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Manufacturing and industrial activity can contribute to sustainable economic development, but this potential is lost to urban industrial rezonings. This is particularly the case in strong market cities where pressures to develop higher-value residential and office space are strong. The literature has documented the industrial displacement process but has yet to probe the institutional factors behind industrial rezonings or the conditions that may catalyze supportive industrial land use policy. I contribute to filling this research gap by exploring how institutional dynamics shape industrial land use planning in San Francisco (CA). Drawing on interviews and document analysis, I show how formal governance institutions, locally embedded intermediary organizations, and policy imaginaries shape policy change. Despite success in redefining and promoting the value of urban industrial lands, ongoing pressures remain with balancing competing land use agendas and priorities. This research highlights the tradeoffs and pressures involved in creating urban industrial land use policy in high-cost cities. The case draws attention to the importance of considering how the local institutional context for policymaking intersects with industry and urban development dynamics rather than assuming market logic alone dictates land use. Planners can better balance competing land use agendas and achieve positive outcomes when they focus on controlling policy narratives and work with intermediary organizations that possess specialist knowledge and connections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem, research strategy, and findings: The American Community Survey (ACS) is a crucial source of socio­demographic data for planners. Since ACS data are estimates rather than actual counts, they contain a degree of statistical uncertainty—referred to as margin of error (MOE)—that planners must navigate when using these data. The statistical uncertainty is magnified when one is working with data for small areas or subgroups of the population or cross-tabulating demographic characteristics. We interviewed (n = 7) and surveyed (n = 200) planners and find that many do not understand the statistical uncertainty in ACS data, find it difficult to communicate statistical uncertainty to stakeholders, and avoid reporting MOEs altogether. These practices may conflict with planners’ ethical obligations under the AICP Code of Ethics to disclose information in a clear and direct way. Takeaway for practice: We argue that the planning academy should change its curriculum requirements and that the profession should improve professional development training to ensure planners understand data uncertainty and convey it to users. We suggest planners follow 5 guidelines when using ACS data: Report MOEs, indicate when they are not reporting MOEs, provide context for the level of statistical reliability, consider alternatives for reducing statistical uncertainty, and always conduct statistical tests when comparing ACS estimates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem, research strategy, and findings:Historic preservation and planning often operate together in the United States within local planning departments, sharing some common roots and a "fragile, uneasy alliance" (Birch & Roby, 1984). Over time, developments in both preservation and planning brought these disciplines and professions closer together, including shared concern for sustainability and common ground in community economic development, revitalization, land use planning, and urban design. Simultaneously, areas of tension and potential conflict emerged. Some preservation-oriented scholars and practitioners call for the expansion of preservation's sphere of influence and concern, while others caution of negative effects. In this literature review, I identify areas of confluence and friction, as well as silences and gaps, focusing especially on planning and preservation literature since the 1980s. Takeaway for practice:Few scholars have identified what planners and preservationists (and those who do both) can learn from one another, with some important exceptions. Planning scholarship can benefit from understanding how preservation has changed in tandem and in relation to planning. Preservationists can gain much from incorporating contemporary planning theory, especially with regard to participation and building an equity agenda for preservation that builds from preservation's strengths and recent advances toward recognizing a wider, more representative set of historic resources. Both planners and preservationists can benefit from stronger alliances in which scholars and practitioners engage in deeper dialogues and exchange. This interdisciplinary collaboration can unite leadership and vision with regard to equity and social justice, with deeper place-based knowledge to improve the social, environmental, and economic health of communities. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Many cities have adopted minimum parking requirements, but there is relatively poor information about how parking infrastructure has grown. We estimate how parking has grown in Los Angeles County (CA) from 1900 to 2010 and how parking infrastructure evolves, affects urban form, and relates to changes in automobile travel using building and roadway growth models. We find that since 1975 the ratio of residential off-street parking spaces to automobiles in Los Angeles County is close to 1.0 and the greatest density of parking spaces is in the urban core, while most new growth in parking occurs outside of the core. In total, 14% of Los Angeles County's incorporated land is committed to parking. Uncertainty in our space inventory is attributed to our building growth model, on-street space length, and the assumption that parking spaces were created as per the requirements. Takeaway for practice: The continued use of minimum parking requirements is likely to encourage automobile use at a time when metropolitan areas are actively seeking to manage congestion and increase transit use, biking, and walking. Widely discussed ways to reform parking policies may be less than effective if planners do not consider the remaining incentives to auto use created by the existing parking infrastructure. Planners should encourage the conversion of existing parking facilities to alternative uses. