BOOK REVIEWS
Books are important. CharacterTowns.org selects and discusses current publications and works from previous generations that still hold wisdom for contemporary city-building. The review also includes published reviews and Youtube links to discussions by or about the author. Books are selected from the attached Suggested Readings.
Lean Thinking 4.0: Enhance the Wisdom of People with the Power of Lean by Robert Brown
ONE SMALL STEP FOR LEAN THINKING; A GIANT LEAP FOR ALL ORGANIZATIONS. Lean Thinking 4.0 is the latest evolution of Lean, enabling any organization to apply Lean tools and concepts to their most valuable resource, people. In Lean Thinking 4.0 you will discover how to: Improve people interactions Mistake-Proof many people interactions Create high-performing teams […]
Life Between Buildings, Using Public Space by Jan Gehl
Jan Gehl has put together an extended career doing urban workfocused on the human scale of cities…designing urban places andspaces for humans that travel at the speed of 5 kilometers an hour. His hometown of Copenhagen serves as a great platform for his discussion of walking and biking as the basis for an urban […]
Lights Out: A Cyberattack, A Nation Unprepared, Surviving the Aftermath by Ted Koppel
Implications for Small Cities and Towns. Electricity is the essential infrastructure in America’s economy andsociety. Small cities and towns have it within their power to establish plans, processes and systems to create a degree of energy self-sufficiency and sustainability for their residents and businesses. While conservation is a big part of the city’s ultimate system, alternative […]
Losing Earth: A Recent History by Nathaniel Rich
From Amazon: By 1979, we knew nearly everything we understand today about climate change―including how to stop it. Over the next decade, a handful of scientists, politicians, and strategists, led by two unlikely heroes, risked their careers in a desperate, escalating campaign to convince the world to act before it was too late. Losing Earth […]
Missing Middle Housing by Daniel G. Parolek
Thinking Big and Building Small to Respond to Today’s Housing Crisis “Today, there is a tremendous mismatch between the available housing stock in the US and the housing options that people want and need. The post-WWII, auto-centric, single-family-development model no longer meets the needs of residents. Urban areas in the US are experiencing dramatically shifting […]
Neighborhood Planning: A Guide for Citizens and Planners by Bernie Jones
First published in 1990. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company. This guide explains neighborhood planning for both citizens and professionals. It explains what information to collect, where to get it, and how to assess it; how to pinpoint key issues, set clear goals, and devise strategies to achieve them; and […]
Neighborhood Planning: A Guide for Citizens and Planners by Bernie Jones
First published in 1990. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company. This guide explains neighborhood planning for both citizens and professionals. It explains what information to collect, where to get it, and how to assess it; how to pinpoint key issues, set clear goals, and devise strategies to achieve them; and […]
Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth
Futurism based on conventional thinking finds an uncomfortable home in Professor Fuller’s book. Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth is another “oldie but goodie” that has fallen out of public view. Buckminster Fuller, 1885-1983, is a character, impatient with conventional thinking. He was also a professional futurist who forecasted significant events decades in advance of their occurrence. […]
Our Towns: A 100,000-Mile Journey into the Heart of America by James Fallows and Deborah Fallows
“Our Towns: A 100,000-Mile Journey into the Heart of America” provides important insights into the success of small cities and towns across America. The Fallows spent four years traveling, by small plane, across America visiting small cities and towns; 43 small cities. They not only visited but they engaged with each, meetings with business owners, […]
Parks and Recreation System Planning by David L. Barth
A New Approach for Creating Sustainable, Resilient Communities. FROM CharacterTowns.org… David Barth has provided the city-buildingprofessions with a holistic guide for developing a great parks systems whileusing it to develop a great city. The power of the parks and recreation system to address the full range of social issues is presented in terms of tactics […]
Planning School Grounds for Outdoor Learning by Cheryl Wagner and Douglas Gordon, Hon. AIA
Almost every K–12 school has at least some outdoor space that faculty could use (or already do) to breathe life into concepts learned in the classroom. Even within tight urban settings, many schools have had success using rooftops to install safe and secure play and garden areas. Research shows that students better absorb and retain […]
Planning Small and Mid-Sized Towns, Designing and Retrofitting for Sustainability by Avi Friedman
“Small and mid-sized suburban towns house two-thirdsof the world’s population and current modes of planningfor these municipalities are facing challenges of both philosophy and form. Common approaches that have prevailed in past decades no longer sustain new demands and require innovative thinking. Rather than dismissing small and mid-sized towns as unattractive suburban sprawl, Planning Small and […]
Plastic Game Changer by Amanda Keetley
How to Reduce Plastic in your Organization to Make a Difference to Plastic Pollution. “Our beautiful oceans are filling with plastic. Devastating marine wildlife and disrupting fragile ecosystems; it is also threatening to be a futurehuman health disaster. We must act now to limit the damage. The only way to stem the flow is to […]
Playing to Win, How Strategy Really Works by A.G. Lafley and Roger L. Martin
Michael Porter inspired A.G. Lafley and Roger L. Martin to write a book about strategy; namely, Playing to Win, How Strategy Really Works. Lafley and Martin present strategy as “an integrated cascade of choices” with five questions: “What are our winning aspirations? “Where will we play? “How will we win? “What capabilities must be in […]
Power Failure, Politics, Patronage, and the Economic Future of Buffalo, New York.
Power Failure [2006] is a terrific analysis of the process whereby a prosperous town deteriorated into a failed city due to its political toxicity. Ms. Dillaway, a professional city planner with twenty-five years of experience in California, has many publications and presentations to her credit. As a native of Buffalo, she returns home and tries to […]
Rationality: What it is, Why it seems Scarce, Why it Matters.
