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This Is Smart Growth Showcases Development at its Best
Many people want to know what smart growth looks like. This Is Smart Growth, a publication from the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) and the Smart Growth Network, illustrates and explains smart growth concepts and outcomes. This full-color booklet describes how, when done well, development can help create more economic opportunities, build great places where people want to live and visit, preserve the qualities people love about their communities, and protect environmental resources.
20 Actions Governors Can Take
The National Governors Association's (NGA) Health and Dignity Task Force provides this issue brief on ways to improve long-term health care issues in America.
2003 Advocates' Guide to Housing and Community Development Policy
The National Low Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC) publishes the Advocate's Guide to Housing and Community Development Policy each year to help keep advocates current on a wide range of issues, programs and tools at play in the world of housing policy, and to serve as a primer for those new to the field.
21st Century Land Development Code
In 21st Century Land Development Code from APA Planners Press, two of the nation's leading experts in land-use law and planning provide a comprehensive guide to drafting and updating land-use regulations.
A Guide for Property Owners Returning to New Orleans
The National Trust for Historic Preservation offers this two-page guide for property owners returning to New Orleans. This overview is designed as an initial guide in helping property owners minimize structural and cosmetic flood damage.
A Guide to Aging in Place
The National Aging in Place Council (NAICP) has create an online Guide to Aging in Place. This resource, indexed by topic, provides detailed information about things to consider if you want to remain living independently in your own home throughout retirement.
A Guide to Smart Growth and Cultural Resource Planning
A Guide to Smart Growth and Cultural Resource Planning, prepared by the Wisconsin Historical Society's Division of Historic Preservation, is now available.
A Legal Guide to Urban and Sustainable Development for Planners, Developers and Architects
Written by pioneering attorneys in the emerging fields of urbanism and green building, A Legal Guide to Urban and Sustainable Development for Planners, Developers and Architects offers you practical solutions for legal issues you may face in planning, zoning, developing, and operating such communities.
A Reporter’s Resource and Media Guide to Growth in CA
Unprecedented population pressures throughout California are threatening the state’s natural values and pristine landscapes. The threat is largely the result of land use policies that favor low-density development over carefully planned growth within existing urban boundaries.
A Residents' Guide to Creating Safe and Walkable Communities
People need walkable communities where sidewalks, trails, and street crossings are safe, accessible, and comfortable for people of all ability levels. A Residents' Guide to Creating Safe and Walkable Communities from the U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration, provides examples from communities that are working to improve pedestrian safety. It includes information, ideas, and resources to help residents learn about issues that affect walking conditions; find ways to address or prevent these problems; and promote pedestrian safety.
A Smart Growth Reader
A Smart Growth Reader, prepared by the American Planning Association (APA), is designed as an aid to understanding the various elements that make up Smart Growth. This on-line publication draws on articles that have appeared in APA publications over the past two years, and is intended as a rich compendium of perspectives on the smart growth.
A Strategy for Saving Rhode Island from Sprawl and Urban Decay
This briefing book from Grow Smart Rhode Island provides background information about issues that are critical for the state’s healthy economic and physical development, quality of life, and social well-being.
Achieving Equity and Inclusion in America
PolicyLink has developed Achieving Equity and Inclusion in America: Policy Principles for the Obama Administration and New Congress, a framework of principles that can guide federal decision-making to maximize the return on national investment for all Americans, especially low-income people and communities of color. These principles reflect the knowledge and experience PolicyLink has developed through its decade-long partnership with local leaders working to foster economic and social inclusion in communities across America.
Achieving Smart Growth in New Hampshire
The New Hampshire Office of Energy and Planning (OEP) has produced a report and website, Achieving Smart Growth in New Hampshire. This project documents how New Hampshire is changing and highlights some positive examples of development and conservation throughout the state.
Active Design Guidelines
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, architects and urban reformers helped to defeat infectious diseases, such as cholera and tuberculosis, by improving design of buildings, streets, neighborhoods, clean water systems and parks. In the 21st century, designers can again play a crucial role in combating the most rapidly growing public health epidemics of our time: obesity and its impact on related chronic diseases such as diabetes, heart disease and some cancers. Today, physical inactivity and unhealthy diet are second only to tobacco use as the main causes of premature death in the United States. A growing body of research suggests that evidence-based architectural and urban design strategies can increase regular physical activity and healthy eating.
