Her approach was dramatic and effective: Simply painting a part of the street to make it into a plaza or bus lane not only made the street safer, but it also lessened congestion and increased foot traffic, which improved the bottom line of businesses. Real-life experience confirmed that if you know how to read the street, you can make it function better by not totally reconstructing it but by reallocating the space that’s already there.      Breaking the street into its component parts, Streetfight demonstrates, with step-by-step visuals, how to rewrite the underlying “source code” of a street, with pointers on how to add protected bike paths, improve crosswalk space, and provide visual cues to reduce speeding. Achieving such a radical overhaul wasn’t easy, and Streetfight pulls back the curtain on the battles Sadik-Khan won to make her approach work. She includes examples of how this new way to read the streets has already made its way around the world, from pocket parks in Mexico City and Los Angeles to more pedestrian-friendly streets in Auckland and Buenos Aires, and innovative bike-lane designs and plazas in Austin, Indianapolis, and San Francisco. Many are inspired by the changes taking place in New York City and are based on the same techniques. Streetfight deconstructs, reassembles, and reinvents the street, inviting readers to see it in ways they never imagined.

    It offers readers a unique survey of her entire career in forty short pieces that have never been collected in a single volume, from charming and incisive urban vignettes from the 1930s to the raw materials of her two unfinished books of the 2000s, together with introductions and annotations by editors Samuel Zipp and Nathan Storring. Readers will find classics here, including Jacobs's breakout article "Downtown Is for People," as well as lesser-known gems like her speech at the inaugural Earth Day and a host of other rare or previously unavailable essays, articles, speeches, interviews, and lectures. Some pieces shed light on the development of her most famous insights, while others explore topics rarely dissected in her major works, from globalization to feminism to universal health care.With this book, published in Jacobs's centenary year, contemporary readers--whether well versed in her ideas or new to her writing--are finally able to appreciate the full scope of her remarkable voice and vision. At a time when urban life is booming and people all over the world are moving to cities, the words of Jane Jacobs have never been more significant. Vital Little Plans weaves a lifetime of ideas from the most prominent urbanist of the twentieth century into a book that's indispensable to life in the twenty-first.Praise for Vital Little Plans"Jacobs's work . . . was a singularly accurate prediction of the future we live in."--The New Republic"In Vital Little Plans, a new collection of the short writings and speeches of Jane Jacobs, one of the most influential thinkers on the built environment, editors Samuel Zipp and Nathan Storring have done readers a great service."--The Huffington Post"A wonderful new anthology that captures [Jacobs's] confident prose and her empathetic, patient eye for the way humans live and work together."--The Globe and Mail"[A timely reminder] of the clarity and originality of [Jane Jacobs's] thought."--Toronto Star"[Vital Little Plans] comes to the foreground for [Jane Jacobs's] centennial, and in a time when more of Jacobs's prescient wisdom is needed."--Metropolis"[Jacobs] changed the debate on urban planning. . . . As [Vital Little Plans] shows, she never stopped refining her observations about how cities thrived."--Minneapolis Star Tribune"[Jane Jacobs] was one of three people I have met in a lifetime of meeting people who had an aura of sainthood about them. . . . The ability to radiate certainty without condescension, to be both very sure and very simple, is a potent one, and witnessing it in life explains a lot in history that might otherwise be inexplicable."--Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker"A rich, provocative, and insightful collection."--Reason

    The book's unrivaled reproduction of these fascinating and intricate documents provides graphic close-ups and reveals more than just pure geography-it offers insight into the cultures and beliefs of the great civilizations that gave rise to them. From classical cities like Rome and Jerusalem to modern hubs like New York and Tokyo, the stories behind each map are revealed: why it was created, who it was intended for, and how it was achieved. Profiles of key cartographers, planners, and artists give even further insight into the history of each urban masterpiece.With its genuinely unique and superbly illustrated approach to the most celebrated city maps in history and its lavish textured and foiled jacket, Great City Maps is a beautiful piece to add to any collection and a must-have for all history and geography enthusiasts.