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Built landscapes—patterns of streets, blocks, parcels of land, buildings, and related infrastructure at the scale of an urban neighborhood or greater—are often difficult for decision makers and the public to understand, especially within the complex "collage city" of the postmodern era. Yet understanding the variety of these forms can help stakeholders make wise choices regarding how to plan and design urban regions in the future to meet goals such as livability and sustainability. Based on aerials, maps, and images available through Google and other sources, I develop a typology of built landscape forms found within 24 metropolitan regions worldwide and use GIS to map these forms and compare regions. The analysis shows that 27 basic types of built landscape make up metropolitan regions worldwide, of which nine are very common. Traditional urban types now make up a small fraction of most metropolitan areas worldwide, while suburban and exurban forms comprise the vast majority of the land area. There are noted regional differences in the mix of built landscape types. Takeaway for practice: Each built landscape form offers challenges and opportunities for planning objectives such as livability and sustainability. It is important for planners to a) help the public and decision makers understand built landscapes and their implications; b) include landscape-scale elements, such as street patterns and networks of green infrastructure, when framing urban development alternatives; c) ensure that local codes and design guidelines enable desired forms of built landscapes and discourage those that are problematic for sustainability; and d) encourage built landscape change that promotes sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this essay, the author traces her development from a political scientist to an urban planner. Looking back on more than 40 years as a scholar and professor of planning, Fainstein deems issues of inequality derived from class, ethnicity, and gender to have been the focus of her teaching and scholarship. At first, she approached these questions through empirical investigations of citizen participation and theoretical exploration of the neo-Marxist literature and her early research focused on the politics of planning in American cities, the contributions of community groups, and the roles played by business interests. Later, she examined redevelopment and housing programs in London and Amsterdam to contrast these more welfare-oriented European cities to the American model and examined the relationship between gender and planning. Eventually, she brought together her empirical and theoretical research to develop a theory of urban justice and to suggest policies at the local level that were in line with these principles. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Planners face tension when dealing with the stock of urban industrial land: Should they enact industrial land preservation policies to protect viable manufacturers that provide good jobs even if it exacerbates the problem of affordable housing and causes cities to forgo growth in other sectors? Planners need better information on the underlying forces that lead to conversion of industrial land and an assessment of the effectiveness of preservation policies. We develop here an index of vulnerability of industrial land that is based on location factors, neighborhood dynamics, detailed industrial trends, environmental hazards, and local regulations. We show how these factors can explain the probability of the conversion of industrial land to other uses in Cook County (IL) and Mecklenburg County (NC) and describe how various industrial preservation polices are effective in limiting conversion. Takeaway for practice: Cities can use this index to strategically plan for industries to target and sites to preserve as industrial uses. Traditional planning and regulatory tools such as industrial zone designations do reduce conversion risk, while factors such as transit accessibility increase the probability of conversion. We argue that local governments should be strategic about which manufacturing industries can be preserved at what locations using these tools. We also develop and demonstrate an open source, interactive, web-based tool that demonstrates some of the key concepts that can be replicated in other places. