Smart Growth
Quick Links:
Information and Technical Assistance Providers
Publications
Model Ordinances
Misc. Tools and Resources
| Information and Technical
Assistance Providers |
 |
Center for Livable Communities
Helps local governments and community leaders be proactive in
their land use and transportation planning, and adopt programs
and policies that lead to more livable and resource-efficient
land use patterns.
http://www.lgc.org/center_livable/
Creating Quality Places: Successful Communities by Design
Outlines Smart Growth principles for homes and neighborhoods,
commercial development, and transportation and open space systems.
http://www.qualityplaces.marc.org
Growing Smart
http://www.planning.org/plnginfo/GROWSMAR/gsindex.html
Joint Center for Sustainable Communities
Provides a forum for cities and counties to work together to
develop long- term policies and programs that will lead to job
growth, environmental stewardship and social well being -- the
three pillars of sustainable communities.
http://www.naco.org/programs/comm_dev/center/index.cfm
LandWorks
A service for professionals working to conserve threatened agricultural
lands.
http://www.farmland.org/landworks.html
National Association of Counties – Smart
Growth Project
Provides information on the tools, techniques, and resources
that local government and communities can use to manage growth.
http://www.naco.org/programs/environ/growth.cfm
Neighborhoods, Regions, & Smart Growth
Project
Intended to help communities become better informed and educated
about smart growth issues.
http://www.neighborhoodcoalition.org/smart%20growth.htm
Sierra Club Challenge to Sprawl Campaign
http://www.sierraclub.org/sprawl/
Smart Growth America
A nationwide coalition promoting a better way to grow; one that
protects farmland and open space, revitalizes neighborhoods,
keeps housing affordable, and makes communities more livable.
http://www.smartgrowthamerica.org/
Smart Growth Network
A growing coalition working to encourage more environmentally
and fiscally responsible land use, growth, and development.
http://www.smartgrowth.org
Sprawl Watch Clearinghouse
A resource center that provides information, advice, and referrals
on issues related to sprawl, smart growth, and livable communities.
http://www.sprawlwatch.org/
| Publications |
|
Ahwahnee Principles for Smart Economic Development
Presents a comprehensive approach to economic development that
embraces economic, social and environmental responsibility and
recognizes the economic value of natural and human capital.
http://www.lgc.org/economic/index.html
Ahwahnee Principles for Smart Economic Development: An Implementation
Guidebook
Helps communities implement a comprehensive set of principles
for building prosperous and livable places.
http://www.lgc.org/bookstore/land_use/publications/econprinciples.html
The Ahwahnee Principles: Toward More Livable Communities
A set of community and regional principles that promote more
livable communities.
http://www.lgc.org/community_design/index.html
Best Development Practices: A Primer for Smart Growth
Focuses on development patterns and shows how changes in current
development patterns can help stop sprawl.
http://bookstore.icma.org
Density by Design: New Directions in Residential Development
Discusses the latest trends in residential development and profiles
innovative projects.
http://www.uli.org/Pub/Pages/d_search/books/N25.cfm
Ecologically Based Municipal Land Use Planning
Discusses ecological resources and provides practical solutions
that municipal planners can implement immediately.
http://www.crcpress.com
The Economic Benefits of Parks and Open Space:
How Land Conservation Helps Communities Grow Smart and Protect
the Bottom Line
An overview of research findings and examples of communities
that are protecting landscapes that contribute to their quality
of life and economic well-being.
http://www.tpl.org/
Grappling with Growth: What to Do When You Want a Strong Economy
and a Great Place to Live
Discusses four Smart Growth strategies — designing expansion
correctly, ensuring that expansion pays its way, restricting
expansion, and building affordable housing — and suggests
that these are incomplete unless linked to efforts to build the
local economy through Natural Capitalism.
http://www.rmi.org/images/other/ER-GrapWithGrwth.pdf
Green Development: Integrating Ecology and Real Estate
Outlines proven procedures, potential pitfalls, and practical
lessons for creating environmentally sound, community-supportive,
and financially rewarding real-estate development.
http://www.rmi.org/store/p385pid958.asp
Green Development:
Literature Summary and Benefits Associated with Alternative Development
Approaches
A compilation of examples, case studies, and issues related to
implementing green development approaches in urban areas.
http://www.smartgrowth.org/bibliographies/greenlit_search/green_lit.html
Greenprints for Growth
Discusses the concept of a “greenprint” for growth
that seeks to identify desirable lands for conservation, such
as sites for parks and recreation, farms, wildlife habitat, watersheds
and historic or scenic landscapes.
