*Housing the Homeless.   Edited by Jon Erickson (Kean U) and Charles Wilhelm (formerly Capital Budget Homeless Housing Program, NY).  With a new introduction by Jon Erickson.  A Center for Urban Policy Research Books.  Piscataway NJ: Transaction Publishers, April 2012, 477p, $39.95pb.  Homeless people  have no permanent residence and seek security, rest, and protection from the elements.  They live in areas that are not designated to be shelters, occupy structures without permission, or are provided emergency shelters by various organizations.  Their number has grown and the complexity of the issue has increased.  Discusses what steps private, charitable, and public organizations can take to alleviate and eventually solve the problem, with a variety of case studies that bring together different perspectives.  Concludes with a resource section that highlights government policies and programs addressing this problem.  (HOMELESSNESS * HOUSING * POVERTY * CITIES)

*Food and the City: Urban Agriculture and the New Food Revolution.  Jennifer Cockrall-King (Edmonton, Alberta, Canada; freelance journalist; www.foodgirl.ca).  Amherst NY: Prometheus Books, Feb 2012, 355p, $21pb (also as e-book for 11.99).  There’s just a three-day supply of food available for any given city due to complex, just-in-time international supply chains.  The system is not only vulnerable but also environmentally unsustainable for the long term.  Examines alternative food systems in cities worldwide—London (gardeners grow on some 30,000allotment plots), Paris, Russia (65% of Moscow households grow some of their own food), Vancouver (promoting edible landscaping), Toronto, Los Angeles (supporting 100 schoolyard food gardens), Milwaukee, Detroit (Hantz Frms will be “the world’s largest urban farm”), Chicago, New York (now home to two major rooftop farms), and Cuba (“urban agriculture on a national scale”)-- that are shortening their food chains, growing food within city limits, and taking  “food security” in their own hands.  Growing spaces in the cities include rooftops, backyards, vacant lots, along roadways, and even in “vertical farms” reusing industrial buildings and derelict inner-city lots.  [NOTE: A fascinating and upbeat tour of many exciting projects.]   (FOOD AND AGRICULTURE * CITIES AND FOOD * URBAN AGRICULTURE * ALTERNATIVE FOOD SYSTEMS)

*Rethinking a Lot: The Design and Culture of Parking.  Eran Ben-Joseph  (Prof of Landscape Architecture and Planning, MIT).  Cambridge MA: MIT Press, March 2012, 184p, $24.95pb.  There are an estimated 600 million passenger cars in the world, and, in some cities, parking lots cover more than a third of the metropolitan footprint.  Parking lots are ripe for transformation and can be significant public places, aesthetically pleasing and environmentally and architecturally responsible.  They can be lushly planted with trees and flowers, and beautifully integrated with the urban built environrnent.  (CITIES * PARKING LOTS RECONSIDERED)

* Global Downtowns.  Edited by Gary McDonogh (Prof of Anthropology, Bryn Mawr College) and Marina Peterson (Ohio U).  Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania Press, Dec 2011, 376p, $59.  Downtowns are products of the activity of planners, power elites, and consumers; these zones of conflict and competition embody the heritage of the modern city and its future.  Reconsiders the energy and exuberance that characterizes downtown areas in Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America and the US– within a framework of contemporary globalization and change.  Draws on extensive fieldwork and archival study in Beijing, Barcelona, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dar es Salaam, Dubai, Nashville, Lima, Philadelphia, Mumbai, Havana, Beirut, Paris, etc.(CITIES * DOWNTOWN AREAS WORLDWIDE)

* Walk Out Walk On: A Learning Journey into Communities Daring to Live the Future Now.  Margaret Wheatley (Cofounder, Berkana Institute) and Deborah Frieze (President, Berkana Institute).  San Francisco CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, April 2011, 288p, $24.95pb (also as e-book).  This is an era of increasingly complex problems, fewer and fewer resources to address them, and failing solutions.  Yet every community has within itself the ingenuity, intelligence, and inventiveness to solve the seemingly insolvable.  Presents people who have “walked out” of limiting beliefs and assumptions and “walked on” to create seven healthy and resilient communities in India, Zimbabwe, Mexico, Greece, Columbus (Ohio), Brazil, and South Africa.                                               (METHODS * CITIES)

* Trends in Urbanisation and Urban Policies in OECD Countries: What Lessons for China?  Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development.  Paris: OECD Publishing, Sept 2010, 222p, free pdf.  Surveys trends in urban policies of OECD countries to identify successes and failures that could inform national Chinese policy-makers in their preparation of an Urbanisation Strategy.  China has become the world’s largest urban nation with over 600 million urban citizens today, projected to reach 900 million by 2050.  Although the scale of China’s urbanization is unprecedented, issues in managing this growth are not.  Among the key challenges: 1) maximizing national benefits of urbanization while mitigating its negative impacts; 2) the economic, social, and environmental costs of meeting these challenges; 3) defining the most effective and efficient allocation of functional responsibilities among various levels of government;  4) effectively planning urban development in a market context. 

