Designing Sustainable Cities

Citation

(2010), "Designing Sustainable Cities", International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, Vol. 11 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijshe.2010.24911bae.003

Designing Sustainable Cities

Article Type: Books and resources From: International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, Volume 11, Issue 2

Edited by R. Cooper, G. Evans and C. Boyko,Wiley,Chichester,August 2009,€72.90,336 pp.,ISBN 1405179155,

This book offers practical solutions to achieving sustainable urban design and development, and helps designers communicate these solutions effectively to planners, developers, and policy makers. Addressing sustainability issues in relation to the design and planning of the urban environment is a complex, multi-disciplinary issue, and solutions never arrive from a single perspective. The authors use design as a facilitating factor to consider when and by whom decisions that contribute to sustainability are made. Through three major city-center case studies – London, Manchester, and Sheffield – they consider social, environmental, and economic factors and examine their relationship to the decision-making process.

Designing Sustainable Cities begins by identifying the key processes and lead decision makers. The following chapters develop an understanding of the dimensions of sustainability, presenting the tools by which the dimensions can be analysed. Later chapters illustrate the trade-offs and the relationships between the dimensions of sustainability – with case study examples – as well as the use of IT in making design decisions.

Finally, the book gives recommendations for future approaches to the design, development and on-going management of urban environments. Through an analysis of the theories and concepts, evidence-based policy and three empirical city-center case studies, this book offers innovative models and operational solutions to achieving sustainable design and development.