The Active Design Guidelines provides architects and urban designers with a manual of strategies for creating healthier buildings, streets and urban spaces, based on the latest academic research and best practices in the field. A growing body of research suggests that evidence-based architectural and urban design strategies can increase regular physical activity and healthy eating.
The Guidelines includes:
- Urban design strategies for creating neighborhoods, streets and outdoor spaces that encourage walking, bicycling and active transportation and recreation.
- Building design strategies for promoting active living where we work, live and play—for example, through the placement and design of stairs, elevators and indoor and outdoor spaces.
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Discussion of synergies between active design and sustainable design initiatives such as LEED and PlaNYC.
The Active Design Guidelines was developed through a partnership of the New York City departments of Design and Construction, Health and Mental Hygiene, Transportation, City Planning and the Office of Management and Budget, working with leading architectural and planning academics, and with assistance from the American Institute of Architects New York Chapter. Other City agencies that contributed to the Guidelines include the Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities, Mayor’s Office of Long-Term Planning and Sustainability, Department of Buildings, Department of Parks and Recreation, School Construction Authority, Housing Preservation and Development and the Department for the Aging.
Ahwahnee Principles for Climate Change
At the 17th Annual Yosemite Conference for Local Elected Officials, a process was set in place by the Local Government Commission's (LGC's) Board of Directors to develop a set of guiding principles for local governments to use in response to global warming. A draft of Ahwahnee Principles for Climate Change was distributed at the conference for comments by all attendees.
AIA 50to50
50to50 from the American Institute of Architects (AIA) is a how-to resource intended to assist architects and the construction industry in moving toward the AIA's public goal of a minimum 50 percent reduction of fossil fuel consumption in buildings by 2010 and carbon neutrality by 2030.
Best Development Practices
APA Planners Press. 1996. In this book Reid Ewing argues that the best development is both profitable and sustainable. APA Planners Press.
Better Models for Development in California
Better Models for Development in California is a one of
a kind publication for creating, maintaining and enhancing livable communities in California.
Bringing Buildings Back
Abandoned properties are a plague across the United States, from rust belt cities like Detroit and Buffalo to small towns like Lima, Ohio, and Waterloo, Iowa. Even in Sunbelt cities such as Houston and Las Vegas, abandonment is a major problem, as investment flows to the periphery, leaving the older, inner neighborhoods behind. In Bringing Buildings Back, author Alan Mallach provides policymakers and practitioners with the first in-depth guide to understanding and dealing with the many ramifications that this issue holds for the future of our older cities.
Building Successful Communities in the Sierra Nevada
Planning for Prosperity: Building Successful Communities in the Sierra Nevada is designed to help decision-makers in the Sierra Nevada plan wisely and effectively for their communities' futures.
Caring for Your Historic Buildings
Technical Preservation Services (TPS) helps home owners, preservation professionals, organizations, and government agencies by publishing printed pamphlets and books -- easy-to-read guidance on preserving, rehabilitating and restoring historic buildings.
Cascadia Scorecard
Northwest Environment Watch (NEW) offers the Cascadia Scorecard, a new gauge of regional progress that monitors seven key trends--health, economy, population, energy, sprawl, forests, and pollution--that are profoundly shaping the region's future.
Chicago's Guide to Completing an Energy Efficiency and Conservation Strategy
Center for Neighborhood Technology recently helped to co-author Chicago's Guide to Completing an Energy Efficiency and Conservation Strategy, a guide that will help cities and counties to develop a long-term and sustainable energy efficiency and conservation plan.
Choosing Our Community's Future
Smart Growth America has released Choosing Our Community's Future, a guidebook developed to assist communities in shaping the growth and development of their neighborhoods, towns and regions.
Communities by Design
From the website: Communities by Design is the first in a series of AIA publications addressing livable communities from the architect's point of view. It is meant to stake out the AIA's position and get people to think of architects as integral to livability issues.
