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An updated edition of the landmark classic by the leader of the ecocity movement
Most of the world's population now lives in cities. So if we are to address the problems of environmental deterioration and peak oil adequately, the city has to be a major focus of attention. EcoCities is about re-building cities and towns based on ecological principles for the long term sustainability, cultural vitality and health of the Earth's biosphere. Unique in the literature is the book's insight that the form of the city really matters-and that it is within our ability to change it, and crucial that we do. Further, that the ecocity within its bioregion is comprehensible and do-able, and can produce a healthy and potentially happy future. EcoCities describes the place of the city in evolution, nature and history. It pays special attention to the key question of accessibility and transportation, and outlines design principles for the ecocity. The reader is encouraged to plunge in to its economics and politics: the kinds of businesses, planning and leadership required. The book then outlines the tools by which a gradual transition to the ecocity could be accomplished. Throughout, this new edition is generously illustrated with the author's own inspired visions of what such rebuilt cities might actually look like.
Ecocity Berkeley offers innovative city planning solutions that would work anywhere, but the book offers a vision of what the future can be like with a fair amount of planning beforehand. This book is very inspirational, and could be used to advocate similar planning improvements in any large city. This book is meant for anyone interested in environmental activism, and anyone looking for serious innovations in their city.
This book presents a selection of the best papers submitted to the International Ecocity World Summit held in Vancouver, October 7-11, 2019. The objective is to accelerate knowledge dissemination about the development of ecocities through attention to what constitutes an ecocity, what cities around the world are doing, what Vancouver as an emerging ecocity is doing, and how education can play a role in preparing the next generation of ecocity practitioners. The book uses the Summit’s overarching theme and sub-themes as an organizing framework and aligns with the International Ecocity Standards that serve as a diagnostic tool to help cities assess their progress on the path to becoming ecocities. The Ecocity Standards are also proving useful to communities in developing locally relevant pathways to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The book is presented in four parts that align with the Summit overarching theme of i) building a bridge to socially just and ecologically sustainable cities, supported by sub-themes of ii) climate action, iii) circular economy, and iv) informal solutions for sustainable development. Chapters comprising each part in the book are introduced by a brief precis that orients the reader to the relevant Ecocity Standards that are being addressed and other important contextual considerations that open the potential application of the chapters to an international audience. Arguments presented in the selected papers provide an orientation to the importance of engaging people, where they live, in ecocity transformations as well as emerging opportunities for affordable and accessible technologies that help cities build capacity for implementation of ecocity initiatives.
Ecological and livable cities need an objective method to be examined. This book is in search of a method to determine the level of livability, ecology and energy efficiency. Ecological and sustainable cities need to properly make up for the existent weakness of the city's construction under fine ecological environment. The intention of this comparative study is an attempt to improve life quality in Tirana, Albania. It gives examples of successful strategies, e.g. bioclimatic solution through passive solar systems and the use of underground tunnels. This book is aimed at researches, professionals, architects and city planners.
As cities undergo vast changes due to industrialization, urbanization, and globalization, environmental considerations assume a growing importance in the urban planning processes of an increasing number of governments around the world. Several cities and regions around the world have already enacted policies that signal the emergence of a paradigm of sustainability in eco-cities planning. Providing an overview of urban ecosystem structure, function, and change, Eco-Cities: A Planning Guide addresses how to successfully accomplish eco-city planning that meets government requirements. It adds a new dimension to the understanding and application of the concept of urban sustainability, based on hypotheses about feedback between social and biogeophysical processes. Emphasizing integration, the first part of the book discusses various aspects of planning theory. It presents three innovative theories for socioeconomic models: a theory on the locational choices made by households and firms, an urban version of the stream continuum concept, and an application of metacommunity theory to the fragmented urban biota. These theories raise new urban planning questions and stimulate integrated modeling. The book also introduces urban planning modeling that uses existing social, vegetation, ecohydrological, and ecosystem service modules but is refined and operated for enhanced cross-disciplinary integration and prediction. The second part of the book consists of several case studies of Chinese eco-cities covering a majority of the urban development patterns that offer in-depth examples of planning practices currently in use. Drawing on experimentation, comparison, long-term measurement, and modeling, this fascinating guide helps readers better understand eco-cities and eco-landscapes as integrated, spatially extensive, complex adaptive systems. It lays a solid foundation for engagement between urban planners, researchers, educators, policy makers, and citizens as they work to adapt to changing environmental, social, and economic conditions.
Designing the Ecocity-in-the-Sky is a comprehensive resource on vertical urbanism and how to plan and design a vertical ecocity of 100 stories. The book covers the main objectives: ecodesign, concepts, habitats, and designing for biodiversity. There are detailed drawings, diagrams, and photos that work through the technical, research, analytic, and engineering issues of ecotowers and eco-engineering designs. The book is also helpful for anyone looking to understand multi-elevatoring concepts for multiuse towers, floor-plate designs for various usages, the effects of wind on towers, and other sustainable eco-engineering concepts.
By 2025, China will have built fifteen new 'supercities' each with 25 million inhabitants. It will have created 250 'Eco-cities' as well: clean, green, car-free, people-friendly, high-tech urban centres. From the edge of an impending eco-catastrophe, we are arguably witnessing history's greatest environmental turnaround - an urban experiment that may provide valuable lessons for cities worldwide. Whether or not we choose to believe the hype – there is little doubt that this is an experiment that needs unpicking, understanding, and learning from. Austin Williams, The Architectural Review's China correspondent, explores the progress and perils of China's vast eco-city program, describing the complexities which emerge in the race to balance the environment with industrialisation, quality with quantity, and the liberty of the individual with the authority of the Chinese state. Lifting the lid on the economic and social realities of the Chinese blueprint for eco-modernisation, Williams tells the story of China's rise, and reveals the pragmatic, political and economic motives that lurk behind the successes and failures of its eco-cities. Will these new kinds of urban developments be good, humane, healthy places? Can China find a 'third way' in which humanity, nature, economic growth and sustainability are reconciled? And what lessons can we learn for our own vision of the urban future? This is a timely and readable account which explores a range of themes – environmental, political, cultural and architectural – to show how the eco-city program sheds fascinating light on contemporary Chinese society, and provides a lens through which to view the politics of sustainability closer to home.
Eco-city planning is a key element of urban land use planning in perspective and of ongoing debate of environmental urban sustainable development with a spatial and practical dimension. The conceptual basis of ecological planning is that we can no longer afford to be merely human-centred in approach. Instead, the interdependency of human and non-human species has forced us to appreciate the ‘rights’ and ‘intrinsic values’ of non-human species in our pursuit for a sustainable ecosystem. This volume has as approach an emphasis on environmental planning policies whereby, for example, energy saving, anti-pollution measures, use of non-car modes, construction of green buildings, safeguarding of nature and natural habitats in urban areas, and use of more renewable resources are promotional norms. Their aims and leading outcome serve to protect the Earth from adverse effects of global warming and different sources of pollution threatening the quality of life of human societies.
A political scientist and an urban architect explore China’s odyssey to become an ecological civilization and transform its massive, unsustainable, urbanization process into one that creates hundreds of eco-cities. The resulting From Eco-Cities to Sustainable City-Regions is the first book-length study combining analysis of politics and power, urban design and planning issues derived from the co-authors’ interdisciplinary research, and on-site fieldwork from their political science and architectural area specialties.