No comments about Recapturing Democracy: Neoliberalization and the Struggle for Alternative Urban Futures.

No comments about Urban Sustainability Through Environmental Design.

No comments about Growing Greener: Putting Conservation Into Local Plans And Ordinances.

No comments about Garden and Landscape Architects of France.

No comments about The Livable City: Revitalizing Urban Communities.

2 comments about Green Development: Integrating Ecology and Real Estate.

1. An excellent overview of the evolving movement towards green development. The book is somewhat dated and lacks in-depth coverage in some areas. Regardless effectively gets you into the space.



2. This book throughly presents sustainable real estate development. It answers the basic questions of how, what, when, why and who with text and photos illustrating numerous case studies.

   It is written for a wide and concerned audience, composed of real estate professionals, financiers and designers. This book is not technical. It is a conceptual book and guides the reader toward sustainable solutions.

   This subject is very large and this book is necessarily a summary, which includes recent projects.

   This book does not "preach to the choir". It addresses difficult obstacles to the sustainable development paradigm and provides workable solutions.

3 comments about Sustainable Urban Design: An Environmental Approach.

1. This well-written and well-organized book, edited by English architecture and urban design professor Randall Thomas, provides a cohesive overview of the current state of theory, techniques and practices for the nascent field of sustainable urbanism. Urban designers, architects, planners, developers and others involved in the design of the built environment are the intended audience for the book.
   
   The book is organized into two parts. The first part, comprised of ten chapters, describes the concepts of sustainable urbanism, including principles and background of urban planning, transportation issues, landscape and nature in the city, building design, energy and information, materials, water, and waste and resources. The second part is a series of European case studies, showing best practices of sustainable urban design and building construction. The case studies are well-illustrated with black and white photographs, diagrams and line drawings, including construction details of such things as wall sections and chimney stacks, and provide useful information for design professionals.
   
   In his introduction, Thomas describes sustainability as being about "poetry, optimism and delight," and that energy use and CO2 figures are secondary concerns. Thomas recognizes the importance of contextual design beyond the building envelope and focuses his argument to inspire, rather than prescribe, sustainable solutions for the block, neighborhood, city and regional scale, though many of the case study examples seem to be focused on solutions for the building.
   
   Sustainable Urban Design is one of several books on the topic that have come out within the last couple of years and is a good complement to Douglas Farr's Sustainable Urbanism: Urban Design With Nature, Mike Jenks' Future Forms and Design for Sustainable Cities, and Matthew Carmona's Public Places - Urban Spaces.



2. i am enjoying shopping with Amazon, since i started working with them i am just trust what i get,...



3. This is a very well researched book - very informative and is now on my recommended reading list for my studio design course. Thoroughly recommended for anyone interested in this field.
   My only quibble is that some of the illustrations are a little too small to read easily.

2 comments about The Spectator and the Topographical City.

1. In this book, Mr. Aurand has achieved the surprising: The Spectator and the Topographical City far exceeds the high quality of his book on quirky Pittsburgh architect, Frederick Scheibler (The Progressive Architecture Of Frederick G. Scheibler, Jr). Aurand leads the reader/spectator on an engrossing tour of Greater Pittsburgh that is insightful, instructive and unexpectedly affectionate from a non-native Pittsburgher. The topography he reveals is physical, metaphysical and metaphoric.
   
   One is immediately impressed with the depth and breadth of the research this work entails. Aurand quotes sources on geology, history, architecture, art, religion, economics and more. This might seem frenetic, except for the skill with which they are used to tell an integrated story.
   
   The book establishes and elucidates the spectator/topography relationships in three principal locations: Downtown Pittsburgh, the Turtle Creek Valley and Oakland. Aurand traces how the natural and man-made topographies continuously shaped one another. He takes the reader through these iterations in the (now) downtown triangle as it morphed through centers of the spiritual, military, residential, industrial, religious, governmental and corporate. Appropriate attention is paid to the city's most important architectural landmark, Henry Hobson Richardson's Allegheny County Buildings.
   
   The story of the Turtle Creek Valley is typical of many industrial centers in the region. Aurand makes it plain, though, that the tale of this production center for iron, steel, railroad and electrical equipment must be told on a heroic scale. Here he deftly weaves history in terms of men (Carnegie and Westinghouse) and movement (industrialization). This is the setting for some of his most picturesque language, especially in evoking the power the great steel mills.
   
   By contrast, Oakland (a section of the city to the east of Downtown) and its surroundings became the locus of cultural and academic institutions, skipping the industrial phase of the other two locations. This account is presented with a concentration on the work of Henry Hornbostel, one of Pittsburgh's most skilled and beloved architects. Here, at two great universities, we learn the topography of large scale architectural design. One can argue that the city's eastern reaches succeeded Downtown as a religious center. In addition to Hornbostel synagogues, it boasts three churches by Ralph Adams Cram, one by Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue and one by the immediate successors of Richardson.
   
   The author makes excellent use of art and photographs. The convenience of illustrations visible from their reference in the text is most welcome. The size of illustrations, especially in the case of topographical diagrams, is somewhat small for ideal clarity. Perhaps that is just the engineer in the reviewer talking.
   
   This book will be especially appreciated by those who know something of the history and architecture of Pittsburgh. However, it would be an ideal introduction and basis for a general study of the city's architecture. (Ironically, Aurand's work on Scheibler - a particular architect in a particular era and a particular section of Pittsburgh - was this reviewer's first serious book on architecture.) The value of the book extends far beyond Pittsburgh, though. The author teaches a new way to see topography, in all the forms he reveals, which is invaluable in the study of any architectural context.



2. Mr. Aurand is an architecture librarian (at Carnegie Mellon University) and brings to this analysis of the city of Pittsburgh an understanding of how the growth and development of the city has been influenced by topography of its location. This book is a collection of illustrations (paintings, drawings, photographs) of parts of the city, concentrating on three areas: Downtown's Golden Triangle, the industrial Turtle Creek Valley, and the cultural and university district of Oakland.
   
   Pittsburgh has a long and varied history. It began as a transportation center as it is in the upper reaches of the Ohio river which begins at the confluence of the Allegheny and the Monongahela. Subsequently Pittsburgh became the quintessential industrial city, and after that a pioneer in the development of a sustainable, green city.
   
   Mr. Aurand presents a rather different view of the city as he discusses the development of the city through its topology.

No comments about Public Spaces - Prototypes.

No comments about Great Planned Communities.