Community Development: A Guide for Grantmakers on Fostering Better Outcomes through Good Process
Community Development is a guide for funders on the valuable role of collaborative process in community development initiatives. It draws from the lessons learned by The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation during twenty years of funding conflict resolution, collaboration, and civic engagement.
Creating a Sense of Place: A Design Guide
Creating a Sense of Place: A Design Guide forms the third in a series of publications produced by Britain's Affordable Rural Housing Initiative, begun in 2003. It is a collaboration between two charitable organizations: Business in the Community and the Foundation for the Built Environment.
Creating Inclusive Communities in Florida
Creating Inclusive Communities in Florida is a manual that offers local officials and affordable housing advocates tools for overcoming NIMBYism, or the Not In My Back Yard syndrome.
Creating Successful Communities: A New Housing Paradigm
The 16-page brochure from the National Multi Housing Council takes on the conventional wisdom about housing preferences and is recommended for use with local planning and zoning boards or to support state and local advocacy efforts.
''Energy Efficient Construction'' Technical Bulletins
''Energy Efficient Construction'' is one of a series of Habitat for Humanity's free Energy Technical Bulletins. The documents provide basic how-to information for a variety of sustainable construction methods, materials and techniques.
EPA's Environmental Justice Collaborative Problem-Solving Model
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) Environmental Justice Collaborative Problem-Solving Model is a handbook for all stakeholders to understand how equitable development and local environmental and/or public health issues can be addressed through the Collaborative Problem-Solving (CPS) Model.
Field Guide to Green Homes and Green Mortgages
The National Assocation of Realtors® has produced an online Field Guide to Green Homes and Green Mortgages. This web digest of published articles covers many topics, including how to finance a green home, incorporating green home elements such as solar power and Energy Star appliances, and environmentally friendly building materials.
Getting the Growth You Want: A Citizens Guide to Subdivisions and Smart Growth
Getting the Growth You Want: A Citizens Guide to Subdivisions and Smart Growth is the first of a two-part series from the Montana Smart Growth Coalition and the Great Yellowstone Coalition designed to help communities approve good subdivisions and deny bad ones.
Getting to Smart Growth
This popular, 100-page primer from the ongoing series by ICMA and the Smart Growth Network describes concrete techniques of putting the ten smart growth principles into practice. The policies and guidelines presented in this primer have proven successful in communities across the United States, and range from formal legislative or regulatory efforts to informal approaches, plans, and programs.
Getting to Smart Growth II
Getting to Smart Growth II: 100 More Policies for Implementation is the newest primer
in the ongoing series from the Smart Growth Network and
ICMA, and follows on the heels of the extremely popular first volume of
Getting to Smart Growth. The publication serves as a road map for states
and communities that have recognized the need for smart growth but are
unclear on how to achieve it. Spanish language version now available!
Getting to Smart Growth: 100 Policies for Implementation (Spanish Version)
Getting to Smart Growth: 100 Polices for Implementation has been made accessible for Spanish readers and speakers. The document has been translated in its entirety, complete with all policies and practice tips.
Getting to Smart Growth: Puerto Rico
Getting to Smart Growth has been adapted for Puerto Rico. Hacia el desarrollo inteligente: 10 principios y 100 estrategias para Puerto Rico is an adaptation of the popular, 100-page primer from the ongoing series by ICMA and the Smart Growth Network.
Going Comprehensive -- Guidebook on Comprehensive Community Development
In Going Comprehensive, a guidebook on comprehensive community development from the Local Initiatives Support Corp., expert practitioners Anita Miller and Tom Burns examine the Comprehensive Community Revitalization Program that produced one of America's most remarkable urban turnaround stories -- New York's once-stricken South Bronx.
Great Neighborhoods: How to Bring them Home
The 1000 Friends Great Neighborhoods Project is intended to help teach the residents and developers in Wisconsin about the social, environmental and economic benefits of building compact, mixed-use, aesthetically appealing neighborhoods; and to offer professional and layperson guidance for how to advocate for and create these neighborhoods.
Green Building Guidelines -- Fifth Edition
The Green Building Guidelines is an easy-to read, builder-friendly primer for homebuilders across the nation. The Guidelines book was originally developed by a committee of builders, architects, building scientists, product manufacturers. This publication from Sustainable Buildings Industry Council (SBIC) was the first national green home building resource. Their work was supported by the Department of Energy's Building America Program through the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the Consortium for Advanced Residential Buildings.