    Money from all over the world flows through it; its land and homes are tradable commodities; it is a nexus for the world's migrant populations, rich and poor. Versions of what is happening in London are happening elsewhere, but London has become the best place to understand the way the world's cities are changing.Some of the transformations London has undergone were creative, others were destructive; this is not new. London has always been a city of trade, exploitation and opportunity. But London has an equal history of public interventions, including the Clean Air Act, the invention of the green belt and council housing, and the innovation of the sewers and embankments that removed the threat of cholera. In each case the response was creative and unprecedented; they were also huge in scale and often controversial. The city must change, of course, but Moore explains why it should do so with a 'slow burn', through the interplay of private investment, public good and legislative action.Fiercely intelligent, thought-provoking, lucidly written and often outrageously and uncomfortably funny, Slow Burn City is packed with fascinating stories about the physical fabric of London in the twenty-first century. But by seeing this fabric as the theatre of social and cultural struggles, Moore connects the political and architectural decisions of London's enfeebled and reactive government with the built environment that affects its inhabitants' everyday lives. In this urgent and necessary book, Moore makes a passionate case for London to invent new ways to respond to the pressures of the present, from which other cities could learn.

    How did this happen and what can we do about it? Everyone needs and deserves housing. But today our homes are being transformed into commodities, making the inequalities of the city ever more acute. Profit has become more important than social need. The poor are forced to pay more for worse housing. Households are subjected to eviction and foreclosure. Communities face gentrification and displacement. And the benefits of decent housing are only available for those who can afford it. In Defense of Housing is the definitive statement by leading urban planner Peter Marcuse and sociologist David Madden. They diagnose the causes and consequences of the housing crisis and detail the need for progressive alternatives. Minor policy changes will not solve they problem, they argue. Rather, the housing crisis has deep political and economic roots, and therefore requries a radical response.

    With essays contributed by an array of city-builders, it proposes solutions for fully inclusive communities that respond to the complexities of a global city.John Lorinc is a Toronto-based journalist who writes about urban affairs, politics, and business. He co-edited The Ward: The Life and Loss of Toronto's First Immigrant Neighbourhood (Coach House, 2015).Jay Pitter is a writer and professor based in Toronto. She holds a Masters in Environmental Studies from York University.

    She traces the relationships between the urban landscape, patterns and practices of everyday life, and social behaviors and relations in Kuwait. The history that emerges reveals how decades of urban planning, suburbanization, and privatization have eroded an open, tolerant society and given rise to the insularity, xenophobia, and divisiveness that characterize Kuwaiti social relations today. The book makes a call for a restoration of the city that modern planning eliminated. But this is not simply a case of nostalgia for a lost landscape, lifestyle, or community. It is a claim for a "right to the city"—the right of all inhabitants to shape and use the spaces of their city to meet their own needs and desires.

    Race matters but the city ignores it when shaping land use and housing policies. The city promises “affordable housing” that is not truly affordable. Zoned Out! shows how this has played in Williamsburg, Harlem and Chinatown, neighborhoods facing massive displacement of people of color. It looks at ways the city can address inequalities, promote authentic community-based planning and develop housing in the public domain.

    Since then, it has grown into a national media organization with an award-winning website, StrongTowns.org, and accompanying podcast. Over the last five years, Strong Towns’ member base has grown and its message has spread across the country. Volume II is a chance to share the top essays published on our website in 2015, reworked and compiled into compelling chapters including, “Can you be an engineer and speak out for reform?” “Dealing with Congestion,” and “My Car Pays Cheaper Rent Than Me.” Also included are sections on Strong Towns’ ongoing campaigns, #NoNewRoads and #SlowtheCars. The book features writing from Strong Towns’ president, Charles Marohn, as well as several Strong Towns contributors.

    From the period spanning the 19th to the 21st century, pioneering architects are featured with a portrait, concise biography, as well as a description of her or his important work.Like a bespoke global architecture tour, you'll travel from Manhattan skyscrapers to a Japanese concert hall, from Gaud�'s Palau G�ell in Barcelona to Lina Bo Bardi's sports and leisure center in a former factory site in S�o Paulo. You'll take in Gio Ponti's colored geometries, Zaha Hadid's free-flowing futurism, the luminous interiors of SANAA, and Charles Rennie Mackintosh's unique blend of Scottish tradition and elegant japonisme.The book's A to Z entries also cover groups, movements, and styles to position these leading individual architects within broader building trends across time and geography, including International Style, Bauhaus, De Stijl, and much more. With illustrations including some of the best architectural photography of the modern era, this is a comprehensive resource for any architecture professional, student, or devotee.About the seriesBibliotheca Universalis -- Compact cultural companions celebrating the eclectic TASCHEN universe!

