Also See:  Editor's Note, Endorsements, and Purchase Information

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PREFACE
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 1: SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT: THE CONCEPT
THE ELEMENTS OF SUSTAINABILITY
        First Element: The Waterbed Principle
        Second Element: Understanding and Accepting Nature's Inviolate Biophysical
          Principles
        Third Element: Understanding and Accepting That We Do Not and Cannot Manage
          Nature
        Fourth Element: Understanding and Accepting That We Make an Ecosystem
          More Fragile When We Alter It
                Self-Destruction
                Loss of Labor Pool
                Introduced Technology
                Long-Distance Transport of Air Pollutants
                Direct and Indirect Pollution of Soil and Water
         Fifth Element: Understanding and Accepting That We Must Reinvest in Living Systems Even as We Reinvest in
          Businesses
         Sixth Element: Understanding and Accepting That Only a Systemic Worldview Is a Sustainable Worldview
                The Transition
         Seventh Element: Accepting Our Ignorance and Trusting Our Intuition, While Doubting Our Knowledge
         Eighth Element: Specifying What Is to Be Sustained
         Ninth Element: Understanding and Accepting That Sustainability Is a Continual Process, Not a Fixed End Point
         Tenth Element: Understanding, Accepting, and Being Accountable for Intergenerational Equity
         Eleventh Element: Understanding, Accepting, and Being Accountable for Biophysical Limitations to Land
          "Ownership" and the Rights of "Private Property"
HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS
        Intrapersonal
        Interpersonal
        Between People and the Environment
        Between People in the Present and Those of the Future
THE QUESTIONS WE ASK
        When Is Enough, Enough?
        Are the Consequences of our Decisions Reversible?
                A Ditch
                A Dam
                Soil
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 2: TRUE COMMUNITY IS FOUNDED ON A SENSE OF PLACE, HISTORY, AND TRUST
COMMUNITY HISTORY
MONEY VERSUS WEALTH
THE VALUE OF SOCIAL CAPITAL
REWEAVING THE SOCIAL FABRIC
GRIEVING FOR OUR ENVIRONMENTAL/SOCIAL LOSSES
OF LEISURE AND COMMUNITY
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 3: NATURE'S INVIOLABLE BIOPHYSICAL PRINCIPLES AND LAND USE PLANNING
PRINCIPLE 1—EVERYTHING IS A RELATIONSHIP
        Application to Land Use Planning
        Example: Industrial Symbiosis, Kalundborg, Denmark
                Energy Flows
                Materials Flows
PRINCIPLE 2—ALL RELATIONSHIPS ARE INCLUSIVE AND PRODUCTIVE OF AN OUTCOME
        Application to Land Use Planning
        Example: The Slow Movement
PRINCIPLE 3—THE ONLY TRUE INVESTMENT IN OUR GLOBAL ECOSYSTEM IS ENERGY FROM SUNLIGHT
        Application to Land Use Planning
        Examples: Municipal Ordinances
PRINCIPLE 4—ALL SYSTEMS ARE DEFINED BY THEIR FUNCTION
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: Sustainable Seattle Community Idea and Project Proposal Checklist
PRINCIPLE 5—ALL RELATIONSHIPS RESULT IN A TRANSFER OF ENERGY
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: Sustainable Seattle Indicators Report
PRINCIPLE 6—ALL RELATIONSHIPS ARE SELF-REINFORCING FEEDBACK LOOPS
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: Eco-municipalities
PRINCIPLE 7—ALL RELATIONSHIPS HAVE ONE OR MORE TRADE-OFFS
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: Well-considered Trade-offs in Salt Lake City, UT
PRINCIPLE 8—CHANGE IS A PROCESS OF ETERNAL BECOMING
        Immediate Change
        Understanding Historical Change
        Change as a Historical Continuum
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: City of Santa Cruz, CA 1989
PRINCIPLE 9—ALL RELATIONSHIPS ARE IRREVERSIBLE
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: Wetland Mitigation Banks and the No-Net-Loss Requirement
PRINCIPLE 10—ALL SYSTEMS ARE BASED ON COMPOSITION, STRUCTURE, AND FUNCTION
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: Removing Invasive Species
PRINCIPLE 11—ALL SYSTEMS HAVE CUMULATIVE EFFECTS, LAG PERIODS, AND THRESHOLDS
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: Tasmania: Land Use Planning and Approvals Act of 1993
PRINCIPLE 12—ALL SYSTEMS ARE CYCLICAL, BUT NONE ARE PERFECT CIRCLES
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: Replacing a Shopping Center with an Ecological Neighborhood, Phalen Park, St. Paul Minnesota, 2005