Can reading a book make you more rational? Can it help us understand why there is so much irrationality in the world? Steven Pinker, author of Enlightenment Now (Bill Gates’s “new favorite book of all time”) answers all the questions here. Today humanity is reaching new heights of scientific understanding–and also appears to be losing […]
Reaching for the Future, Creative Finance for Smaller Communities
Reaching for the Future, Creative Finance for Smaller Communities[embeddoc url=”https://www.charactertowns.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Financing-small-cities.pdf” width=”100%” download=”all” viewer=”google”] is another wonderful ULI publication that addresses an important facet of city government with a range of financing and funding options useful in supporting public infrastructure and operations.. FacebookTweetLinkedInEmail
Reaching for the Future, Creative Finance for Smaller Communities by Tom Murphy, Maureen McAvey and Bridget Lane
ULI continues to produce professional studies useful to the development community and the small cities and towns they serve. This one addresses finance programs and their use described in six case studies. Although the information and programs apply to the entire city, there are valuable lessons and tools for neighborhood association use. The task is […]
Reaching for the Future, Creative Finance for Smaller Communities by Tom Murphy, Maureen McAvey and Bridget Lane, ULI
SUMMARY. ULI continues to produce professional studies useful to the development community and the small cities and towns they serve. This one addresses finance programs and their use described in six case studies. Although the information and programs apply to the entire city, there are valuable lessons and tools for neighborhood association use. The task is to adapt the discussed […]
Recast Your City: How to Save Your Downtown with Small-Scale Manufacturing
“Too many U.S. cities and towns have been focused on a model of economic development that relies on recruiting one big company (such as Amazon), a single industry (usually in technology), or pursuing other narrow or short-term fixes that are inequitable and unsustainable. Some cities and towns were changing, even before the historic retail collapse […]
Regenerating Older Suburbs by Richard Peiser
OVERVIEW FROM ULI… “How can aging inner-ring suburbs remain vital and attract the strategies and solutions employed by 10 inner-ring suburbs—some experiencing significant redevelopment and others striving to attract redevelopment.” “Richard B. Peiser was appointed the first Michael D. Spear Professor of real estate development in the department of urban planning and design at Harvard […]
Retrofitting Suburbia: Urban Design Solutions for Redesigning Suburbs
“Updated with a new Introduction by the authors and a foreword by Richard Florida, this book is a comprehensive guide book for urban designers, planners, architects, developers, environmentalists, and community leaders that illustrates how existing suburban developments can be redesigned into more urban and more sustainable places. “While there has been considerable attention by practitioners […]
Sea Level Rise A Slow Tsunami on America’s Shores by Orrin H. Pilkey and Keith C. Pilkey
“In Sea Level Rise Orrin H. Pilkey and Keith C. Pilkey argue that the only feasible response along much of the U.S. shoreline is an immediate and managed retreat. Among many topics, they examine sea level rise’s effects on coastal ecosystems, health, and native Alaskan coastal communities. “They also provide guidelines for those living on […]
Seeing Trees, A History of Street Trees in New York City and Berlin by Sonja Dümpelmann
From Yale Books: “A fascinating and beautifully illustrated volume that explains what street trees tell us about humanity’s changing relationship with nature and the city. “Today, cities around the globe are planting street trees to mitigate the effects of climate change. However, as landscape historian Sonja Dümpelmann explains, the planting of street trees in cities […]
Seeing Trees, A History of Street Trees in New York City and Berlin by Sonja Dümpelmann
FROM YALE BOOKS… “A fascinating and beautifully illustrated volume that explains what street trees tell us about humanity’s changing relationship with nature and the city. “Today, cities around the globe are planting street trees to mitigate the effects of climate change. However, as landscape historian Sonja Dümpelmann explains, the planting of street trees in cities […]
Seeing Trees; A History of Street Trees in New York City and Berlin by Sonja Dümpelmann
“A fascinating and beautifully illustrated volume that explains what street trees tell us about humanity’s changing relationship with nature and the city. “Today, cities around the globe are planting street trees to mitigate the effects of climate change. However, as landscape historian Sonja Dümpelmann explains, the planting of street trees in cities to serve specific functions […]
Shaping Our Nation: How Surges of Migration Transformed America and Its Politics [2013].
Population origins make a difference. Shaping Our Nations by Michael Barone tells the story of several mass migrations and imigrations that have happened in the United States since the 1600s and a few that surprisingly did not happen. His research is broad and his data is compelling; it explains the demographic composition of contemporary America and […]
Sidewalks and Trails
From the Florida Department of Transportation From CT.org…FDOT has done a great service in describing their ideas and specs for sidewalks. A useful guide plus links to three other resources. From FDOT…”To meet the needs of all pedestrians, designers must have a clear understanding of the wide range of abilities that occur within the population. […]
SIMSOC, The Coordinator’s Manual by William A. Gamson with Larry G. Peppers
An Overview. SIMSOC (which is pronounced sim-sock and stands for simulated society) is the most versatile role-playing game in the world. It has been used by hundreds of thousands of people and tens of thousands of groups, in introductory sociology courses and business seminars, for firsthand understanding of the forces that determine success or failure […]
Small Town Economic Development: Reports on Growth Strategies in Practice by Joaquin Jay Gonzalez III, PhD, Roger L. Kemp, PhD, Jonathan Rosenthal, MPA, AICP
The book begins with nine articles on the state of small towns and cities in the United States, and ends with another eight articles on warnings and challenges for the future. In between, the bulk of the book is focused on best practices in economic development. These include ideas in leadership and strategy, marketing and […]