Green Government Initiative Publications
NACo's Green Government Initiative Publications are free resources for local governments on all things green, including energy, air quality, transportation, water quality, land use, purchasing and recycling. Includes fact sheets, guidebooks, and case studies of Green Initiatives from throughout the country.
Green Rehab Guide for Multifamily Properties
The Green Guide for Rehab from Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) is an accessible and in-depth tool to help affordable housing owners and their consultants integrate green building and energy efficiency into the upgrades of their multifamily properties.
Growing Smarter, Living Healthier: A Guide to Smart Growth and Active Aging
This guidebook is intended for older adults who are interested in how our communities work and how we might help them become more 'age-friendly.' Many of us have longed for the kind of age-friendly neighborhood that has different types of homes for people at different stages of life; walking paths and public transit to make it easy to get around without a car; and parks, shops, services, and homes that are closer together. Older adults are finding that by designing new neighborhoods differently — as well as redeveloping existing neighborhoods and roadways — we can make places that are healthier for ourselves, our neighbors, and the environment. Rather than let aging limit our options, we can actually become more independent by reducing our dependence on the auto, increasing our travel choices, and improving our quality of life right when we've started to have time to enjoy it. We can enrich our own remaining decades, as well as hand off a more sustainable community to future generations. That is, if we decide to do something about it.
In this guide, we address the basic principles of neighborhood and town design. But it is also intended to help you understand why community design matters, and how becoming involved in your community's decisions about growth can make it a better place in which to grow old. You'll find suggestions for ideas to try, and links to resources to learn more about how to remake your neighborhoods to be easier to get around, whether you live in a city, suburb, or small town. We’ll also give you a few ideas for getting involved and staying engaged, providing more housing options and gathering places, eating healthier, and making it easier to carry out your daily activities. After all, our age group spans decades, and some of us are very active, while others have limited mobility.
Active Aging concepts (activities that increase endurance, strength, flexibility, balance, and the principles of injury prevention) can also be built into community design and development to encourage walking, biking, and active use of parks, so that people of all ages get exercise in the course of daily life.
This is an image of a group of senior women doing water aerobics in a pool
The first chapter, Staying Active, Connected, and Engaged, outlines why our choices of where and how to live can have an impact on our health and wellbeing. The next three chapters — Development and Housing, Transportation and Mobility, and Staying Healthy — outline strategies and include project examples that address these key issues. Within each chapter, the What You Can Do section provides some ideas for what you can work on with your friends and neighbors. The Conclusion: Next Steps chapter summarizes additional follow-up ideas. In the Resources chapter, you’ll find links to more detailed strategies, websites, and information about each of the ideas discussed in the guide. We included a community self-assessment checklist for you to identify what your community is already doing, and where you might want to focus your energy — so get together, and get moving!
Growing Smarter, Living Healthier: Age-Friendly Neighborhood Design Guidebook
Growing Smarter, Living Healthier is a guidebook from the U.S. EPA intended for older adults who are interested in how our communities work and how we might help them become more ''age-friendly.''
Guide to Neighborhood Placemaking in Chicago
Guide to Placemaking in Chicago provides basic instruction on Placemaking at the local level and highlights specific examples of citizen-led Placemaking that has already led to sweeping improvements in Chicago neighborhoods. The book encourages citizen action and provides a framework to engage local businesses and government in helping create positive change.
Guide to Transit-Oriented Development
The Minnesota Metropolitan Council's Guide for Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) highlights key ideas about TOD and shows how these ideas have been put to work within the Twin Cities metropolitan area.
Guiding Growth and Development in Georgia Handbook
Georgia's land use laws, together with innovative planning and fresh approaches to community engagement, provide the tools needed to build strong communities that are sustainable both economically and environmentally. Guiding Growth and Development in Georgia: A Handbook on Planning and Land Use Law and Practices was created by the Livable Communities Coalition for elected officials and interested citizens. This guide is intended to provide an overview of those planning tools and the laws, terms, and concepts essential for using them wisely.
