Landscape Ecology

In chapter 16 I appreciated the basic definitions provided by the author concerning the topics covered (landscape ecology, urban forestry and wetlands). I have great respect for the natural world and enjoy spending time in it, but am greatly unfamiliar with the science behind it all. So it was good to review the basic ecological concepts. Maybe most beneficial for me were the components of spatial structure: matrix, patch, corridor, and mosaic.

I can see how this book would be a handy reference to have on the bookshelf when it comes to a chapter like this and the ones we discussed last week about storm water management and stream restoration. The chapters provide good illustrations and diagrams on a whole range of things. An example from this chapter would be the four-level vegetation classification system on page 517. It’s interesting for me to look at now, but I would need to refer back to it in the future to really use it.

Also in Chapter 16, I learned for the first time about American Forests and some of their work. The CITYgreen application sounds like a very useful tool for municipalities. The image of Atlanta on p. 527 is rather disturbing.

Sprawl

The authors of Measuring Sprawl and Its Impact do planners, politicians, and citizens a favor by conducting research and analyzing data that quantifies sprawl in a more comprehensive way than ever before. The four factors used to determine sprawl scores for MSAs are residential density, neighborhood mix of homes, jobs, and services, strength of activity centers and downtown, and accessibility of the street network.

It was interesting, but not necessarily shocking, to learn that many cities in the Southeast scored very low (more sprawl) because they were designed around the automobile. New York scored very high all around in all four factors, with Jersey City not far behind. It's a city I don't usually think about, but as far as sprawl goes its doing very well!

In the section of the article that discusses other sprawl studies, the authors point out that Kahn explored the potential benefit of sprawl in term of keeping housing affordable and creating greater equality of housing opportunities across racial lines. I know we discussed this a bit a long time ago in another class, but I'd forgotten about it and it's important to keep it in mind.

Environmental Impacts of Transportation (Air Quality)

Apparently there are very significant environmental impacts of transportation on air quality as the first article stated: “the transportation sector is projected to be the fastest growing contributor to carbon emissions in the next twenty years. Our Built and Natural Environments provided a good overview of the relationships between land use, transportation, and environmental quality. I think I’d read about induced traffic before but I thought there was another term for it. In any case, I wonder if the concept of induced traffic is accepted in all circles or if it is scrutinized; it is referred to as a theory so it must be open to criticism by those who promote expansion of road as a way to reduce congestion. It makes me question the expanding of a road in South Asheville which includes the addition of a bridge over the French Broad River as well. The article states that communities are realizing that the addition of road capacity is not by itself a viable long-term solution to problems of traffic congestion. I should do more research to find out whether or not there land use-based solutions as well that are part of this plan to relieve congestion to a part of Asheville that is responding to growth.

The article “Cleaning the Air” was informative for me in detailing efforts made by the federal government to advocate for clearer air among the states. The Clean Air Act in its original state (1970) as well as with the amendments in 1990 that require MPOs to create TIPs and LRTPs which meet state requirements in the SIP seem to be good steps in that direction. The Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement program provides a set of federal funds to help states and local govts meet the air quality standards set up under the Clean Air Act via innovative transportation projects and programs. Again, sounds great especially because the article mentions the CMAQ gets broad support from a variety of interests. Then the article launches into threats to these 2 federal efforts by the Bush administration which was fairly depressing. I just hope, as the author pointed out, that if an appropriate method for determining the cost-effectiveness of the CMAQ is agreed upon, that it highlights the benefits of the program and/or improves it.

NMT

I felt blindsided by the readings put out by the US DOT because they paint a picture of all the benefits of bicycle and pedestrian planning and how to do it, but the comments in class point out how difficult it is to actually work with the DOT to get any of these things done. That’s frustrating on so many levels, but based on other comments in class it became clear that it’s also possible, with enough citizen initiative, to get the DOT (NCDOT in this case) to move forward with bicycle planning as was the case earlier this year with the Asheville bike plan. It’s this class commentary that allows me to see the reality of different aspects of planning which is a great complement to the readings.