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: Local, regional, and state growth management policy in the United States has been evolving since the 1950s, generally becoming much more comprehensive in how it addresses growth over time. Purpose: In this article, I describe the three historic phases of local, regional, and state approaches to managing growth in the United States since the 1950s. I then sketch the characteristics of the emerging fourth wave, one that must respond to challenges relating to economic development, climate change, and changing energy demands and supplies. Methods: Using a review of the literature and an assessment of the major trends shaping local, regional, and state land planning efforts, the article traces the evolution of growth management policy. Results and conclusions: Of the many changes land planning policy has experienced over time, the most telling is the shift in attitudes toward growth and development. For many decades growth management policy viewed development as a problem to be limited or managed, but in the last two decades planners have embraced new development as an opportunity for fixing past errors and addressing problems linked with growth. Takeaway for practice: Although smart growth remains an anchor for land planning policies and programs, approaches to managing growth will and must evolve in the coming years. Despite the many economic and political challenges faced by land planners and growth management advocates, there is much to be optimistic about as a new fourth wave of growth management emerges. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Problem: For many cities and planners, adopting smart-growth sprawl-containing strategies is associated with the conversion of relatively inexpensive industrial-zoned land to land zoned for mixed-use commercial and residential redevelopment. This can weaken the urban economic base, reduce the supply of good-job producing land, and contribute to industrial-sector suburban sprawl. Purpose: We expose smart growth's blind side by revealing the lack of attention to urban industrial redevelopment in planning practice. We expand the smart growth dialogue by describing a) the impacts on productive urban industrial land of adopting smart policies, and b) local government measures to protect urban industry while pursuing smart growth. Methods: We review the recent local industrial policies of 14 cities and 10 practice-oriented smart growth publications with local economic development components to reveal the disconnect between urban industrial development and smart growth approaches. We compare elements of adopted local industrial policies from selected cities with commonly accepted smart growth principles to illuminate the challenges smart growth policies pose for protecting and revitalizing urban industrial areas. Results and conclusions: Our review of cities initiating local industrial policies reveals that significant amounts of industrial land have been converted to other uses as cities pursued smart growth. The smart growth literature provides little to no acknowledgment of the need to coordinate urban industrial development practices with other mainstay smart growth activities. Although development pressures to convert industrial land to higher densities and other uses persist, the national economic crisis has led to a call for strengthening manufacturing. There has also been a decline in the nonindustrial infill development that epitomizes smart growth projects. Together these trends present opportunities and challenges for city and regional planners to change smart growth approaches. Takeaway for practice: Industrial land is at risk in cities. Recent efforts to reduce this risk, such as explicit local policies to preserve industrial land and jobs while also pursuing smart growth, illustrate how challenging it is to attract new manufacturers and prevent further industrial decline in urban neighborhoods. Pursuing smart growth and sustainable urban industrial development should not be an either/or proposition, and requires approaches that explicitly safeguard productive urban industrial land and discourage industrial sprawl. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: What is a “good plan”? Among their key goals, plans aim to communicate, influence and engage. Persuasiveness (the ability to engage and motivate) is, therefore, an essential plan quality. Unfortunately, all too many comprehensive plans lack this important quality. In addition, state planning mandates intended to strengthen planning can instead worsen this shortcoming. Purpose: To develop a methodology to measure and compare the communicative and persuasive qualities of plans in states with and without planning mandates. Methods: A specially designed protocol was developed to measure the communicative and persuasive qualities of comprehensive plans. Plans of 20 municipalities in states with planning mandates were compared with those of 20 municipalities in states without planning mandates. Statistical analyses of the results were conducted using the Wilcoxon–Mann–Whitney (U) test and simple t tests. Results and conclusions: Requiring local governments to prepare plans did not result in better plans—at least as measured by a protocol tailored specifically to assess the persuasiveness and communicative quality of plans. Plans prepared in mandate states were much more rigid and standardized than those prepared in nonmandate states. Nonmandated plans also scored much higher in terms of their narrative and storytelling qualities than mandated plans. Private consultant involvement in plan making significantly increased the communicative and persuasive qualities of plans. Takeaway for practice: Plans in all 40 municipalities fell far short of the ideal communicative and persuasive qualities set forth in the protocol. The deficiency was greatest in states with planning mandates. The involvement of private consultants had a positive impact on plan quality, while the provision of state funding for planning did not. Research support: None. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Problem: Planning aspires to intervene and make positive change. However, our ideas about how to create institutional reform need to be revisited because they do not fully account for the changes we have witnessed. Purpose: This article assesses the state of our knowledge about institutions and of how we construct and change them. It identifies the major deficiencies in new institutionalism in planning theory and searches for ideas about how to influence positive institutional change. Methods: I analyzed over 90 publications in the planning literature and other social sciences that discussed “institutions,” and identified the varying definitions and underlying epistemologies and philosophies that are at odds with each other. I then examined empirical studies of successful economic development cases in order to critically appraise the efficacy of different theories to account for the observed changes. Results and conclusions: Disparate new institutionalism theories in the social sciences have been starting to converge by focusing on social cognition. The unimaginable, fundamental changes that have occurred in our lifetimes have not been the result of rational state planning, manipulation by political elites, or activist organizations. A society-wide process of tacit learning from peers and exemplars built new paradigms and practices, ultimately normalizing new realities. Takeaway for practice: Planning practice that aims toward large institutional changes rather than incremental ones should incorporate the empirical lessons of contemporary history and the latest findings in cognitive science. Knowing more about the social cognition process can help planners to more effectively engage in fundamental change. Furthermore, if it retains its strengths in empirical research and multiscalar, interdisciplinary analysis, planning practice and research can make policy-relevant contributions to our understanding of social cognition change. Research support: None. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Problem: Many metropolitan jurisdictions face contests over industrial land because growth in the industrial sector is slow while the office and retail sectors and population grow more rapidly. This article presents a methodology for planning and setting priorities for industrial land use under these circumstances. Purpose: This article describes an approach to evaluating market demand for industrial land, applied here to Prince George's County, MD, in order to determine which industrial areas could be rezoned to alternate uses without causing major employment and tax losses to the county. Methods: I led a team that included an urban planning colleague and graduate students in identifying three types of industrial land: economically healthy industrial districts; industrially zoned areas where there was evidence of conflict between industry and alternative residential, commercial, and office land uses; and areas zoned for industry where demand for industrial space and land was weak or nonexistent. The project used data from private data provider CoStar, the U.S. Department of Labor's Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, county zoning maps and tax records, Microsoft Map, and Google Map to assign each industrial district to one of five categories of demand, ranging from weakest (no history of industrial demand) to strongest (economically healthy industrial activity). Results and Conclusions: Two estimates, one based on the projected absorption rate of industrial land over the next 10 years, and one on the industrial acreage exhibiting evidence of weak demand, both suggest a similarly large surplus of industrial land in the county. Further, rezoning and redeveloping industrial districts in the three weakest demand categories would cause the county to lose little industrial employment. Thus, all analyses reach consistent conclusions that the county should release some industrially zoned land for other uses while protecting some that is essential to the local economy. Takeaway for Practice: This article presents a methodology for assessing industrial areas to determine where industrially zoned land could be rezoned at little loss to the local economy; where land use conflicts should be addressed with urban design or industrial land protections; and where industrial areas are economically healthy and important components of the regional economy. Comprehensive plans can improve the health of local economies by identifying districts where industrial activities are strong and essential to the regional economy and encouraging investment in those areas while accommodating and protecting them. Research Support: This research evolved out of two years of work for Prince George's County, MD, by a team from the University of Maryland's urban planning program, supported by the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: Localities and states are turning to land planning and urban design for help in reducing automobile use and related social and environmental costs. The effects of such strategies on travel demand have not been generalized in recent years from the multitude of available studies. Purpose: We conducted a meta-analysis of the built environment-travel literature existing at the end of 2009 in order to draw generalizable conclusions for practice. We aimed to quantify effect sizes, update earlier work, include additional outcome measures, and address the methodological issue of self-selection. Methods: We computed elasticities for individual studies and pooled them to produce weighted averages. Results and conclusions: Travel variables are generally inelastic with respect to change in measures of the built environment. Of the environmental variables considered here, none has a weighted average travel elasticity of absolute magnitude greater than 0.39, and most are much less. Still, the combined effect of several such variables on travel could be quite large. Consistent with prior work, we find that vehicle miles traveled (VMT) is most strongly related to measures of accessibility to destinations and secondarily to street network design variables. Walking is most strongly related to measures