Ecologically Based Municipal Land Use Planning

Rating:
Summary: Ecologically Based Municipal Land Use Planning
Review: ESRI Magazine:

"Honachefsky provides nuts and bolts solutions for controlling urban sprawl, emphasizing the integration of federal, state, and local land use plans. It discusses ecological resources and provides practical solutions that municipal planners can implement immediately. It discusses the most recent scientific data, how to extract what is important, and how to apply it to the local land planning process. The author includes the application of GIS to problem solving, and he generated all the GIS-derived color maps in the book using ArcInfo and ArcView."

Environmental Building News:

"This book is a thorough and practical presentation of two fundamental planning principles: (1) incorporating the science of ecology into land planning fulfills its real purpose of protecting "the long-term interests and future well-being of the community"; and (2) zoning should be one tool used in implementing a sound municipal master plan and not the other way around. A must-read for land planners and citizen planning board members."

ECOIq Magazine:

"His book incorporates the latest research, GIS mapping techniques, and a host of unique ecological indicators into a new approach to land use planning. The goal is to broaden the process beyond the considerations normally involved in zoning. It provides easily understood, nuts and bolts solutions for controlling urban sprawl, emphasizing the integration of federal, state, and local policies and plans."

Tidepool Books:

"Ecologically Based Municipal Land Use Planning -- a new book with some very new ideas about incorporating the values and services of our ecological infrastructure into our development and land use decision making. Ignore the academic title, and you'll find a useful, well written and well illustrated book packed with the latest thinking on land use management, written in non-condescending but easy to understand terms and punctuated with anecdotes from the author's 30 year career as an environmental scientist, investigator and professional planner."

Rating:
Summary: Much Needed Ecological Planning Guide
Review: Honachefsky provides planning practitioners with a much-needed justification and framework for moving land use planning in a more sustainable direction. Through ecosystem inventories, use of indicators of the health of community natural resources, and GIS mapping tools, land use plans can better complement rather than ignore natural systems. Provides a lot of detail but not overwhelming. I would have like a little more how-to instruction.