    In Vertical, Stephen Graham rewrites the city at every level: how the geography of inequality, politics, and identity is determined in terms of above and below. Starting at the edge of earth's atmosphere and, in a series of riveting studies, descending through each layer, Graham explores the world of drones, the city from the viewpoint of an aerial bomber, the design of sidewalks and the hidden depths of underground bunkers. He asks: why was Dubai built to be seen from Google Earth? How do the super-rich in Sao Paulo live in their penthouses far above the street? Why do London billionaires build vast subterranean basements? And how do the technology of elevators and subversive urban explorers shape life on the surface and subsurface of the earth? Vertical will make you look at the world around you anew: this is a revolution in understanding your place in the world.

      The Handbook of Biophilic City Planning & Design offers practical advice and inspiration for ensuring that nature in the city is more than infrastructure—that it also promotes well-being and creates an emotional connection to the earth among urban residents. Divided into six parts, the Handbook begins by introducing key ideas, literature, and theory about biophilic urbanism. Chapters highlight urban biophilic innovations in more than a dozen global cities. The final part concludes with lessons on how to advance an agenda for urban biophilia and an extensive list of resources.   As the most comprehensive reference on the emerging field of biophilic urbanism, the Handbook is essential reading for students and practitioners looking to place nature at the core of their planning and design ideas and encourage what preeminent biologist E.O. Wilson described as "the innate emotional connection of humans to all living things."

    In developing the concept of spatializing culture, Setha Low draws on over twenty years of research to examine social production, social construction, embodied, discursive, emotive and affective, as well as translocal approaches. A global range of fieldwork examples are employed throughout the text to highlight not just the theoretical development of the idea of spatializing culture, but how it can be used in undertaking ethnographies of space and place. The volume will be valuable for students and scholars from a number of disciplines who are interested in the study of culture through the lens of space and place.

    Many of these structures are the work of new, experimental practices like China-based MAD Architects. MAD Works not only documents the buildings of this group of avant-garde architects but also traces the development of their ideas through associated practice including art, research, and exhibition projects. Organized thematically, the book explores the underlying concepts of MAD Architects' work. MAD Works is illustrated with photographs, architectural drawings, and 3D visualizations to provide a thorough exploration of MAD Architect's international portfolio of completed works, unbuilt projects, and future ideas.

    Nearness to work, friends and culture has always been a driving force in urban development, from the first cities in which people walked everywhere to today s car-powered cities with their scattered suburbs, highways and narrow pavements. Many scholars, politicians and civic groups are beginning to question the way cities are adapted to car traffic as it causes distance rather than proximity. As a result, a radical urban transformation has begun. What will the cities of the future look like? How will we live our lives and how will new technologies self-driving cars for example and new city planning ideals affect urban development? What would happen in the event of a major fuel shortage or climate change? Closer Together presents a unique future study and trend analysis developed by 400 experts and scholars. Three potential scenarios selected by 5,000 people through their vote in the media are presented via text and images. The result of their vote is as clear as the emerging trend: cities will have to change. They will need to be more condensed and user-friendly for pedestrians and people who travel by bike. Alexander Stahle s book Closer Together explains the political and economic forces and the subcultures that drive change in terms of urban environment and transport, as well as the way cities need to transform in order to bring people closer together and, not least, the way it will bring about greater equality and prosperity."

    But like many New York intellectuals, the essay was his characteristic form, accommodating his multifarious interests and expressing his protean, searching exuberant mind. This collection includes early essays from and on the radical 60s, on New York City, on literary figures from Kafka to Pamuk, and late essays on rock, hip hop, and gentrification. Concluding with his last essay, completed just before his death in 2013, this book is Berman s intellectual autobiography, tracing his career as a thinker through the way he read the signs in the street. "

    The book chronicles the evolution and migration of this concept from 19th-century French social utopian thinkers and 20th-century Soviet Constructivist architectural circles to its incubation in postwar London, its theorization by members of CIAM and Team 10, and its eventual dissemination to North America and Asia, where extensive systems were built in cities such as Minneapolis, Calgary and Hong Kong. This fascinating and untold history explores an architectural idea as it evolves under varying social, geographic and political contexts--charting its use as an ever-shifting multipurpose tool to segregate or commingle the classes, foster social cohesion and the public good, facilitate security and surveillance, improve pedestrian safety and traffic flows, or to enhance retail consumption by ameliorating climatic extremes. The implementation of streets above streets creates parallel cities, not mirrored but alternate realities where questions about access, use and control emerge. The book considers both radical visionary schemes of the future urban metropolis by progressive architects and the grand, if visually more mundane, implementation plans of extensive networks built in cities around the world that engender what the authors call a surreptitious urbanism. The first and only comprehensive book on the subject, Parallel Cities represents important new scholarly research on a topic that remains a persistent theme in architecture and urban planning. Accompanying the extensively illustrated text is a lexicon of related terms and an appendix of specific systems drawn from key cities.

