Amazon.com

The second of three books published by the Center for Environmental Structure to provide a "working alternative to our present ideas about architecture, building, and planning," A Pattern Language offers a practical language for building and planning based on natural considerations. The reader is given an overview of some 250 patterns that are the units of this language, each consisting of a design problem, discussion, illustration, and solution. By understanding recurrent design problems in our environment, readers can identify extant patterns in their own design projects and use these patterns to create a language of their own. Extraordinarily thorough, coherent, and accessible, this book has become a bible for homebuilders, contractors, and developers who care about creating healthy, high-level design. ... Read more

Reviews (52)

Placemaking Guide
One can find the answers to most of life's little (and big) problems in this classic work. It does everything from helping one determine why the backyard just doesn't feel right to describing the problems with sprawl. I hesitate to label it as an architectural work because it can be so much more. Certainly, it illustrates how architecture can play a much larger role in shaping our lives than it has during the past fifty years.

The format of the book is effective in that it allows one to follow the connections between various design rules/patterns that might otherwise not be obvious. The use of these "links" within the book could have been a source of inspiration for web designers. This book will appeal just as much to the lay person as it does to the legions of architectural professionals who use it as a guide on a frequent basis.

Required reading for designers, planners and architects
Part 2 of 3 part series.

This book is the dictionary for A Timeless Way of Building. The Oregon Experiment is a case study of the use of these ideas to plan a college campus.

This book is about functional design for humans rather than design for design's sake. It directly refutes the real estate industry's insistence on neutral design for quick sale (which is the industry's goal - not the goal of a homeowner!) It promotes design which fits the needs and desires of the user, not the developer or architect. The philosophy involves the users heavily in the process of design, permitting integrated design without requiring comprehensive knowledge of all interacting factors on the part of the designers, it is a way of modularizing the design process into smaller, comprehensible units which can be understood and discussed in a useful way.

You will not be disappointed in reading these books.

Yes, it's dated a bit, especially in it's language approach to social issues.

Yes, it's Utopian, but not impractical.

No, all of the patterns do not apply to all people in all places, but then, they are not intended to.

What is important is the basic premise: That physical environment design can either promote community or divide people. That there exist basic patterns of interaction between people, buildings, roads and environment.

No, you cannot just change your entire community overnight into a utopia (mores the shame) however, these books can help to redefine how your community grows and develops to improve the quality of life for everyone in the community.

All of the research is fairly old, but it is research into basic human actions and reactions to their surroundings - not something which is subject to a great deal of change - examples cover several thousand years.

If you're tired of strip malls, rampant development for development's sake, neighborhoods without character or community, irritating traffic patterns, multiple hour commutes, buildings which are uncomfortable to live and work in or just interested in improving your corner of the world, read these books and apply some of the principles wherever you feel they will fit your life.

I own multiple copies and recommend it highly.

This book changed the way I look at buildings ... and life!
My fascination with Christopher Alexander's work began with "The Timeless Way of Building," but increased tenfold upon discovering his inexhaustible classic, "A Pattern Language." At over a thousand pages (I think,) "A Pattern Language" is an encyclopedic study of what makes buildings, streets, and communities work -- indeed, what makes environments human.

Alexander and his co-authors present us with over two hundred (roughly 250) "patterns" that they believe must be present in order for an environment to be pleasing, comfortable, or in their words, "alive." The patterns start at the most general level -- the first pattern, "Independent Regions," describes the ideal political entity, while another of my favorite patterns, "Mosaic of Subcultures," described the proper distribution of different groups within a city. The patterns gradually become more specific -- you'll read arguments about how universities should relate to the community, the proper placement of parks, the role of cafes in a city's life. If you wonder about the best design for a home, the authors will describe everything from how roofs and walls should be built, down to how light should fall within the home, where your windows should be placed, and even the most pleasant variety of chairs in the home. An underlying theme of all the patterns is that architecture, at its best, can be used to foster meaningful human interaction, and the authors urge us to be aware of how the houses we build can help us balance needs for intimacy and privacy.

They admit that they are uncertain about some of the patterns -- they indicate their degree of certainty using a code of asterisks placed before the pattern. For each pattern, the authors summarize the pattern in a brief statement printed in boldface, and then describe it at length, drawing upon a variety of sources to give us a full sense of what they mean: these "supporting sources" include an excerpt from a Samuel Beckett novel, papers in scholarly journals, newspaper clippings, etc. Most patterns are accompanied by a photograph (many of them beautiful and fascinating in their own right) and all are illustrated by small, casual hand-drawings. Taken together, "A Pattern Language" is an extraordinarily rich text, visually and conceptually.

As I said in the header of this review, "A Pattern Language" has changed the way I look at buildings and neighborhoods -- I feel like this book has made me attuned to what works, and what doesn't work, in the human environment. I'm constantly realizing things about buildings and streets that this book helped me see -- things that make people feel at home, or feel "alive," in their surroundings, or conversely, things that make people uncomfortable. And the book makes me think differently about life because it showed me how our well-being depends so much upon the way our buildings fit, or don't fit, us as UNIQUE INDIVIDUALS.