Housing Development Step-by-Step Tutorial
Enterprise's Housing Development Step-By-Step (formerly known as the Housing Developer's Support System, or HDSS) is a comprehensive guide to affordable rental and homeownership housing development for nonprofit organizations.
How to Create a Vibrant Waterfront
This resource from the Project for Public Spaces (PPS) offers 19 tips on how to create a vibrant waterfront, drawing on success stories from around the world.
Impact Fees and Housing Affordability
As part of its efforts to reduce regulatory barriers to affordable housing product, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has issued Impact Fees and Housing Affordability: A Guide for Practictioners, a new guide for local governments to help them implement equitable impact fees. The report is a valuable resource for apartment firms promoting the sustainability of higher-density housing or opposing unreasonable impact fees.
Is Your City a Great City?
The Project for Public Spaces (PPS) offers a checklist on its website that provides benchmarks of a Great City.
Land Bank Authorities
Land Bank Authorities: A Guide for the Creation and Operation of Local Land Banks from Local Initiative Support Corporation (LISC) explores the development of land banks in St. Louis, Cleveland, Louisville, Atlanta, and Genesee County, Mich., addressing the conditions, history, and legal structures of each.
Leadership for Active Living Strategies
One of the most important issues our communities face today is a staggering increase in the rates of obesity and chronic disease. Active living offers an opportunity for leaders to address this issue and to help improve the health and vitality of our communities. The 22-page Action Strategies Booklet lists more than 25 strategies and tactics local and state governments can use to support active living.
Livability 101
Livability 101: What Makes a Community Livable? is designed by the American Institute of Architects’ Center for Communities by Design to help public officials, and all others actively engaged in this civic dialogue, understand the basic elements of community design and take advantage of existing tools, strategies, and synergies at the policy, planning, and design levels so that their communities can reach their full potential.
Livable Communities@Work #1: Community Organizing
A Populist Base for Social Equity and Smart Growth
This paper, released in November 2002, is the first in a new series being published by the Funders' Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities. The Livable Communities@Work series will focus on the practical aspects of how we create smarter, more livable communities for all and will highlight successful strategies, explore tensions created by competing issues, and generally help spur informed debate on critical topics.
Local Planning Handbook
The Metropolitan Council of the Twin Cities area in Minnesota has produced a Local Planning Handbook to guide and support local municipalities in developing and amending their comprehensive plans.
Local Tools for Smart Growth: Practical Strategies and Techniques to Improve Our Communities
Stories, tools and lessons learned from communities thoughout the nation on how to employ planning and development policy to improve quality of life and achieve smart growth goals.
MA State Sustainability Guide
The Massachusetts State Sustainability Planning and Implementation Guide, written by the State Sustainability Council in collaboration with Program staff, is a guidebook providing agencies with goals and actions that can be taken to initiate and advance sustainability efforts.
Massachusetts Agency Sustainability Planning and Implementation Guide
The Massachusetts State Sustainability Planning and Implementation Guide is a comprehensive guidance document written by the State Sustainability Council in collaboration with Program staff.
Minneapolis Sustainability Indicators
Produced by the City of Minneapolis, this publication list steps to creating a sustainable Minneapolis.
Model Smart Land Development Regulations
The American Planning Association's (APA's) Research Department has created 11 model Smart Growth Codes for Land Development. The model codes are ordinances and regulations that advance smart growth objectives in towns, cities, and counties. This project goes well beyond promoting the concepts of smart growth and moves into fundamental repair of the regulatory system.
Montana's Smart Growth Coalition Checklist
The Montana Smart Growth Coalition has created a quantitative checklist of criteria to determine if a development project is truly smart growth and deserves MSGC's support during permitting and marketing. A developer may use an MSGC endorsement for marketing purposes after the development is half built out.
One Future, Different Paths
The UK Government and Devolved Administrations has launched their new Strategic Framework, One Future -- Different Paths. This was launched in conjunction with the UK Government's new strategy for sustainable development, Securing the Future.
Overcoming Obstacles to Smart Growth Through Code Reform
The Local Government Commission’s Smart Growth Zoning Codes: A Resource Guide is intended to help local officials improve community livability through code reform.