*State of the World’s Cities 2010/11 — Cities for All: Bridging the Urban Divide.  Edited by UN-HABITAT. London & Sterling VA: Earthscan (dist by Stylus), June 2010/200p/$39.95pb.  Uses the frameowrk of “The Urban Divide” to analyze the complex social, political, economic, and cultural dynamics of urban environments.  Focuses on the “right to the city” to explain the way many urban dwellers are excluded from the advantages of city life by exploring links among poverty, inequality, slum formation, and economic growth.                            (CITIES * “URBAN DIVIDE” * WORLD’S CITIES)

*Urbanism in the Age of Climate Change. Peter Calthorpe (Berkeley CA; founding member, Congress for New Urbanism).  Washington DC: Island Press, Sep 2010/225p/$49.50.  A leading proponent of New Urbanism and author of The Regional City: Planning for the End of Sprawl advocates sustainable development that thoughtfully combines good urbanism with renewable energy sources, state-of-the-art conservation techniques, new green technologies, and integrated services and utilities. Also considers the new generation of ecological design, smart grids, climate responsive buildings, electric cars, and next-generation transit systems.

* Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto.  Stewart Brand (Sausalito CA).  NY: Viking, Dec 2009/316p/$25.95.  Founder of The Whole Earth Catalog views climate change as the single largest threat to humanity.  A carbon-free future is needed, with rapid deployment of a new generation of nuclear power plants as the leading component of a green energy plan.  Other key ideas: 1) large-scale geoengineering is now imperative because it is too late to completely prevent or mitigate climate change; 2) booming megacities facilitate beneficial arrangements between humans and the environment (e.g., allowing half of humanity to live in 2.8% of the land); 3) urban slums (“squatter cities”), home to more than half of city dwellers, are the new sustainable communities pioneering in urban farming; 4) GM crops must be embraced so as to reduce pesticide and water use; 5) “open-source biotech” is needed to develop non-patent-protected seeds.                            (CLIMATE CHANGE * SUSTAINABILITY * NUCLEAR ENERGY * MEGACITIES * SQUATTER CITIES * GM CROPS * GEOENGINEERING)

*Cities for People.  Jan Gehl (Gehl Architects, Copenhagen).  Foreword by Lord Richard Rogers.  Washington: Island Press, May 2010/285p/$49.50.  Discusses how to reconfigure unworkable cityscapes into landscapes for people, human issues successful to successful city planning, experiencing the urban landscape at the speed of walking rather than the speed of riding, human-scale planning in fast-growing cities of developing countries, and how to develop cities that are lively, safe, sustainable, and healthy.  Illustrated with >700 photos and drawings.                        (CITIES)

* Reinventing the Automobile: Personal Urban Mobility for the 21st Century.  William J. Mitchell (Smart Cities research group, MIT Media Lab), Christopher E. Borroni-Bird (Director of Advanced Vehicle Concepts, GM), and Lawrence D. Burns (former VP for R&D at GM).  Cambridge MA: The MIT Press, March 2010/240p/$21.95.  Today’s cars are inefficient for personal mobility in cities: they need to be green, smart, connected, and fun.  Four big ideas to make this feasible and timely: 1) base underlying design on electric-drive and wireless communications; 2) a Mobility Internet for sharing traffic and travel data; 3) electric-drive vehicles integrated with smart electric grids based on renewable energy; 4) dynamically priced markets for electricity, road space, parking space, and shared-use vehicles.                                                (TRANSPORTATION * AUTOMOBILES FOR 21C * CITIES)

* State of the World’s Cities 2008-2009: Harmonious Cities.   UN Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT). NY: United Nations Publications, 2008/280p/$40 (Sales #E.08.III.Q.1). Assesses various intangible assets within cities that represent the soul of the city and are as important for harmonious urban development as tangible assets; focuses on three key areas: spatial or regional harmony, social harmony, and environmental harmony.                                                                         (CITIES)

 

** Sustainable Urbanization: Revisiting the Role of Urban Planning. UN-Habitat. London & Sterling VA: Earthscan, Oct 2009/380p(8x11”)/$49.95pb. The 2009 Global Report on Human Settlements, reviewing major challenges facing cities and towns worldwide, the spread of modern urban planning, the defects of current approaches, and innovative practices responsive to future challenges.

 

* Emerald Cities: Urban Sustainability and Economic Development. Joan Fitzgerald (Law, Policy and Society Program, Northeastern U). NY: Oxford UP, Feb 2010/256p$29.95. In the absence of a comprehensive national policy, many large and mid-size cities (NYC, Chicago, Portland, San Francisco, Seattle, Toledo, Syracuse) have taken the lead in addressing environmental issues and green economic development to improve quality of life.                                                      (CITIES * SUSTAINABILITY)

 

* Megaregions: Planning for Global Competiveness. Edited by Catherine L. Ross (Prof of Regional Development, Georgia Tech). Foreword by Richard Florida. Washington: Island Press, June 2009/350p$35. Concepts of “the city,” “the state,” and the “nation state” are passé; the new scale for considering economic strength and growth opportunities is “the megaregion,” a network of metro centers and their surrounding areas; by 2050, megaregions will contain two-thirds of US population.