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Nature and Cities

The Ecological Imperative in Urban Design and Planning

Edited by Frederick R. Steiner, George F. Thompson, and Armando Carbonell

November 2016, English

Lincoln Institute of Land Policy


This book overflows with imaginative insights and proposals to guide the ongoing urbanization of our planet.”

Bruce Babbitt, U.S. Secretary of the Interior, 1993–2001

This illustrated collection of essays by leading international architects, landscape architects, city planners, and urban designers demonstrates the economic, environmental, and public health benefits of integrating nature more fully into cities.

Read an excerpt from the book by the editors of Nature and Cities.

Susannah Drake’s chapter, WPA 2.0: Beauty, Economics, Politics, and the Creation of Twenty-First Century Public Infrastructure, is also available to read in its entirety.

About the Editors

Frederick Steiner serves as the dean and Paley Professor for the University of Pennsylvania School of Design.

George F. Thompson has been a professional editor and publisher since 1984.

Armando Carbonell is vice president of programs at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.


Reviews

The beautiful photographs and lush design of Nature and Cities mask a radical and revolutionary set of ideas from some of the world’s most insightful and intelligent landscape architects and urbanists. Brilliantly curated and edited, these essays offer fresh ideas about how to integrate our understanding of the human condition and the health, vitality, and sustainability of the planet.”

— Darren Walker, President, Ford Foundation

This important and beautiful book signals an exciting maturation of the linkage between ecological science and the theory and practice of urban design. The essayists, who represent both long-standing pioneers and new leaders in landscape architecture and planning, suture the urban and natural together, based on sound understanding of urban ecology. The integration is illustrated with innovative designs and plans that document the power and ethical need for the ecological turn in metropolitan design.”

— Steward T. A. Pickett, Distinguished Senior Scientist, Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies

In their new book, editors Frederick Steiner, FASLA, George Thompson, and Armando Carbonell have made complex ideas about urban ecological design incredibly accessible. They make a convincing argument that ‘ecological literacy’ is an ‘essential base’ for anyone involved in urban planning and design today. There are 17 thought-provoking essays from leading landscape architects and planners from around the world.”

DIRT Best Books of 2016 (American Society of Landscape Architects)

This valuable collection of new essays asserts that nature and cities can no longer be posited as diametrically opposed conditions. In this critical moment of rapid global climate change and unprecedented species loss, we are ethically tasked with the creation and stewardship of equitable urban systems and productive urban landscapes that support both human and nonhuman biota.”

Catherine Seavitt Nordenson, Associate Professor, City College of New York, and Co-author, On the Water: Palisade Bay

Yes, lightening can strike twice. Expanding on the discourse they ignited almost 20 years ago with Ecological Planning and Design, Thompson and Steiner (joined by Carbonell) have assembled another collection of timely, illuminating, and thought-provoking essays that is essential reading for both students and professionals.”

Charles A. Birnbaum, FASLA, FAAR, President and CEO, The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Nature and Cities summarizes all that we have learned about how natural systems shape cities since Ian McHarg’s Design with Nature was published in 1969. It illustrates how design professionals, ecologists, and citizens can strike a new balance between human settlements and nature in designing the cities and regions of the emerging Anthropocene epoch.”

Robert Yaro, Professor of Practice, University of Pennsylvania, and President Emeritus, Regional Plan Association

Nature and Cities places ecology at the crosshairs of a rapidly evolving world—not merely as an applied science but as a systemic way of thinking toward building a healthy and resilient future.”

Ignacio Bunster-Ossa, FASLA, LEED AP, Landscape Architecture Practice Leader (Americas), AECOM


Table of Contents

George F. Thompson, Frederick R. Steiner, and Armando Carbonell

The Landscape Today and the Challenges Ahead

 

James Corner

The Ecological Imagination: Life in the City and the Public Realm

 

Richard Weller

The City Is Not an Egg: Western Urbanization in Relation to Changing Conceptions of Nature

 

Anne Whiston Spirn

The Granite Garden: Where Do We Stand Today?

 

Charles Waldheim

The Landscape Architect as Urbanist of Our Age

 

Kongjian Yu

Creating Deep Forms in Urban Nature: The Peasant’s Approach to Urban Design

 

Elizabeth K. Meyer

Sustaining Beauty: The Performance of Appearance Design

 

Jose Alminaña and Carol Franklin

Creative Fitting: Toward Designing the City as Nature

 

Forster Ndubisi

Adaption and Regeneration: A Pathway to New Urban Places

 

Danilo Palazzo

The Role of Utopia in Ecological Planning and Design

 

Susannah Drake

WPA 2.0: Beauty, Economics, Politics, and the Creation of Twenty-First Century Public Infrastructure

 

Timothy Beatley

New Directions in Urban Nature: The Power and Promise of Biophilic Cities and Blue Urbanism

 

Kate Orff

Gardening the Bay: Participatory Frameworks for Ecological and Economic Change

 

Nina-Marie E. Lister

Resilience Beyond Rhetoric in Urban Design

 

Chris Reed

Projective Ecologies in Urban Design and Planning

 

Kristina Hill

Form Follows Flows: Systems, Design, and the Aesthetic Experience of Ecological Change

 

Laurie Olin

Water, Nature in Cities, and the Art of Landscape Design

 

Frederick R. Steiner, George F. Thompson, and Armando Carbonell

Afterword: Prospects for Urban Ecological Design and Planning

 


Keywords

Adaptation, Climate Mitigation, Conservation, Development, Ecology, Environment, Environmental Management, Natural Resources, Planning, Regionalism, Resilience, Sustainable Development, Urban, Urban Design, Urban Development, Urban Revitalization, Urbanism, Water