    More than 40 years in development and a decade in production, this work now stands at over 480 pages and is without doubt his most substantial and important book yet.Ontological Graffiti provides for us a vibrant vudutronic, spiritualist, art-grimoire. It presents the strange narrative of certain magical work conducted at the infamous ‘Hyde Park Lodge’ in Chicago during the period 1965-1975. The lodge was a ‘ritual collective of occult initiates’ who would meet monthly under the directorship of Dr. Hector-Francois Jean Main.Ontological Graffiti contains the séances, lecture notes and descriptive texts for this intense period. This material accompanies the series of large acrylic magical paintings produced by Bertiaux, who was assigned to capture through his art the messages and images of various ‘transcendental consciousnesses’ which manifested during the course of their workings. The Lodge later discovered that rituals conducted using these paintings deepened the connection with the spirits, Loa, and ‘Other Minds’. In addition, the book also offers the reader countless drawings, collages and ‘passeports for contacting and travelling within the spirit realms.’Everywhere in the Gnostic Continuum, ‘mind’ is active. The Hyde Park Lodge was able to tap into extra-dimensional, transcendental mind-forms, and develop methods to understand and make use of inner-plane communications. Ontological Graffiti details the work which allowed this ability, and serves as a magical record of a group of seekers discovering Gnostic and Vudu pathways and making use of the tremendous energy and knowledge gained from traveling them.-Michael Bertiaux

    As cities work to become more compact, sustainable, and healthy, their work is paying dividends: in 2014, Americans took 10.8 billion trips on public transit, the highest since the dawn of the highway era. But most of these trips are on streets that were designed to move private cars, with transit as an afterthought. The NACTO Transit Street Design Guide places transit where it belongs, at the heart of street design. The guide shows how streets of every size can be redesigned to create great transit streets, supporting great neighborhoods and downtowns.   The Transit Street Design Guide is a well-illustrated, detailed introduction to designing streets for high-quality transit, from local buses to BRT, from streetcars to light rail. Drawing on the expertise of a peer network and case studies from across North America, the guide provides a much-needed link between transit planning, transportation engineering, and street design. The Transit Street Design Guide presents a new set of core principles, street typologies, and design strategies that shift the paradigm for streets, from merely accommodating service to actively prioritizing great transit. The book expands on the transit information in the acclaimed Urban Street Design Guide, with sections on comprehensive transit street design, lane design and materials, stations and stops, intersection strategies, and city transit networks. It also details performance measures and outlines how to make the case for great transit street design in cities.   The guide is built on simple math: allocating scarce space to transit instead of private automobiles greatly expands the number of people a street can move. Street design and decisions made by cities, from how to time signals to where bus stops are placed, can dramatically change how transit works and how people use it.   The Transit Street Design Guide is a vital resource for every transportation planner, transit operations planner, and city traffic engineer working on making streets that move more people more efficiently and affordably.

    If you ve ever wondered what goes through architects minds when they design buildings, you ll be happy to know that there s no shortage of brilliant reading material to satisfy your curiosity. Wading through the archives at your local library may prove fruitful to your endeavor, but it won t give you the instant gratification thatArchitecture Theorywill.This book brings together all of the most important and influential essays about architecture written since the Renaissance, copiously illustrated and neatly organized chronologically by country. From Alberti and Palladio to Le Corbusier and Koolhaas, the best treatises by architecture s greatest masters are gathered here, each accompanied by an essay discussing its historical context and significance. This is the all-in-one, must-have book for anyone interested in what architects have to say about their craft.The comprehensive overview that will help transform even the most uninformed novices into well-informed connoisseurs! About the Series: Bibliotheca Universalis Compact cultural companions celebrating the eclectic TASCHEN universe at an unbeatable, democratic price!Since we started our work as cultural archaeologists in 1980, the name TASCHEN has become synonymous with accessible, open-minded publishing.Bibliotheca Universalisbrings together nearly 100 of our all-time favorite titles in a neat new format so you can curate your own affordable library of art, anthropology, and aphrodisia.Bookworm s delight never bore, always excite! "

    Its authors offer succinct, candid and carefully illustrated commentaries on the trials and successes of risk-taking research, revealing how they collaborate across fields of expertise, inventing or adapting methods to suit bespoke situations. Featuring novel uses and combinations of practice-from activism, architectural design and undercover journalism, to film, sculpture, performance and photography- in a diversity of cities such as Beirut, Johannesburg, Kisumu, London and Rio de Janeiro, Engaged Urbanism demonstrates how some of the greatest challenges for present and future populations are being rigorously and creatively addressed.