One question I had that I didn’t ask in class was if there were any known examples of communities that took bicycle planning into their own hands after being frustrated by agonizingly slow government and stubborn governmental agencies. Once I thought more about it though I realized you can’t really work outside of government on this sort of thing because you’re working with public land. I’m sure there are aspects of bike planning that get contracted out to private agencies, but the government does have to be intimately involved.

The documents put out by the World Bank were very surprising for me, but I appreciate the efforts of the World Bank to encourage NMT planning (which I is the first time I’ve said I appreciate the World Bank so it was a revelation for me). I had not considered the thought that developing nations would have planned for NMT. I had the impression that masses of people in China and India just took their lives in their hands by sharing roads with motorized transit and this does appear to be the case in many cities. I was pleasantly surprised to read about plans for bicycling in Bogota and South Africa, but thought about my friend who grew up in Colombia and was not allowed to learn how to ride a bike because it was something only boys did. One of the articles addressed this issue, albeit in a short paragraph about women and bicycling. It was a particularly disturbing to think about half of the population not being included in this type of transport, and I think it would be interesting to learn more about the social and cultural norms surrounding bicycling in counties like Colombia and India and China.

Edgier Cities

While this article by Joel Garreau is not a resounding vote of confidence for what planning will contribute in the future, maybe it can be seen as a helpful hint to the planning community to chill out. It had a calming effect on me, for sure, because I get a certain sense of anxiety when I see huge box stores cropping up and when I think about these un-urban centers (edge cities) that don't have the same characteristics that make urban areas so appealing to me (walkability, density, etc). Yet Garreau has imagined a transformation of these edge cities that is quite appealing to me with people, specifically young-ish artist types, taking the lead and making them their own. And this calls to mind the idea that people are creative beings and when presented with a problem or unsatisfactory set of circumstances, many of them will rise to the challenge and solve the problem. Garreau is onboard with this idea, especially it seems if people are given the freedom to use their creativity and not held constrained by rules, regulations... extensive planning in the Irvine example.

This may be an idealized point of view from Garreau and perhaps it does not take into account all the circumstances that it should about the future of edge cities, but what cool ideas about how these places will eventually be seen as historic wonders- if we let things happen and let the city be the "living organism" that he claims it is. These are fascinating ideas and the article was a mind-opening read.

The Commons

Firstly, I haven’t read about the commons since my undergrad days and I definitely had a limited definition in my mind about what constitutes the commons. So this article was integral in opening up my mind as to what commons can be: not just land that is jointly farmed but marine areas, forests, dialects, air, silence, and genetic diversity to name a few. And to get more abstract, the author says that it’s not fruitful to define the commons through their physical domains, but instead through their social and cultural organizations. I particularly appreciate working with the definition of “a system of common rights”. This is a big shift from my other impression of the commons but it is more encompassing which seems necessary given the examples in the article.

Also contributing to my new impression was the information about how these systems are regulated with communal rules and practices and how crucial it is to keep this power at the local level. One reason for this makes complete sense: when people rely directly on their natural surroundings to sustain themselves they also develop an intimate knowledge of their surroundings and this knowledge directly informs their actions. This sounds ideal at first and one might think that all contributors would agree on issues because they are working with this set of common, intimate knowledge about their common rights, but that’s not necessarily true. I agree that people are more connected and informed about their surroundings and this is of huge significance, but that doesn’t mean they will always agree on what action to take about their surroundings. Having said that, I agree that it’s important to keep power at the local level for this and the other reasons listed.

It was interesting that the author pointed out that government, international planning agencies and also many conservationists hold hostility towards commons regimes. Members of these groups think that local control over land, forests, and streams will lead to environmental destruction. Then the author’s bias really comes out when he says the only way they think you can protect the environment is to put a fence around it and give it economic value through development. It was easy for me to get sucked into the romanticism of the commons from reading this article but this comment was a blast back into the reality that not everyone agrees with the system of common rights.

Expectations

My expectations for this course are...

1) to get my brain around the big picture of environmental planning and policy
2) to get my brain around how big picture environmental planning and policy are implemented at the local level
3) to get my brain around how local level politics can effect bigger picture environmental policy and planning
4) to research environmental policy in some regard to affordable housing (and get my brain around it)
5) to contribute to meaningful class discussion based on my experiences and our assigned reading