Different Meanings for Different People
While ostensibly a book about city planning, architecture and building construction, A Pattern Language is a treasure chest offering so much more:

Academics will respect this 1171-page treatise for its thoroughly researched (eight years' work by six co-authors during the 1970s) and eminently logical (mathematically motivated) analysis, arriving at an optimal hierarchical configuration of our living space (253 self-consistent "patterns"), based on the simple premise that social function should determine physical form.

Idealists will praise the book for its wonderfully comprehensive utopian prescription specifying how our society--cities, neighborhoods, houses, rooms, alcoves and even trim and chairs--should be designed and built.

Curious types will marvel at the richness of this book as a launching pad for exploring new realms--for example: Land usage (how countryside in England differs from public parks and private farms in the U.S.), transitional space (how outdoor-indoor and public-private boundaries are as important as the buildings and rooms themselves), small window panes (how large pane windows paradoxically do not bring us closer to nature), etc.

Romantics will be moved by the contrasting luminescence in Tapestry of Light and Dark, the warmth of The Fire, and the retelling in Marriage Bed of how Odysseus was reunited with his wife, Penelope, after 20 years of separation.

Pragmatists will take the best ideas from the collection--The Flow Through Rooms, Light on Two Sides of Every Room, Alcoves--and use them with abandon in the most opportunistic way in designing, building and remodeling homes.

Members of the status quo will see this book as the underground manifesto of a threatening movement, an attempt by Berkeley anti-architect radicals to apply social engineering to thrust their liberal values (e.g., communal bathing, composting of human waste, banning of skyscrapers and chain stores) on our present society that is "just fine the way it is, thank you!"

And realists will criticize this book for falling short, failing to tell us in any truly practical sense how to fix the problems inherent in our convenient, automobile-centric, impersonal, profit-oriented social structure of today.

Modern Architecture Ends Here
Not quite the research it pretends to be, more a polemic against Modernism in its final days, recycling many of the themes of the 19th Century Arts and Crafts movement. If you don't object to reading things like cladding should be layered but stucco is OK because it's "layered internally", you might enjoy it. ... Read more

Book Description

Now available in an updated, expanded second edition, People Places is a fully illustrated, ASLA award-winning book that offers research-based guidelines and recommendations for creating more usable and enjoyable public open spaces of all kinds.

This new edition of People Places contains a chapter-by-chapter review of the literature, a completely new color-photo section, 50 new black and white illustrations, a new chapter on post-occupancy evaluation, case studies, and a discussion of accessibility issues, including ADA regulations and universal design. In addition, updated and new information on seven types of urban open space are included: urban plazas, neighborhood parks, mini and vest-pocket parks, campus outdoor spaces, in housing and outdoor spaces for the elderly, child-care, and hospital outdoor spaces. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

If you are a not a specialist, this book is great.
I read this book as part of a research project I was doing about the design of college campuses. I found it to be extremely helpful in my project and I plan on refering to it in the future; I am pursuing a Master's of Landscape Architecture. What I liked about this book is two-fold:

1. Each chapter is a self-contained guide to designing a plaza, park, campus, or playground with people in mind. This important to me becuase I try to focus my designs around the people who will be using them. Each chapter gives useful design tips and helps about the given topic.

2. This book was academic while remaining readable. The authors refer to studies relevent to the topic at hand, but do not become bogged down in theoretical nonsense.

I recommend buying it to anyone who would like a well-organized general design reference book. I would not recommend it to anyone who needs in depth information on any specific topic covered in the book. Check it out from the library if that is your intent. ... Read more

Book Description

The methods of discrete choice analysis and their applications in the modelling of transportation systems constitute a comparatively new field that has largely evolved over the past 15 years. Since its inception, however, the field has developed rapidly, and this is the first text and reference work to cover the material systematically, bringing together the scattered and often inaccessible results for graduate students and professionals.

Discrete Choice Analysis presents these results in such a way that they are fully accessible to the range of students and professionals who are involved in modelling demand and consumer behavior in general or specifically in transportation - whether from the point of view of the design of transit systems, urban and transport economics, public policy, operations research, or systems management and planning.

The introductory chapter presents the background of discrete choice analysis and context of transportation demand forecasting. Subsequent chapters cover, among other topics, the theories of individual choice behavior, binary and multinomial choice models, aggregate forecasting techniques, estimation methods, tests used in the process of model development, sampling theory, the nested-logit model, and systems of models.