Placemaking: Tools for Community Action
This guide provides a starter kit for a community member, city official, planner, or design professional to identify currently available planning tools and to assess their applicability and appropriateness to specific projects or issues, alone or in combination.
Post Carbon Cities: Planning for Energy and Climate Uncertainty
Post Carbon Cities: Planning for Energy and Climate Uncertainty is the first major guidebook on peak oil and global warming for local governments in the United States and Canada. It provides a sober look at how these phenomena are quickly creating new uncertainties and vulnerabilities for cities of all sizes, and explains what local decision-makers can do to address these challenges.
Realizing the Vision: 2040 Regional Framework Plan
An important new set of tools to help local elected officials and planners make land-use decisions is available from the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission (NIPC). The 2040 Regional Framework Plan plan is the culmination of an extensive public-involvement process that included 200 workshops where 4,000 participants expressed their vision of how the region should address growth through the year 2040.
Regional Comprehensive Plan: Charting a Course for Southern California's Future
The Regional Comprehensive Plan (RCP) is a problem-solving guidance document that responds to what the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) has learned about the region's challenges through the annual State of the Region report card. Through extensive outreach and input from the RCP Task Force, SCAG's policy committees, subregions, local governments and other key stakeholders, the RCP is a collaborative effort to address our region's challenges and set a path forward.
Removing the Roadblocks: How to Make Sustainable Development Happen Now
Removing the Roadblocks: How to Make Sustainable Development Happen Now, from UCLA School of Law and the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, presents a comprehensive guide for federal, state, and local governments and business leaders to follow to make sustainable development easier, more affordable, and more widespread.
Road Map to Understanding Innovative Technology Options for Brownfields Investigation and Cleanup
The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) produced the fourth edition of the Road Map to Understanding Innovative Technology Options for Brownfields Investigation and Cleanup to assist a broad audience of brownfields stakeholders in identifying and selecting innovative site characterization and cleanup technologies during the redevelopment process.
Shared Prosperity, Stronger Regions: An Agenda for Rebuilding America’s Older Core Cities
Shared Prosperity, Stronger Regions: An Agenda for Rebuilding America’s Older Core Cities is a report from PolicyLink demonstrating that, despite significant challenges, older core cities can become economically competitive places where all residents can participate and prosper. Shared Prosperity, Stronger Regions looks closely at five cities: Baltimore, Cleveland, Detroit, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh, and examines how innovative economic development, land use, transportation, neighborhood revitalization, and housing policies are bringing about significant economic and social revitalization.
Smart Bylaws Guide
West Coast Environmental Law has developed a Smart Bylaws Guide to assist local governments to implement smart growth strategies through policy and bylaw changes. The Guide brings together the best practices of municipalities across British Columbia, and highlights other innovators in the United States.
Smart Growth at the Frontier
This 84-page publication examines how rural areas may use urban and suburban smart growth strategies to combat sprawl.
Smart Growth Checklist
New Westminster, British Columbia, has developed a Smart Growth Checklist to assist landowners or developers and their consultants to create the most sustainable project possible.
Smart Growth for Coastal and Waterfront Communities
Smart Growth for Coastal and Waterfront Communities, an interagency guide developed in consultation with the national Smart Growth Network, builds on the network's ten smart growth principles to create coastal and waterfront-specific strategies for development.
Smart Growth Guidelines for Sustainable Design & Development
In Connecticut, the Capitol Region Council of Governments (CRCOG) partnered with the U.S. EPA to address the challenges and opportunities of growing smarter and building greener. Many of these challenges and opportunities are shared by communities and regions around the country. CRCOG collaborated with EPA’s Smart Growth Program to identify tools and strategies for implementing a state affordable housing program, HOMEConnecticut, to grow smarter, ensure healthy and affordable housing, and support long-term economic competitiveness at the local and regional levels.
The guidelines were developed for communities in Connecticut and around the country striving to get development and future growth that result in stronger neighborhoods, protected open space and watersheds, and healthier and more affordable homes. The guidelines also are applied to site-level conceptual plans for development that are featured in a companion report, Together We Can Grow Better: Smart Growth for a Sustainable Region.