of land use diversity, intersection density, and the number of destinations within walking distance. Bus and train use are equally related to proximity to transit and street network design variables, with land use diversity a secondary factor. Surprisingly, we find population and job densities to be only weakly associated with travel behavior once these other variables are controlled. Takeaway for practice: The elasticities we derived in this meta-analysis may be used to adjust outputs of travel or activity models that are otherwise insensitive to variation in the built environment, or be used in sketch planning applications ranging from climate action plans to health impact assessments. However, because sample sizes are small, and very few studies control for residential preferences and attitudes, we cannot say that planners should generalize broadly from our results. While these elasticities are as accurate as currently possible, they should be understood to contain unknown error and have unknown confidence intervals. They provide a base, and as more built-environment/travel studies appear in the planning literature, these elasticities should be updated and refined. Research support: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: Children make little use of many neighborhood parks even though they have facilities for active recreation. Purpose: We examined the factors that bring children to parks, and aimed to understand how park visitation patterns differ between boys and girls, among children of different races and ethnicities, and between inner-city and suburban children. Methods: We surveyed children and their parents in 12 middle schools and analyzed the results. Our team also observed children at 50 inner-city and 50 suburban parks, and we used multiple regression models containing park- and neighborhood-level variables to relate them to the numbers of children using parks. Results and conclusions: The study confirms that many middle-school children make little use of parks. This is primarily explained by their own lack of interest in the existing park activities and their households' lack of time and concerns about safety. Active recreation facilities and organized sport programs, natural features, and good levels of maintenance and cleanliness are the most significant factors attracting middle-school children to parks. Our survey found some significant gender, racial, and ethnic differences in preferences for park equipment, perceptions of park safety, and park visitation patterns. Additionally, our regression models confirmed that inner-city and suburban children were attracted to parks of different sizes and containing different facilities, and that the association between park safety and park use was also different in these two settings. Takeaway for practice: Neighborhood parks provide the potential for active recreation, but they are often underutilized and attract only a subset of neighborhood children. Planners should take into account that different factors attract different groups of children to parks. Research support: This research was supported by the John Randolph and Dora Haynes Foundation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: Vancouver, BC, has achieved international acclaim for its livability and compact urban form, making it one model of good planning practice. What techniques and strategies contributed to effective planning practice in the city? Purpose: This article shares stories from a prominent practitioner in Vancouver, illuminating some of the techniques and processes planners used to help develop consensus around building a socially responsible and progressive city. Methods: The article presents results from interviews with Larry Beasley, the former director of current planning with the City of Vancouver. Excerpts from the interviews illustrate his locally situated theory of planning practice. Results and conclusions: Beasley's stories of practice are not those of a heroic planner, but affirmations of basic planning principles: good processes, practical ethics, and effective organization. Beasley's model of “experiential planning” pursues good city form and function using socially just and politically responsive participatory processes. Vancouver planners helped build consensus by framing meaningful visions based on the everyday experiences and aspirations of residents. This model holds promise for further development. Takeaway for practice: As we search practitioners' success stories for strategies and outcomes to emulate, it is important to identify which factors made a difference to outcomes. Those seeking to copy Vancouver's success will find some elements of the Vancouver case unique. However, Vancouver planners also developed engagement techniques and management strategies with wide applicability. Research support: This research was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: Legal requirements and good planning practice dictate that land development induced by major highway investments be forecasted. Two forecasting methods, the first qualitative and based on expert judgment and the second quantitative and based on formal spatial interaction models, are often presented as equivalent. Purpose: We aim to extract lessons about the strengths and weaknesses of the two methods from a case study of a controversial highway, the Intercounty Connector (ICC), in the suburbs north of Washington, DC. Methods: We compare forecasts of induced development obtained using both methods and judge their reasonableness against the empirical literature. Results and conclusions: The two methods gave dramatically different results. The subjective judgment of experts predicted small impacts, on average, compared to a simple spatial interaction model. Also, subjectively