http://www.tpl.org/
Growing Greener: Putting Conservation into Local Plans and Ordinances
An illustrated workbook that presents a new look at designing
subdivisions while preserving green space and creating open space
networks.
http://www.islandpress.org/
Growing Together: City/County Smart Growth Profiles
Features six profiles of counties and cities that are taking
significant steps to partner with their neighboring jurisdiction
to resolve mutual land-use problems.
http://www.naco.org/programs/comm_dev/center/resource/successes.pdf
Hot Topics: Managing Growth
Discusses the costs and impacts of sprawl and profiles model
county growth management programs.
http://www.naco.org/pubs/cnews/99-2-1/hot_topics2.pdf
Low-Impact Development Design Strategies:
An Integrated Design Approach
Describes a radically different approach to conventional stormwater
management that combines a hydrologically functional site design
with pollution prevention measures to compensate for land development
impacts on hydrology and water quality.
http://www.epa.gov/owow/nps/lidnatl.pdf
Low-Impact Development Fact Sheet
Briefly summarizes environmental impacts of urban development
and the components of low impact development.
http://www.dakotaswcd.org/lid_fs.htm
National Sprawl News Network
A monthly directory of articles about suburban sprawl, downtown,
and city abandonment.
http://www.interaxs.net/pub/mikemonett/natl.htm
Open Space Planning Packet
What exactly is open space? And, how do you identify it, characterize
it, prioritize it, acquire it, and fund it? This packet of materials
answers these questions, and more.
http://www.canr.uconn.edu/ces/nemo/npubsform.html
Paving Paradise: Sprawl and the Environment
Discusses how urban sprawl affects many aspects of American life
and presents the case for smarter growth.
http://www.nrdc.org/cities/smartgrowth/rpave.asp
Paying for Growth, Prospering from Development
Addresses the difference between growth and development, the
reasons communities seek growth, the ways in which local governments
unwittingly worsen growth problems in their attempts to solve
them, and how communities can develop viable local economies
without growth.
http://www.rmi.org/images/other/ER-Paying4Growth.pdf
Profiles of Business Leadership on Smart Growth:
New Partnerships Demonstrate the Economic Benefits of Reducing
Sprawl
Presents the perspectives of business leaders engaged in combating
sprawl and promoting smart growth.
http://www.nalgep.org/smartgrowth.htm
Pedestrian- and Transit-Friendly Design: A Primer for Smart Growth
Illustrates features both essential and desirable to encourage
pedestrian- and transit-friendly design.
http://bookstore.icma.org
Principles of Smart Development
Discusses principles of smart development, documents obstacles
to their implementation, and outlines strategies that may help
overcome those obstacles.
http://www.planning.org/pas/pas479.htm
Smart Growth for Local Governments
A report that contrasts the causes and results of sprawl with
the characteristics of smart growth development that serves the
economy, the environment, and the community.
http://bookstore.icma.org
Smart Growth: Myth and Fact
Investigates eight common myths about Smart Growth and counters
them with data and examples of development and public policies
that work.
http://www.uli.org/Pub/Media/A_issues/A_SmL4_Myth.pdf
Smart Growth Tool Kit
Provides step-by-step instructions to help communities get started
and explains the strategies that have worked in other cities.
Case studies help you make the case for smart growth by providing
concrete examples of successful projects. Also includes a resource
guide, program agendas, and a smart growth presentation.
http://www.uli.org
Smart Investments for City & County
Managers: Energy, Environment, & Community
Development
A guide on smart growth containing resources and ideas useful
to local government officials.
http://www.smartgrowth.org/library/smartinvest.html
Smart Talk for Growing Communities:
Meeting the Challenges of Growth & Development
A guide for public dialogue and problem-solving that helps communities
address the effects of growth.
http://www.studycircles.org/pdf/growth.pdf
Street Design Guidelines for Healthy Neighborhoods
Identifies better ways to design new neighborhoods or retrofit
existing ones to be more healthy, interactive, walkable, enjoyable
and livable.
http://www.lgc.org/publications/center/clcpubs.html
Streets and Sidewalks, People and Cars:
The Citizens' Guide to Traffic Calming
Provides a method to evaluate and improve the safety of neighborhood
residential and commercial streets.
http://www.lgc.org/publications/center/clcpubs.html
Street Reclaiming: Creating Livable Streets
and Vibrant Communities
Provides a step-by-step process to psychologically and physically
reclaim streets.
