No comments about Urban Environmentalism Global Change and the Mediation of Local Conflict.

3 comments about Cities: A Magisterial Exploration of the Nature and Impact of the City from Its Beginnings to the Mega-Conurbations of Today.

1. When I picked up this book, Cities by John Reader, I wasn't sure what I was going to think of it. I mean, c'mon, its a book about cities. But, I was pleasantly surprised. It is engaging book and one that tells interesting stories.
   
   I really enjoyed the early portions of the book as it looks over the ancient cities and discusses how they were formed. My historical knowledge of ancient cities is sorely lacking, so it was interesting to read how organized these cities were and the structure that made up these cities.
   
   The biggest complaint though that I had was that the story seemed to not quite know where to go from chapter to chapter. You begin by thinking the book would flow from ancient times and just progress to present time but it does not. It bounces back and forth from what goes into making up a city to plagues in a city to how to feed cities, etc. It often seemed disjointed.
   
   The story telling though is very good. The facts and figures are interesting (it was interesting to read of the difficulties to get food/grain into Rome 2000 years ago and that there were over 6 million individual loads taken from the shores to downtown Rome to be able to feed the Romans). I wish the organization was a bit better, but the book was enjoyable nonetheless.



2. This book seems to be getting good reviews, and to be honest I am not completely sure why. Let me begin with the good. It is an easy read and the story told is interesting. However this is not particularly a history and there are parts of the book that left me wondering what the point was. On the positive side, Mr. Reader begins the book with a particularly fascinating account of early cities beginning in Turkey and going to Sumaria.
   
   From here though he gets lost. He devotes very little time to Greece and Rome and then seems to gloss through history. Some of what he relates, while interesting sheds little light on cities or their development. His chapter on Francesco deMarco Datini comes to mind first. It is an interesting story and I am sure he has something to do with the development of cities or lives in them, but I was left unsure what. Much could be told about the rise of Renaissance Italy and its city-states such as Florence, Venice, Genoa, and Milan. But little is offered.
   
   Then there is his attempt to make political points. Sometimes it is pro-free market, sometimes pro-environment, sometimes it seems he is off to fight a battle against poverty that while maybe worthy, seems out of context. In fact at the end of many chapters he tries to bring in a modern point all too often. For example there is a chapter on the plague. It is interesting, but he never really explains how it was defeated in Europe. Instead we get some point on doctors and hospitals that seems to be a call for medical reform of some type. There is also a chapter on Hiroshima, which begins well enough and promises to hold interest. Questions like how did people live there after the bomb or how was the city rebuilt pop into my mind. From there he goes into a discussion of solar energy. What is the connection? What do we learn about the city in general or Hiroshima in specific?
   
   In short, this book wanders so much in such a short space I would give it only 1 star, but the stories, even though off-topic are interesting so I give this book three stars but suggest anybody really trying to learn history start somewhere else like say Alexandra Ritchie's book on Berlin.



3. With a subject as broad and diverse in its scope, and is as potentially weighty as humanities' urban complexes, one would think a book of the same name would cover over 500 pages and be detrimental to simple leisure browsing -- not so: Cities is a lively, engaging, and vigorous revelation of just how cities evolved, what made them thrive or decline, and how they transformed themselves to cultural centers over the centuries. Contrary to popular belief, cities actually fostered the growth of farming and hold a symbiotic and close relationship with the countryside and trade routes: John Reader's Cities provides a map of changes and the social, political and economic connections between cities and country around the world. The lively format the author John Reader created for Cities makes for an exceptional historical coverage which lends particularly well to leisure reading.

No comments about Environmental Planning for Site Development.

1 comments about Urban Fiction: Urban Utopias from the Antiquity until Today.

1. Throughout recorded human history, the concept of an ideal city has been a part of every culture that had some form of metropolis. That municipal idea is known in literature and legend as Utopia. In "Urban Fiction: Strolling Through Ideal Cities From Antiquity To The Present Day", Gunther Feurstein (who until his retirement was a professor at the Hochschule fur Gestaltung in Linz and also a lecturer at the Akademie der blindenden Kunste and the Technische Universitat in Vienna) takes the reader on an impressive series of examinations covering some 350 cities created and occupied throughout various periods time and in countries around the world. Accompanying an informed and informative text are more than 500 illustrations and overflights of 800 additional dream cities. The result is a lexicon of utopian notions of the ideal city, notions created by philosophers, artists, travelers, saints, dreamers, and city planners. From Palmanova, Freudenstadt, and Guise, to Brasilia, Lingang, and Auroville, intermixed are utopias drawn from literature, archeology, myth, and social reformers. Some are works of sheer imagination, others the result of innovative thinkers and hard work. Enhanced with the inclusion of a Bibliography, an Index, and a listing of Photo Credits, "Urban Fiction" is very strongly recommended for personal, professional, and academic library reference collections and supplemental reading lists as a unique, original, and seminal contribution to Urban Studies.

No comments about Above and Beyond: Visualizing Change in Small Towns and Rural Areas.

1 comments about The Portland Edge: Challenges And Successes In Growing Communities.

1. I am a professor of City and Regional Planning and I found this book a much-needed addition to the urban-planning literature. The book is written at a level appropriate for a wide range of audiences including planning students, policy makers, politicians, urban planners, and community activists. The comprehensiveness of the work provides a much-needed explanation for students yearning for a broader understanding of how an ensemble of urban elements can help American cities accommodate growth while sustaining a sense of community for their dwellers.
   
   What is unique about Portland's current land-use system? If planning is so popular, how does one explain the recent backlash? Where would be the balance between regulatory rules and other possibilities? These are examples of questions asked by The Portland Edge (edited by Connie Ozawa), written by a team of academics at Portland State University's School of Urban Studies and Planning. The thirteen chapters of the edited book are organized in four sections. The first section presents the demographic, economic, and civic character of the Portland region by presenting data on key dimensions of economy, equity, and environment. The second section traces Portland's growth-management policies and details the institutional structures by describing a range of the roles of regional and city bodies, such as Metro (the elected regional planning authority), the Portland Development Commission, citizen-involvement mechanisms, and neighborhood associations. The third section unveils Portland's social structures that allow people to create collective visions of community and offers examples of how the underrepresented groups and the citizen advocates work to voice themselves. The last section lays out several issues of the most interest, such as the liveliness of downtown and neighborhoods, housing affordability, implementation of state transportation and environment policies at the local jurisdiction level, and Portland's responses to the homeless.
   
   Those interested in examining the ways in which urban policy and planning have made a difference in the Portland region will find that the book offers a valuable overview of the region, a helpful background of the stressors on the current urban political and social system, and an effective explanation of current conditions in the context of the people and social institutions that have been influential in shaping today's Portland. The book offers the reader a comprehensive range of matters: each chapter picks a different angle of the inquiry--for example, the struggle between the well represented and the underrepresented, the competition between the central city and the suburbs, the rivalry between highways and transit, and the balance between Portland's natural landscapes and the interests of today's property owners. The bulk of the book presents a balanced view of Portland today through operationalizing the concept of quality of life. The book contributes in integrating environmental, social, and economic issues in a systematic evaluation framework that allows other communities to carry out critical and empirical inquiry to examine civic identity and urban environment in their communities. The book does a good job of what it intends to accomplish: to detail successes and challenges in Portland communities.

No comments about Innovation in Sustainable Housing: Tango.

No comments about Building Barcelona: A Second Renaixenca.

No comments about Civilizing Terrains: Mountains, Mounds and Mesas (Architectural Documents).

No comments about Planning and Decentralization: Contested Space for Public Action in the Global South.