Best of
Urban-Planning

1991

The City Shaped: Urban Patterns and Meanings Through History


Spiro Kostof - 1991
    Widely used by both architects and students of architecture, The City Shaped won the AIA's prestigious book award in Architecture and Urbanism. With hundreds of photographs and drawings that illustrate Professor Kostof's innovative ideas, this has become one of the most important works on urbanization.

Residential Landscape Architecture: Design Process for the Private Residence


Norman K. Booth - 1991
    The text provides a thorough, how-to explanation of each of the steps of the design process--from initial contact with the client to a completed master plan. The text's numerous illustrations and useful case study examples offer a rich learning experience for students. Whether you are just starting your design career or are a current practitioner, this valuable resource is sure to enhance your skills and knowledge.

Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design


Timothy Crowe - 1991
    The concepts presented in this book explain the link between design and human behavior. Understanding this link can enable a planner to use natural environmental factors to minimize loss and crime and to maximize productivity.This practical guide addresses several environmental settings, including major event facilities, small retail establishments, downtown streets, residential areas, and playgrounds. A one-stop resource with explanations of criminal behavior and the historical aspects of design, it teaches both the novice and the expert in crime prevention how to use the environment to affect human behavior in a positive manner.

Metabolism of the Anthroposphere: Analysis, Evaluation, Design


Peter Baccini - 1991
    This global network of urban systems, including ecosystems, is the anthroposphere; the physical flows and stocks of matter and energy within it form its metabolism. This book offers an overview of the metabolism of the anthroposphere, with an emphasis on the design of metabolic systems. It takes a cultural historical perspective, supported with methodology from the natural sciences and engineering. The book will be of interest to scholars and practitioners in the fields of regional development, environmental protection, and material management. It will also be a resource for undergraduate and graduate students in industrial ecology, environmental engineering, and resource management.The authors describe the characteristics of material stocks and flows of human settlements in space and time; introduce the method of material flow analysis (MFA) for metabolic studies; analyze regional metabolism and the material systems generated by basic activities; and offer four case studies of optimal metabolic system design: phosphorus management, urban mining, waste management, and mobility.This second edition of an extremely influential book has been substantially revised and greatly expanded. Its new emphasis on design and resource utilization reflects recent debates and scholarship on sustainable development and climate change.

Precisions on the Present State of Architecture and City Planning


Le Corbusier - 1991
    Concise summations of the Swiss-born French architect’s pioneering philosophy, the lectures contain some of Le Corbusier’s most compelling aphorisms and cover topics from technique, design and human scale, and the 1927 League of Nations competition to the teaching of architecture and an analysis of the transformation of his own work over time. On his return, Le Corbusier reconstructed the lectures, publishing them in French in 1930. Published to honor the fiftieth anniversary of Le Corbusier’s passing, this new and expanded edition presents the Precisions lectures to a new audience. During the lectures, Le Corbusier punctuated his points with a series of improvised crayon-on-paper drawings. This is the first edition to reproduce all forty drawings in color. The book also includes Le Corbusier’s introduction, appended in the 1960s, which describes the tremendous impact the city of Buenos Aires had on the architect—its beauty and vast potential, as well as the considerable challenges presented by this city “trembling on the verge of great works.” A second, new introduction by British art historian Tim Benton places the lectures in context with the larger body of Le Corbusier’s work and its lasting significance. Finally, an appendix has been added to this edition to provide new generations of architects and students with a brief description of key figures and events discussed. For many, including Le Corbusier himself, the Precisions lectures marked an important shift in the architect’s thinking and are considered one of his most mature statements on modern architectural revolution. This new edition sheds light on the principles that informed his work.

People, Plans, and Policies: Essays on Poverty, Racism, and Other National Urban Problems


Herbert J. Gans - 1991
    He believes that not only must parents have jobs to improve their children's school performance, but that the country needs a modernized "New Deal," a more labor-intensive economy, and a thirty-two hour work week to achieve full employment. Other controversial ideas presented in this book include Gans's opposition to the whole notion of an underclass, which he feels is the latest way for the nonpoor to unjustly label the poor as undeserving. He also believes that poverty continues to plague society because it is often useful to the nonpoor. He is critical of architecture that aims above all to be aesthetic or to make philosophical statements, is doubtful that planners can or should try to reform our social or personal lives, and thinks we should concentrate on achieving individual public policies until we learn how to properly plan as a society.