http://www.newsociety.com/new.html
Sustainable Development: Prosperity Without Growth
A discussion of the pitfalls of growth and the elements of the
viable alternative, sustainable development.
http://www.rmi.org/images/other/ER-SusDevProWoGrth.pdf
Watershed Events: Smart Growth
The Fall 1999 issue of the Watershed Events newsletter that focuses
on Smart Growth as an emerging concept to promote watershed protection.
http://www.epa.gov/owow/info/WaterEventsNews/fall99/eventf99.html
When City and Country Collide:
Managing Growth in the Metropolitan Fringe
Presents a workable approach to fostering more compact development
and better, more sustainable communities in urban areas.
http://www.islandpress.org
Why Smart Growth: A Primer
This primer looks at why sprawl is no longer a viable development
option and illustrates the outcomes of growth.
http://bookstore.icma.org
| Model Ordinances |
|
From Policy to Reality: Model Ordinances
for Sustainable Development
A package of model ordinances developed by Minnesota Planning
to help make the best choices today for the health of the community
tomorrow.
http://www.mnplan.state.mn.us/SDI/ordinances.html
Growing Greener Ordinance Language:
Visually Enhanced Zoning and Subdivision Models
An interactive CD-ROM that provides an enhanced, visually interactive
version of the model zoning and subdivision ordinances that appear
in an appendix to the book "Growing Greener: Putting Conservation
into Local Plans and Ordinances" by Randall Arendt (see
Publications section for more information). Included are more
than 50 commentary images and short video clips that illustrate
the model ordinances and help explain and clarify the available
options. Also included are text files that users can copy and,
working with local land-use attorneys, adapt to fit local conditions
in their communities.
http://www.islandpress.org
Local Ordinances: A User's Guide
Preparing local ordinances and regulating new development comprise
the theme of this comprehensive guide for local planners.
http://www.terrene.org
Maryland Smart Growth Codes & Ordinances
http://www.mdp.state.md.us/smartgrowth/smartcode/smartcode00.htm
Model Ordinances to Protect Local Resources
Includes model ordinances to serve as a template for those charged
with making decisions concerning growth and environmental protection.
http://www.epa.gov/owow/nps/ordinance/
| Misc. Tools and Resources |
|
Alternative Factor Summaries
Summaries and worksheets that focus on the economy, the community,
and the environment.
http://www.rmi.org/images/other/ER-AltFactorSumm.pdf
Critical Thinking for Sustainable Community Decision-Making:
A Community Leadership Tool
A simple scoring system for use in facilitated group decision-making.
http://www.rmi.org/images/other/ER-CriticalThink.pdf
Project Assessment Worksheet:
A Community Decision Making Tool
A worksheet designed to encourage better-informed decisions and
better project design.
http://www.rmi.org/images/other/ER-ProjAsstWksht.pdf
Smart Growth
A video featuring urban planners, designers, developers, and
city officials that offer their comments and analysis of seven
communities across the U.S. that have realized the value of Smart
Growth.
http://www.videoproject.org/smartgrowth.html
Smart Growth INDEX
A GIS sketch model for simulating alternative land-use and transportation
scenarios, and evaluating their outcomes using indicators of
environmental performance.
http://www.crit.com/indx_overview_frameset.htm
Smartgrowth.net
A website for journalists that includes fact sheets, interview
sources, press releases, and links to position papers, research
studies, and testimony.
http://www.uli.org
Smart Growth News
A weekly e-mail newsletter featuring abstracts of articles culled
from more than 1,400 information sources.
http://www.uli.org
Smart Growth Project Reference Files
Features snapshots of developments that exhibit features of smart
growth.
http://www.uli.org
Smart Growth Tool Kit
Explains Smart Growth strategies that have worked in other cities.
http://www.uli.org
Smart Growth Video
This 15-minute video on smart growth is a great way to educate
citizens and public officials about smart growth. The video highlights
smart growth principles as applied in different kinds of developments
around the country. It also offers solutions to common growth
and development problems.
http://bookstore.icma.org
Subdivide and Conquer: A Modern Western
This film explores the consequences of sprawl, the history of
this automobile-centered pattern of development, and profiles
places where sound public policy and good land use planning have
stemmed the tide of sprawl.
http://www.subdividefilm.com
Tools for Watershed Protection in Developing Areas
Part of EPA’s Watershed Academy 2000, this module outlines
a watershed protection approach that applies eight tools to protect
or restore aquatic resources in an urbanized or developing watershed.
http://www.epa.gov/owow/watershed/wacademy/acad2000/protection/
