Community By Design

Overview

*A practical guide to implementing New Urbanism principles in suburbs and small communities

*Case studies present clear solutions for typical suburban problems: the need for pedestrian access, the lack of parking, the presence of industrial-park eyesores, and the issue of how to create a "sense of place"

*Illustrations take architects and planners step-by-step through the design and development process

Table of contents

Part 1: Parts of the Puzzle.
Chapter 1: What is Community Design, Anyway?
Chapter 2: What's the Process of Community Design?
Chapter 3: What Is the Language of Design.
Chapter 4: What Is the Framework of Community?
Part 2: Putting It All Together.
Chapter 5: Where Would You Rather Live?
Chapter 6: Where Would You Rather Shop?
Chapter 7: Where Would You Rather Work?
Chapter 8: Where Would You Rather Relax?
Chapter 9: Learning How to Put It All Together.

Review quote

The suburban landscape of the United States – the all-too-familiar array of fast-food franchise, big-box retail stores, parking lots, and clogged arterials – the subject of Hall and Porterfield's book. … Guided by the principles of the Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU), the authors use excerpts from that organization's charter to illuminate their advocacy of more connected development patterns. The book’s scope extends beyond the commercial strip to include the major building blocks of towns and suburbs suck as apartment complexes, schools, parks, and office campuses. ...

One ideal audience for this book might be suburban planning commissioners, who need guidance from designers in order to understand the differences between conventional suburban development pods and walkable human-scale neighborhoods. The many black and white photographs of completed projects are helpful in this regard. ...

Review quote

by William A. Green, ASLA[Community by Design] was written for professionals, politicians, and citizens "taking an active role...and for those who are not yet part of the process but who want to know what it's about."Part 1, "Parts of the Puzzle," provides the reader with background on a variety of important topics and tools. In Chapter 1, "What is Community Design, Anyway?" the authors introduce basic definitions of neighborhood and community, present the building blocks of community design, and offer a description of spatial components and some of the community designer's tools.In "Putting It All Together" [Part 2], each chapter contains information focused on community design issues. With chapter titles including "Where Would You Rather Live?" and variants "...Shop?",...Work?",...Relax?", the authors present material that is well organized, clear, and accessible. In each chapter they describe pertinent issues, present patterns of development found in conventional suburban developments (those built after World War II), and offer alternatives from traditional neighborhood developments or those developments that are often found in older communities. Each chapter emphasizes some of the choices we have when designing communities as places for living, shopping, working, and relaxing. This comparative format works effectively.For illustration, the authors provide black-and-white photos, descriptive plans, and project profiles....Community by Design...provide[s] valuable information that...can provide planners, designers, and citizens with information for making more educated community design decisions.

Biographical note

Kenneth B. Hall (Virginia Beach, VA) is a landscape architect with the award-winning firm CMSS Architects. A specialist in community and park planning, he has written a number of technical articles. He holds a MA in landscape architecture. Gerald A. Porterfield (Chesapeake, VA) is director of community design for the Talbot Group. He is a member of the Urban Land Institute and the American Planning Association.

Back cover copy

Community is not an accumulation of buildings with interstate access, neighborhood not a housing project convenient to shopping. Everyone knows what suburban sprawl looks like and the problems is creates. This book knows answers.The First Step to Communities that WorkCreate maximum livability, cohesiveness, and style in developments outside cities. In these pages, you’ll find recommendations for creating true neighborhoods within the context of the existing suburban landscape—in an illustrated, step-by-step, case-study format. Written by two notable designer/planners, Community by Design makes it simple to: *Create places that foster community identity, neighborliness, and positive growth in new and existing developments *Find new solutions to vexing problems in residential, commercial, office, recreational, and public areas*Accommodate growth in a sustainable manner while preserving the character of the landscape*Improve your own neighborhood with tested ideas from award-winning design firms.Community by Design is the first practical guide to creating communities that truly are communities—not merely enclaves near off-ramps. Giving you page after page of solutions to the problems of suburban sprawl and the traffic congestion it engenders, this pictorial guide makes it easy to envision, create, and apply answers that make your town or new development a better place to live. Community by Design provides complete solutions for all the places that people live, shop, work, and relax, including:*Defining community in terms we can all understand*Understanding neighborhood as the fundamental building block of community*Identifying the process of community design from concept to implementation*Learning how to put the automobile in its place*Creating places where people want to walk*Using recommended design strategies to create livable neighborhoods or recreate existing ones*Applying the concepts found in traditional neighborhood design in order to bring scale and sense of placeYou are given practical ways to integrate the elements discussed throughout the book. This guide to creating communities is more than a pie-in-the-sky. Community by Design is a concise, realistic, easy-to-read book about making today’s communities meet the needs of their citizens. Design professionals, elected officials, and citizens need this book as they take an active role to ensure that their communities are products of real vision. This book is also for those who want to know what it’s all about in easily understandable terms and to be able to talk about it with their friends.