forecasted impacts were limited to lands near the new facility, while modeled impacts rippled out across a much larger area. The subjective method seemed to give too little weight to accessibility effects and too much to zoning constraints, while a simple spatial interaction model seemed to do the opposite. Takeaway for practice: Where time, budget, or data limitations preclude the development of state-of-the-art integrated land use and transportation models, we conclude based on this case study that the best approach is to combine simple models and expert judgment. Expert panels can be used to check model inputs against local knowledge and to adjust outputs in light of factors otherwise unaccounted for. Conversely, model outputs can be used to check expert opinion for inconsistency with known land use-transportation relationships. Research support: None. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: To succeed, the smart growth movement must be active at the local level. However, little is known about the movement's composition and effects. Purpose: This research aims to identify who pursues smart growth at the local level, what types of smart growth policies are being adopted, and the impact of supporters on the types of policies adopted. Methods: Using surveys I conducted with planning and development officials in 202 cities and other data, I estimate regression models predicting the effects of local activism and other possible influences on the number of smart growth, land preserving, and inner-city redevelopment policies these cities adopted. Results and conclusions: I found that (a) as the number of types of groups promoting smart growth increases, cities adopt more smart growth policies; (b) the supporters of smart growth have more impact on the adoption of land preserving policies than on the policies associated with inner-city redevelopment; and (c) cities in states that require comprehensive planning adopt more smart growth policies. Takeaway for practice: Politics prevents many cities from adopting comprehensive smart growth policies, though state laws that mandate comprehensive planning at the local level appear to encourage them. Planners can build support for smart growth by inviting environmental groups to the table and by devising smart growth policies that encourage both land preservation and inner-city densification. Research support: None. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: While concerns about traffic safety were central to the development of conventional community design practice, there has been little empirical examination of the relationship between community design and the incidence of traffic-related crashes, injuries, and deaths. Purpose: We examine the relationship between community design and crash incidence. Methods: We present a brief historical review of the safety considerations that helped shape conventional community design practice and then analyze GIS data on crash incidence and urban form using negative binomial models. Results and conclusions: We find that many of the safety assumptions embedded in contemporary community design practice are not substantiated by the empirical evidence. While disconnecting local street networks and relocating nonresidential uses to arterial thoroughfares can reduce neighborhood traffic volumes, this does not appear to improve safety, but rather substitutes one set of safety problems for another. We found urban arterials, arterial-oriented commercial developments, and big box stores to be associated with increased incidences of traffic-related crashes and injuries, while higher-density communities with more traditional, pedestrian-scaled retail configurations were associated with fewer crashes. We found intersections to have mixed effects on crash incidence. We conclude by discussing the likely reasons for these findings (vehicle operating speeds and systematic design error) and outline three community design strategies that may help improve traffic safety. Takeaway for practice: Community design is strongly associated with crash incidence. The speed and operating characteristics of arterial thoroughfares, as well as the design and configuration of commercial and retail uses, appear to be particularly important. Our findings suggest that safety may be enhanced by strictly managing access along arterial thoroughfares and by locating commercial and retail uses away from these roadways, or at least orienting them toward lower-speed access lanes with limited connections to the arterial system. Designing communities to have higher-density, more urban design configurations generally appears to help reduce crash incidence, although four-leg intersections pose potential traffic hazards. Research support: This research was sponsored by the Southwest University Transportation Center (SWUTC). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: When the First National Conference on City Planning took place in Washington, DC, 100 ago, the delegates failed to foresee the consequences of automobility and suburbanization, but in other ways they were remarkably prescient. They stressed the importance of the linkage between transportation and land use, understood that transportation facilities must be harmoniously embedded in the urban fabric, and viewed transportation investment as a way to direct growth, revitalize flagging areas, and link jobs and housing. Since transportation planners in subsequent decades kept this vision alive, envisioning a network of context-sensitive urban freeways fully integrated into the urban milieu, why is this not what was built? Purpose: We consider the history of U.S. urban transportation planning over the past 100 years, to explain the evolution and legacy of the single most important