Eugenie L. Birch

Having a Longer View on Downtown Living

Abstract Steven Levins painting Clouds depicts the interior of a studio apartment in the warehouse district of Minneapolis. The downtown building, which formerly housed a John Deere factory, illustrates one type of downtown housing discussed in Eugenie Birchs Longer View article. Levin lives and works in Minneapolis and has exhibited widely, including with the Plein Air Painters of America, the Salmagundi Club in New York City, and the Royal Society of Portrait Painters in London. Thanks to the Gandy Gallery (http://www.gandygallery.com/) for their help in securing use of this image. Many American cities are experiencing a rise in the number of residents in their downtowns. This phenomenon has deep roots but is extremely fragile. Six approaches to developing downtown housing dominate the arrangements. The public and private sectors have cooperated in many ways to attract this type of investment. Downtown housing, however, is only one part of the larger puzzle of urban revitalization and metropolitan growth. Many questions regarding the nature of downtown land uses, including the relationship between housing and employment, remain. This article presents statistical evidence regarding downtown housing for 45 cities and outlines the approaches many have employed to capture these housing units. It also demonstrates the difficulty of defining a citys downtown.

Growing Greener Cities: Urban Sustainability in the Twenty-First Century

Preface: Common Ground, Common Good -Amy Gutmann Introduction Urban Greening and the Green City Ideal -Eugenie L. Birch, Susan M. Wachter PT. I GREENING AT EVERY SCALE: NATION TO ROOF TOPS 1. Taking the Initiative: Why Cities Are Greening Now -Tom Daniels 2. Growing Greener Regions -Robert D. Yaro, David M. Kooris 3. The Inter-Regional Dimension: The Greening of London and the Wider South East -Robin Thompson 4. Greening Cities: A Public Realm Approach -Alexander Garvin 5. Growing Greener, New York Style -Rachel Weinberger 6. Greener Homes, Greener Cities: Expanding Affordable Housing and Strengthening Cities Through Sustainable Residential Development -Stockton Williams, Dana L. Bourland PT. II GETTING GREENING DONE 7. Urban Stream Restoration: Recovering Ecological Services in Degraded Watersheds -Rutherford H. Platt, Timothy Beatley, Sarah Michaels, Nancy Goucher, Beth Fenstermacher 8. The Role of Citizen Activists in Urban Infrastructure Development -Paul R. Brown 9. Blue-Green Practices: Why They Work and Why They Have Been So Difficult to Implement Through Public Policy -Charlie Miller Miller 10. The Roots of the Urban Greening Movement Victor Rubin Rubin, Victor 187 11. Leveraging Media for Social Change Harry Wiland Wiland, Harry Dale Bell Bell, Dale 207 12. Transformation Through Greening J. Blaine Bonham, Jr. Bonham, J.Blaine, Jr. Patricia L. Smith Smith, Patricia L. 227 13. Community Development Finance and the Green City Jeremy Nowak Nowak, Jeremy 244 14. Growing Edible Cities Domenic Vitiello Vitiello, Domenic 259 PT. III MEASURING URBAN GREENING 15. Ecosystem Services and the Green City -Dennis D. Hirsch 16. Metro Nature: Its Functions, Benefits, and Values -Kathleen L. Wolf 17. Green Investment Strategies: How They Matter for Urban Neighborhoods -Susan M. Wachter, Kevin C. Gillen, Carolyn R. Brown 18. Measuring the Economic Impacts of Greening: The Center for Neighborhood Technology Green Values Calculator -Julia Kennedy, Julia Peter Haas, Peter Bill Eyring 19. What Makes Todays Green City? -Warren Karlenzig Afterword -Neal Peirce Peirce Notes List of Contributors

Downtown in the “New American City”

The “new American city” is composed of many parts, including downtowns of primary cities whose contents have changed over the past fifty years as a new paradigm about their functions has emerged. Housing has increasingly played an important role, as seen in earlier studies documenting the rise of this phenomenon. A contextual explanation for increases in downtown residential populations and updated data on current levels help assess the effects of this change on the area.