Smart Growth Primer
The purpose of this Smart Growth Primer is to describe what kinds of strategies make up a smart growth approach to urban and near-urban development. At the same time, the Primer is an opportunity to share examples from the many communities in British Columbia that are already successfully using smart growth techniques.
Smart Growth Resources for Massachusetts Cities and Towns
This booklet from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts provides a comprehensive listing of financial and technical resources for cities and towns interested in promoting smart growth. The publication is produced by the Office of Commonwealth Development (OCD), which integrates energy, environmental, housing, and transportation policies, programs, and
Smart Growth Shareware
Smart Growth America offers Smart Growth Shareware, a free CD-ROM featuring 100 smart growth publications.
Smart Growth Zoning Codes: A Resource Guide
This guidebook
will help planners design a zoning code that encourages the
construction of walkable, mixed use neighborhoods and the
revitalization of existing places.
Smart Growth: A Guide to Developing and Implementing Greenhouse Gas Reduction Programs
Smart growth development, based on 10 key principles, benefits the economy, the community, the environment, and public health. This guide provides information on how local governments have planned, designed, and implemented approaches that encourage smart growth in their communities.
The guide is designed to be used by city planners, local energy managers and sustainability directors, local elected officials, regional planning agencies, metropolitan planning organizations, and citizen groups. Readers of the guide should come away with an understanding of smart growth principles and how they can be applied in practice, foundations and strategies for smart growth development, expected costs, and potential funding opportunities.
The guide describes the benefits of smart growth (section 2); planning and design approaches to smart growth (section 3); key participants and their roles (section 4); foundations for smart growth program development (section 5); implementation strategies for effective programs (section 6); investment and funding opportunities (section 7); federal, state, and other programs that may be able to help local governments with information or financial and technical assistance (section 8), and finally two case studies of local governments that have successfully implemented smart growth principles in their communities (section 9). Additional examples of successful implementation are provided throughout the guide.
The guide can be downloaded free at the link below.
This Smart Growth guide is one in a series of Local Climate and Energy Strategy Guides produced by EPA. While each guide stands on its own, the entire series contains many interrelated strategies that can be combined to create comprehensive, cost-effective programs that generate multiple benefits. Access the guides at www.epa.gov/statelocalclimate/resources/strategy-guides.html.
Smart Infill
The Greenbelt Alliance has released Smart Infill, a 72-page guide for
civic leaders and local citizens that shows how the Bay Area can achieve
more livable communities and more sustainable development by developing
underutilized land within existing urban areas. The report presents 12
key strategies to bring about well-planned infill housing and mixed-use
development. These recommendations include zoning changes, design
guidelines, public participation processes, revised parking
requirements, and preparation of ''Specific Plans'' coordinating
neighborhood revitalization.
Smart Plans
The Montana Smart Growth Coaltion offers a comprehensive list of Smart Growth Model Plans and Regulations on its web site.
Smart Scorecard for Development Projects
The purpose of a Smart Project Scorecard (SPS) is to assist elected local officials, developers, investors, neighborhood groups and designers make better project-level decisions that achieve the Smart Growth objectives.
Smart, Green and Growing Planning Guide
The Maryland Department of Planning (MDP) created the Smart, Green & Growing Planning Guide in response to the many requests from State and local government officials, smart growth advocates and interested citizens to produce a concise reference to planning and smart growth in Maryland. This guide provides you with a brief introduction to planning in Maryland, emphasizing key planning laws and tools that guide smart, sustainable growth.
SmartCode
This resource has been updated. Please see SmartCode V9.0 at the resource link below.
Stemming the Tide
Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) has produced Stemming the Tide: A Handbook on Preserving Subsidized Multifamily Housing. The book details the loss of thousands of subsidized houses in the U.S. during the past decade.
Sustainable Community Development Code -- Beta
The Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute has released a beta version of the Sustainable Community Development Code, a guidebook that provides extensive resources encompassing the broad scope of sustainable living.
Sustainable Prosperity: Grow Smart Rhode Island's Briefing Book for Candidates
A Blueprint for Sustainable Prosperity and Enhanced Quality of Place is Grow Smart Rhode Island's 2008 Candidates' Briefing Book, a nonpartisan effort to promote better understanding of growth and development issues and various strategies and best practices to tap Rhode Island's full economic, environmental and social potential.