transportation development of the past century save automobility itself: the emergence of the urban freeway. Methods: We reviewed primary and secondary material, including plans, manuscripts, newspaper accounts, and scholarly articles and books. Results and conclusions: We argue that the method used to fund interstate highway development put federal and state highway engineers in charge, and this affected highways' location and design. State highway engineers imposed a narrow, traffic-service-oriented vision on metropolitan freeways that focused on maximizing vehicle throughput and largely ignored other urban concerns. With too little advance thought, overbuilt, sparse, ring-radial networks were routed through neighborhoods in cities around the country, often at great social and environmental cost. Though the system has undeniably conferred great benefits in terms of enhanced mobility, the costs have been high as well. Recent years have seen a return to the early planners' perspective, stressing the social, environmental, and aesthetic impacts of transportation facilities and interactions with land use. Takeaway for practice: A century-old vision of coordinated transportation and land use planning has resurfaced in practice, but in the meantime politically expedient decisions about public finance have had unanticipated, but profound and long-lasting effects on projects, travel, and urban form. Research support: Portions of this research were funded by the University of California Transportation Center and the University of California, Los Angeles Academic Senate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem: Urban agriculture has potential to make cities more socially and ecologically sustainable, but planners have not had effective policy levers to encourage this. Purpose: We aim to learn how to use land inventories to identify city land with the potential for urban agriculture in order to plan for more sustainable communities by answering two questions: Do land inventories enable integration of urban agriculture into planning and policymaking? Do land inventories advance both ecological and social dimensions of local sustainability agendas? Methods: We use case studies of two Pacific Northwest cities (Portland, Oregon, and Vancouver, British Columbia), comparing the municipal land inventories they undertook to identify public lands with potential for urban agriculture. We study how they were initiated and carried out, as well as their respective scopes, scales, and outcomes. Results and conclusions: We find that the Portland inventory both enabled integration of urban agriculture into planning and policymaking and advanced social and ecological sustainability. In Vancouver similar integration was achieved, but the smaller scope of the effort meant it did little for public involvement and social sustainability. Takeaway for practice: Other local governments considering the use of a land inventory should contemplate: (a) using the inventory process itself as a way to increase institutional awareness and political support for urban agriculture; (b) aligning urban agriculture with related sustainability goals; (c) ensuring public involvement by creating participatory mechanisms in the design and implementation of the inventory; (d) drawing on the expertise of institutional partners including universities. Research support: The Centre for Urban Health Initiatives at the University of Toronto provided financial support for writing up this research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article investigate whether surveys of urban planning practitioners yield valid and reliable information. it mentions reliability is about determining whether different informants from an organization provide similar responses over time and surveys to understand housing development. It also mentions implications for planning practice and zoning and duration of permit reviews and types of variances issued.

During redevelopment, dilapidated and obsolete buildings must often be removed to make way for new construction. One way to achieve this is through deconstruction, selectively disassembling buildings rather than demolishing them mechanically. This approach can yield new jobs, workforce skills training, and small business development, and can conserve natural resources. Thus deconstruction may meet the goals of sustainability by making optimal use of existing economic, physical, and social resources. In this article, we consider existing and potential policies that support the use of deconstruction in redevelopment projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes best practices from contemporary scientific protocols that can be used to perform pre-construction validation of urban design guidelines. Because of the prominence of skylines in the urban landscape, their regulation represents a prime candidate for applying design guidelines. We tested guidelines for three prospective skyline factors: overall skyline shape (convex, concave, or flat), number of turns in the roofline of individual buildings (4, 8, or 12), and level of variance in four attributes of individual buildings: height, width, depth, and setback (low, medium, or high). Level of variance in building attributes had the strongest effect on judged pleasantness. The respondents preferred rugged skylines over simple ones, whatever their overall shape. These findings suggest that regulations for skyline appearance should focus on variances in the four building attributes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented that discusses issue articles on topics including U.S. federal downtown revitalization funding, industrial land conversion in U.S. cities, and the relation between gas prices, land use policies, and public transit ridership.