Understanding Soils in Urban Environments is a concise book explaining
how urban soils develop, change, and erode. Soils provide the foundation
for buildings and infrastructure, and the medium for plant growth in
fields, parks, and gardens. They can act as a sink for waste, and can be
contaminated in urban areas by heavy metals, organic chemicals and other
contaminants. Soil properties such as water retention, salinity and
acidity can cause environmental and structural problems for buildings
and other engineering works. This text recognizes and draws attention to
the particular nature of soils in urban environments and discusses their
distinctive management needs.
Since the first edition was published in 2011, it has been used across a
wide range of disciplines, many of which require an understanding of
urban soil and specific soil properties that cause environmental
concern. Urban soils are now recognized as much more important than they
were ten years ago, when they were seen as a poor relation to
agriculture. The need for better understanding of all aspects of this
topic has become evident especially at conferences in the last 5 years
in Australia and internationally, where urban soils are now included as
specific sections, not just as subsets such as contamination.
This new edition updates and expands on the original text, including a
specific chapter on the use of manufactured soil for rehabilitation and
recreation, and additional case studies in other chapters, particularly
on contamination. The text is also updated to address the increasing
importance of soil health for seed banks and parklands, and its
implications for planning developments, the legal determination of
bioregions, and addressing environmental issues that can arise from
mismanagement of urban soils.
