Toward the Livable City is intended for commuters, suburbanites, and
city dwellers concerned about making their lives more livable and
interested in knowing what that might mean. Combining first hand
accounts of the attractions and distractions of city life, this book
also introduces a wide range of perspectives about creating successful,
livable cities, with examples from across America and around the
world.
The book conveys what leading thinkers--including James Howard Kunstler,
Jane Holtz Kay, Tony Hiss, Phillip Lopate, Bill McKibben, Myron Orfield,
and john powell, among others--say about such topics as smart growth,
opportunity-based housing, traffic calming, pedestrian rights, regional
planning, riverfront redevelopment, urban agriculture, and the pleasures
of a saunter down tree-lined streets to restaurants, theatres, shops,
with the presence of other people.
The mayor of Curitiba, Brazil, closed downtown streets to cars and built
bus stops that load and unload passengers with the same speed as
subways. In Boston, urban agriculture produces more than 10,000 pounds
of vegetables each season. Minneapolis has redeveloped its riverfront
while Manhattan ponders what to do along the Hudson. With these and
other examples, Toward the Livable City reveals the many benefits of
parks, healthy neighborhoods, and mixed use communities.