Practitioners and the Art of Planning

Over time, practitioners, both in the “field” and in academia, have revised their conceptions of the three facets (defined here as design, craft, and presentation) of the art of planning, responding to evolving societal needs and growing demands of university-based professional training. Tracing the contents of successive American Planning Association (APA) (and its predecessors’) mission statements and several versions of the “Green Book” (and its predecessors) reveals these dramatic changes and demonstrates the profession’s remarkable adaptability. In the future, as practitioners continue to elaborate the art of planning, they must maintain and strengthen their own internal links, remain focused on the profession’s underlying themes and, most important, emphasize and reward applied research drawn from in-field experience. The Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning and the APA/American Institute of City Planning have decisive roles in this effort.

The Planner and the Preservationist: An Uneasy Alliance

Abstract In many ways the planning and historic preservation movements have had similar but separate patterns of institutional development. Although the planning profession is older and more refined than the preservation effort, their shared concern for the quality of the built environment has made them natural allies in promoting conservation practices in American metropolitan areas. At times, differing objectives have marred their mutual cooperative endeavors; but on the whole, they have developed an important symbiotic relationship that has served to strengthen both professions.

Advancing the Art and Science of Planning Planners and Their Organizations 1909-1980

Abstract The interplay between harmony and conflict focusing on the definition of planning and the financing of promotional activities has characterized the seventy year history of the professional organizations. Despite these currents, foundation support, visionary leadership, and dedicated volunteerism have combined to spread the planning ideal throughout the nation. Nonetheless, the profession remains weakly defined, leaving a challenge for the newly formed American Planning Association.

Woman-Made America The Case of Early Public Housing Policy

Abstract The 1937 Wagner-Steagall Act provided for the first permanent public housing program subsidized by the federal government. Although immediate economic conditions caused by the Depression provided the direct impetus for its passage, a painstakingly constructed intellectual background and grass-roots political support created the climate for its acceptance. This atmosphere was the product of the work of many housing reformers. However, two women, Edith Elmer Wood and Catherine Bauer, stand out as leaders having the most significant impact on the formulation of the new policy. As women, they contributed two major facets to it: the recognition of the need for government construction of dwellings when the private sector did not build; the demand that publicly constructed homes be positively supportive of family life.

A Review of “Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability” and “Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of Climate Change”

Well, its bad news and good news for city planners according to the latest reports by the United Nations (UN) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Founded in 1988 by the World Meteor...

Measuring U.S. Sustainable Urban Development

On Earth Day 2011, Mayor Michael Bloomberg mounted the podium of the Harlem Stage and let a small, triumphant smile cross his face as he announced that New York City was on its way to having the cleanest air of all large cities in the United States. He reminded his audience, who had come to hear the four-year progress report on PlaNYC 2030, that clean air was a key goal of his much-heralded sustainability plan. As of that day, he said, the city had banned Grades 4 and 6 heating oil, a move that, aside from his effort to curb smoking, would be “the single biggest step that we have taken to save lives.” Since buildings using low-quality heating oil produce more soot than all the cars and trucks in New York City, cleaning up the air would improve the Big Apple’s health record. Every year, he reported, soot caused 3,000 deaths, 2,000 hospital admissions for lung and heart conditions, and approximately 6,000 emergency department visits for asthma in children and adults.1

A Midterm Report: Will Habitat III Make a Difference to the World's Urban Development?

In an exploration of the potential impact of Habitat III, the all–United Nations (U.N.) conference that meets every 20 years, I suggest that, in addition to government commitments, clear messaging and strong civic engagement are essential to its success. The basis for these critical elements is already in play, but is it strong enough? In answering this question, I discuss the treatment of cities and human settlements within the U.N. system, the legacies shaping the conference, and the views on sustainable urban development being put forth in its outcome document, the New Urban Agenda (NUA), arguing that the current draft NUA differs from its predecessors, leaving room for strengthening the required advocacy. I conclude with a short challenge to city and regional planners worldwide to become advocates.