    Bridging the gap between theory and practice, it shows how the design of our cities and urban spaces can be interpreted and informed through contemporary theories of urbanism, architecture and spatial analysis.Relating abstract ideas to real-world examples, and taking assemblage thinking as its critical framework, the book introduces an array of key theoretical principles and demonstrates how theory is central to urban design critique and practice. Thirty short chapters can be read alone or in sequence, each opening a different kind of conceptual window onto how cities work and how they are transformed through design practice. Chapters range from explorations of urban morphology, typology, meaning and place identity to particular issues such as urban design codes, informal settlements, globalization, transit and creative clusters.This book is essential reading for those engaged with the practice of urban design and planning, as well as for anyone interested in the theoretical side of urbanism, architecture, and related disciplines.

    These suburban cities arose in the last half of twentieth-century America, based largely on the success of the single-family home, shopping centers, and the automobile. The low-density, auto-centric development of suburban cities, which are largely in the arid West, presents challenges for urban sustainability as it is traditionally measured. Yet, some of these cities—Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Salt Lake, Dallas, Tucson, San Bernardino, and San Diego—continue to be among the fastest growing places in the United States.  In The Future of the Suburban City, Phoenix native Grady Gammage, Jr. looks at the promise of the suburban city as well as the challenges. He argues that places that grew up based on the automobile and the single-family home need to dramatically change and evolve. But suburban cities have some advantages in an era of climate change, and many suburban cities are already making strides in increasing their resilience. Gammage focuses on the story of Phoenix, which shows the power of collective action — government action — to confront the challenges of geography and respond through public policy. He takes a fresh look at what it means to be sustainable and examines issues facing most suburban cities around water supply, heat, transportation, housing, density, urban form, jobs, economics, and politics.The Future of the Suburban City is a realistic yet hopeful story of what is possible for any suburban city.

    This is surprising, considering that since the early twentieth century most New Zealanders have lived in towns and cities – 86 per cent were urban in 2014. Yet we know surprisingly little about these urban dwellers and the spaces in which they lived.The pursuit of city life is one of the most important untold stories of New Zealand. The Big Smoke is the first comprehensive history to tell this story, presenting a dynamic and highly illustrated account of city life from 1840 to 1920.It explores such questions as: what did cities look like and how did they change; why were women especially drawn to live in cities; in what ways did Māori experience and shape cities; how far was the street a living room and stage for city life; and why did New Zealand so quickly become a nation of townspeople?At a time of national debate over housing and the growth of our cities, Ben Schrader’s superb new history reveals how our urban origins have shaped the people we are today.

    As cities across America experience a remarkable renaissance, and more and more young, diverse families choose to live, work, and play in historic neighborhoods, the promise and potential of using our older and historic buildings to revitalize our cities is stronger than ever.   This urban resurgence is a national phenomenon, boosting cities from Cleveland to Buffalo and Portland to Pittsburgh. Experts offer a range of theories on what is driving the return to the city—from the impact of the recent housing crisis to a desire to be socially engaged, live near work, and reduce automobile use. But there’s also more to it. Time and again, when asked why they moved to the city, people talk about the desire to live somewhere distinctive, to be some place rather than no place. Often these distinguishing urban landmarks are exciting neighborhoods—Miami boasts its Art Deco district, New Orleans the French Quarter. Sometimes, as in the case of Baltimore’s historic rowhouses, the most distinguishing feature is the urban fabric itself. While many aspects of this urban resurgence are a cause for celebration, the changes have also brought to the forefront issues of access, affordable housing, inequality, sustainability, and how we should commemorate difficult history. This book speaks directly to all of these issues.   In The Past and Future City, Stephanie Meeks, the president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, describes in detail, and with unique empirical research, the many ways that saving and restoring historic fabric can help a city create thriving neighborhoods, good jobs, and a vibrant economy. She explains the critical importance of preservation for all our communities, the ways the historic preservation field has evolved to embrace the challenges of the twenty-first century, and the innovative work being done in the preservation space now.   This book is for anyone who cares about cities, places, and saving America’s diverse stories, in a way that will bring us together and help us better understand our past, present, and future.