.

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Revitalizing underutilized industrial sites---how it's done.......1999-10-29

The authors clearly present the factors that, on one hand, allow industrial and commercial property eyesores to exist, and on the other hand, those factors that can redevelop them into valuable modern real estate. The NST/Engineers, Inc. reviewers have participated in brownfields remediation designs and in the development of estimated costs for remediation, sometimes extending decades into the future. Brownfields are, according to an EPA definition, "...abandoned, idled, or underused industrial and commercial sites where expansion or redevelopment is complicated by real or perceived environmental contamination that can add cost, time and uncertainty to a redevelopment project."

A few decades ago industrialists eyeing real estate for acquisition would be concerned about the use they could foresee, the asking price, zoning potential, the neighborhood, and a few other particulars. Rarely were they deeply concerned about what had gone on at the property in past years. Now, one of the first things a prospective buyer wants to know is "what might have gone on here in past years that has resulted in contamination of structures, the grounds, subsurface, or any water bodies." Property owners have similar concerns, but they have more information. So that both buyers and sellers wonder what magnitude of environmental remediation costs would be required for various redevelopment projects. The authors take the reader through the major considerations of both buyer and seller. They treat both the private and municipal redeveloper.

Their case studies, though largely drawn from their Chicago experiences, emphasize the careful planning and execution steps required in redevelopment anywhere. Based on data from less than 200 sites, the cost of brownfields redevelopment has been estimated to be just under $60,000 per acre. Cleanup of contamination, where it occurs, has been estimated at 8% of the total cost of redevelopment. The authors make an excellent point that much more cooperation is needed between interested parties to expand brownfields redevelopment. Venture groups are needed consisting of environmental scientists and engineers, capital providers, insurance specialists, real estate experts, and an experience project management team. Not to be forgotten is "due diligence". For a brownfields purchaser this means an in-depth analysis of the physical, economic, and legal conditions of any property in question. The authors describe how this analysis must have much more depth to it than the due diligence involved with purchase of an uncompromised industrial property. Federal, state, and local environmental officials, and governmental officials must appreciate the importance of rejuvenating unused brownfields as opposed to converting more fertile farms to industrial properties. And finally those officials must have the will to find ways to make a remediation happen. Individuals in all of the above occupations are well-advised to read this book.

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