PRINCIPLE 13—SYSTEMIC CHANGE IS BASED ON SELF-ORGANIZED CRITICALITY
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Example: see Principle 8
PRINCIPLE 14—DYNAMIC DISEQUILIBRIUM RULES ALL SYSTEMS
        Application of Principle to Land Use Planning
        Closing Comment
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 4: PLANNING FOR A LOCAL LIVING ECONOMY: REINVENTING THE COMPREHENSIVE PLAN
LIVING ECONOMY DEFINED
COMMUNITY AS ECOSYTEM
COMPREHENSIVE PLAN FOR A LOCAL LIVING ECONOMY
        Example: Human Capital
                Housing
                Public Utilities and Facilities
                          Wastewater Treatment
                          Water Supply
                          Energy
                          Waste Management
                Transportation
                Food and Nutrition
                Cultural Resources
        Example: Financial Capital
                Economic Development
                Local First Ithaca
                Alternative Business Ownership Models
                Fostering Economic Development Through Human-Scale Public Improvements
                Natural Capital
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 5: PLANNING FOR A LOCAL LIVING ECONOMY: NATURE'S BIOPHYSICAL REQUIREMENTS
PROTECTING NATURE'S FREE SERVICES
PROTECTING DIVERSITY THROUGH CONSTRAINTS TO DEVELOPMENT AND LAND USE
  PLANNING
        Habitat
        Open Space
        Communal Open Space
        Water
        Quiet
        Surrounding Landscape
        Agricultural Cropland
        Forestland
        Riparian Areas and Floodplains
                Riparian Areas
                Floodplains
THE MISGUIDED ROLE OF TODAY'S PLANNING FOR TRANSPORTATION
WHEN A COMMUNITY'S POPULATION BEGINS TO DESTROY ITS QUALITY OF LIFE
IN THE END, IT IS A QUESTION OF BIOLOGICAL CARRYING CAPACITY versus CULTURAL
  CARRYING CAPACITY
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 6: REFRAMING THE PROBLEM
ALL OF LIFE IS CYCLIC
WE MAKE WHAT WE ARE
HUMANKIND IN AMNESIA
COMPETING INSTINCTS AND ECOLOGICAL UNCONSCIOUS
REMOVING THE BLAME FACTOR
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 7: MODELING THE PLANNING PROCESS AFTER NATURE
ZERO WASTE
DIVERSITY WITHIN THE PLANNING PROCESS
STRENGTHENING THE FLOW OF ENERGY THROUGH SELF-ORGANIZATION
FREE-FLOWING COMMUNICATION
OPEN SPACE PLANNING, AN ALTERNATIVE PROCESS
STEP-BY-STEP: A SUGGESTED PROCESS FOR DEVELOPING A COMPREHENSIVE PLAN
        Setting the Stage for Planning
        Step 1: Mining for Meaning-Obtaining Community Values
        Step 2: Creating a Community Vision
        Step 3: Preparing Elements of the Plan
A TOP-DOWN PLANNING PROCESS: LESSONS FROM THE FIELD
        Bioengineering versus Natural Processes
                I. Riverbank Instability and its Risk of Failure
                II. The Riverfront Forest
                III. The Outcome of the Proposed Project is Uncertain
        Listening—Really Listening—to the Citizens
        Or Only Pretending to Really Listen
        Eliminating Unwelcome Voices Within
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 8: IMPLEMENTING THE COMPREHENSIVE PLAN
ZONING ORDINANCES
        The Percent Impervious Surfaces
        Building setbacks
        Plans for Erosion Control and Contouring the Land
        Open Space Requirements
        Requirements for Landscaping
        Design Controls: Site Design, Architecture, and Signage
                Site Design
                Architectural standards
                Signage standards
TRANSITIONING TO LOCAL LIVING ECONOMY LAND USE PRACTICES
        Overlay districts
        Revisions to development standards to accommodate green building practices
OTHER REGULATORY APPROACHES TO LAND USE CONTROL
        Protection of Farmlands
        Population Growth Rate and New Construction
NON-REGULATORY METHODS OF CONTROLLING LAND USE
        Incentive-Based Tools
                Outright Purchase of Land
                Donated Conservation Easements
                Purchase of Development Rights
                Transfer of development rights
        Incentives Themselves
        Development Review
                Citizen-initiated Development Review
                Obstacles to Development Review
        Fiscal Impact Analysis: Require of Specified Development Proposals
        Environmental Impact Analysis
        Checklists for Sustainability
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 9: MONITORING PROGRESS
CHANGE AND OUR PERCEPTION OF IT
CREATING MEASURES OF PROGRESS
OUTPUTS VS. OUTCOMES
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES

CHAPTER 10: ONGOING COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT—CITIZENS AS PLANNERS
KNOWING OUR AUDIENCE
WHAT DO WE NEED TO BE COMMUNICATING AND HOW
IS A "PARADIGM SHIFT" OCCURRING?
BARRIERS TO OVERCOME
SUMMARY
ENDNOTES
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Editor's Note for the "CRC Press" Book Series, Social-Environmental Sustainability:

"The book you are holding is part of a series on the various aspects of social-environmental sustainability. Land-Use Planning For Sustainable Development focuses on the primacy and quality of relationships among people sharing a particular place and between those people and their environment. "Development" means personal and social transformation to a higher level of consciousness and a greater responsibility toward the next generation. "Sustainability" is the act whereby one generation saves options by passing them to the next generation, which saves options by passing them to the next, and so on.

This series of books on the various facets of social-environmental sustainability is a forum in which those who dare to seek harmony and wholeness can struggle to integrate disciplines and balance the material world with the spiritual, the scientific with the social, and in so doing expose their vulnerabilities, human frailties, and hope, as well as their visions for a sustainable future

In writing this book, we are reminded of a comment author Scott Nearing noted many years ago when he wrote on a small card, "The majority will always be for caution, hesitation, and the status quo-always against creation and innovation. The innovator—he [or she] who leaves the beaten track—must therefore always be a minoritarian-always be an object of opposition, scorn, hatred. It is part of the price he [or she] must pay for the ecstasy that accompanies creative thinking and acting."

As the title of this book implies, Land-use Planning for Sustainable Development, is part of our human journey toward the ideal of social-environmental sustainability as an unconditional gift from the present generation to those of the future. Although some people are quick to point out that ideas, such as those expressed in this book, are against what society has come to unquestioningly accept as "human nature," we disagree. This notion is unacceptable when our present course is inextricably impoverishing each successive generation. Besides, those who are afraid of change inevitable point to ideas that differ from their own and say they are impractical. However, so-called "impracticality" is merely a horizon of ideas that have not yet been tested. Until they are, how does one know they are 'impractical?'"

Chris Maser, Series Editor
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Endorsements:

"Society's understanding of sustainability has evolved, along with that the language that most clearly conveys its meaning. Efforts toward social-environmental sustainability have become more urgent with an increased research focus on systems-based innovation, and noteworthy legislation. This new edition captures the most current success stories and explains the relationship between innovative land use planning and nature's impartial, inviolate biophysical principles that govern the outcome of all planning. It focuses on how decision making that flows from and aligns with nature's biophysical principles benefits all generations by consciously protecting and maintaining social-environmental sustainability."—Publisher's description.

"A comprehensive and visionary approach to land-use planning that grounds the unfolding of human communities and economies within an underlying matrix of living systems. This book should help reinvigorate the planning profession at a time of unprecedented change, complexity, and need for resilience."

Stuart Cowan, Ph.D.
Co-Author, Ecological Design
Bainbridge Graduate Institute
Portland, OR

"Silberstein and Maser help us imagine a world in which life is valued more than money, and the purpose of business is to serve people, community, and nature."

David Korten
Author of, Agenda for a New Economy
Board Chair of, YES! Magazine
Bainbridge Island, WA

"Must read this book, must read it!! Silberstein and Maser have written a must-read book for anyone interested in local community-planning with a definite sustainability twist. I read it for a paper on sustainable participation and found it to be quite easy to read; plenty of case examples and thought-provoking ideas make sure of that. I especially liked reading about the everyday problems that are so common in community-planning, it makes it easy to relate to."

vagabundo
on Amazon

"excellent piece of work... brilliantly written and thoroughly referenced."

Dr. H. James Quigley
Lecturer and Director, Environmental Design, Policy and Planning Sustainability Studies Program
Stony Brook University
Stony Brook, NY

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Purchase Information:

This book is available on Amazon.