Ten Principles for Coastal Development
The Urban Land Institute's booklet Ten Principles for Coastal Development provides guidelines for balancing the demand for coastal development with resource conservation, including public access vs. private property, sustainability, enhancing value through conservation, siting and construction, and more.
Ten Principles for Developing Affordable Housing
The Urban Land Institute's Ten Principles for Developing Affordable Housing provides a road map for affordable housing a reality in your community. The principles address building community support, leveraging public incentives and financing, creating effective partnerships, understanding your market and your customer, and the importance of good design and sustainability.
Ten Principles for Rebuilding Neighborhood Retail
This booklet will help you identify the key issues that neighborhood streets face, determine the most effective ways to rebuild them and ensure their long-term competitive position, and set strategic principles to guide the community, public planners, retailers, and developers.
Ten Principles for Suburban Smart Growth on the Fringe
Based on contributions from experts in the real estate industry as well as conservationists, Ten Principles for Suburban Smart Growth on the Fringe takes a fresh, realistic approach to suburban development, providing guidelines to make new development more attractive, accessible, efficient, environmentally sensitive, livable, and profitable.
The Business of Affordable Housing
The Business of Affordable Housing from the Urban Land Institute tells the secrets of ten firms, both for-profit and nonprofit, that are able to successfully produce affordable housing. Gain insight into best practices and diverse strategies for business plans, predevelopment, working with the community, complex financing, property management, and organizational growth and sustainability.
The Citizen's Guide to Planning
For decades, planning officials and engaged citizens have relied on The Citizens Guide to Planning for a better understanding of the basics of planning. The newly released Fourth edition describes the land-use planning process, the key players in that process, and the legal framework in which decisions are made.
The Great American Neighborhood
Great American Neighborhoods from GrowSmart Maine is a two-page information sheet that describes the Great American Neighborhood as a place where people of all ages can live, meet their daily needs, and spend their leisure time, all within walking distance; a place where kids can walk or bike to school and play with friends in the neighborhood; a place where people are brought together in their day-to-day lives, creating a sense of shared community.
The Green Home Guide
The Green Home Guide from the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) is a web-based resource for all aspects of green homes, including green home programs, remodeling guidelines, and news and events.
The SmartCode Solution to Sprawl
The SmartCode Solution to Sprawl from the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) is a practical guide to changing unsustainable land use patterns. The SmartCode is a comprehensive zoning tool designed by a diverse group of planners, designers, attorneys, developers, and concerned citizens led by Andres Duany, the noted land use expert and one of today's foremost urban planners.
TOD 202: Station Area Planning
Station Area Planning: How To Make Great Transit-Oriented Places is the first in a series of ''TOD 202'' guidebooks from Reconnecting America that promote best practices in transit-oriented development.
Transportation Improvement Program
''A Guide for Municipal Officials, Special Interest Groups, and Citizens.'' A pamphlet explaining how municipalities and interest groups can get involved in the region's transportation project development process.
Turning Bases into Great Places: New Life for Closed Military Facilities
Turning Bases into Great Places: New Life for Closed Military Facilities, a guidebook from the U.S. EPA, discusses how to create a vision for former installations that provides housing and transportation choices, creates a mix of jobs and housing, and makes the most of natural assets.
Unlocking the Promise
Unlocking the Promise: A Guide for Funders Interested in Transformational Grantmaking from the Funders' Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities focuses on the intersection of race, class, and access to opportunity, as related to growth and development decisions made by governments, private developers, and not for profit organizations in communities of all sizes.
Vision Dixie 2035
Vision Dixie is a historic effort by leaders throughout Utah's Washington County to build a vision for tomorrow based on the ideas and values of county residents. Through Vision Dixie, more than three thousand residents created a framework in which future development and transportation work together to create communities, and a region, that preserve Southern Utah's quality of life, along with an affordable, livable future.
Youth VOICES in Community Design Handbook
Youth VOICES in Community Design Handbook, a how-to guide on getting youth involved in local policymaking and community planning, provides a step-by-step guide to youth engagement and is supported by an extensive online library of articles and activities.
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