Moshe Ben-Akiva and Steven R. Lerman are both faculty members of the Civil Engineering Department at MIT and affiliated with its Center for Transportation Studies. Discrete Choice Analysis is ninth in the MIT Press Series in Transportation Studies, edited by Marvin Manheim. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

An overall good book that needs some update and expansion.
Two knowledgable authors gave in-depth treatments on the subject of DCM. The math is fairly easy to follow in most places. The biggest strength is a nice combination of theoretical and practical issues. The readers however should be benefitted from a new edition, which should include, among other things, extended exposures on ordered responses and grouped/aggregated data analyses with DCM. An introduction to the existing software and relevant issues should also be a plus.

Excellent treatment of transportation travel demand
This book is intended for serious graduate students who wish to learn demand analysis. This book is used as a text for the demand analysis course at MIT for 1st/2nd year grad students. Rigorous statistical and econometric background is a must preparation for this book. Includes very crisp and elegant proofs and dicussion. Impressive methodological treatment for demand analysis. Although all examples are drawn from the Transportation field, the content can easily be implemented for Marketing Science and other fields. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

a guidebook of magnificent ideas on city
Perhapes part of Kostof's category for urban patterns( as organic, grids, grand manner....) is arguable, but his wonderful ananlyses for each individual sample lead us into deeper understanding of urban patterns and social meanings behind. Many cities familiar to most of us (Siena, Paris, New Dehli....) appear refreshingly unfamiliar in his book.

A Bible for an Urban Designer
Probably the most comprehensive guide to the thoughts, theories and practical aspects of designing a city. Buy it and weep for your boring grid plan cities.... ... Read more

Book Description

The distinguishing feature of the construction manuals from Edition Detail and the internationally renowned journal Detail is the exceptional quality of the information it imparts. These books have set new standards and become indispensable in the daily work of planning and building. They are now being published in English for the first time. This volume shows the wide range of possibilities for using glass in construction, beginning with a historical overview of glass in architecture. It goes on to explore the principles of construction, providing information on the physical properties of glass together with the practical aspects such as fixing systems. Also investigated are different types of glass, energy-saving aspects, norms and guidelines. The entire spectrum in contemporary glass building is documented with a large number of international examples. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Professional grade
This is a complete compendium of engineering information for the most typical use of glass--as a window. Everything needed to analyze a building's energy budget--at least for the German climate--is presented and well explained, as is daylighting. Atria and double leaf facades are discussed at the end to summarize the principles. There is also a comprehensive section on the mechanical properties of glass: resistance to wind loads, how to attach it, etc.
Only downside is the quality of the translation (I assume), which results in an occasional unusual sentence: "As no energy can be lost from the total system, the balance of the incident energy must be able to be resolved mathematically."
Nothing that impairs understanding though.

Beautifull, Informative, and well done
This is one of the better books that I have seen on the topic of curtain wall design. It is full of very accurate amd well explained techincal information as well labeled details. The project section is a comprehensive study of some of the most complex curtain walls built. This section is full of detail drawings and color images of the built details. This is a MUST HAVE book for anyone working on complex wall systems, or anyone interested in the state of the art in curtain wall design. ... Read more

Book Description

Get the latest information on parking development and operations. Whether you plan to offer free or pay parking, you will learn best practices for how to plan, design, finance, build, and operate a parking facility. Updated throughout, this edition covers the impact of sport utility vehicles and lights trucks, and best practices in financing, parking at commuter and subway rail stations and compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act. ... Read more

Book Description

A comprehensive, beautifully designed guide to the complex process of urban design.

From an important urban design and architecture firm comes this manual for urban designers, based on the firm's in-house practice and procedures. Covering the process from basic principles to developed design, this invaluable book can serve as an introductory course in urbanism as well as an operations handbook for architects, planners, developers, and public officials. 200 color illustrations. ... Read more

Reviews (5)

How to build a great city
The architects at Urban Design Associates use war stories and bold illustrations to provide detailed instructions on how to transform a blighted urban area into an aesthetically pleasing community. This Pittsburg-based firm created the architectural plans for city redevelopment in communities from Cincinnati, Ohio to Winston-Salem, North Carolina to Riverside County, California. The book shares UDA's time-tested, 10-part "charrette process."

The charrette brings together local residents, government officials, real estate developers and other stakeholders to guide the design process. Using the existing community's "best addresses" as an ideal, UDA produces a unique pattern book that describes preferred neighborhood building arrangements and architectural styles. The plans emphasize the area's natural features by making parks and public space an integral part of each project.

UDA has one cardinal rule that guides these working sessions: "No matter how many encounters you may have with participants, the first time you meet people, you are asking questions, not giving answers." Judging from the work presented in this full-color manual, they are asking the right questions. Their designs are scaled for pedestrians and they incorporate building sites that can accommodate single-family homes, multi-family residences, civic buildings and commercial space.

The book is stuffed with specifics--everything from consensus building tips to digital filing guidelines. Architects, engineers, planners and developers are the obvious target audience for this trade book. But, new urbanists and city enthusiasts everywhere will also enjoy it as an entertaining and instructive reference.

First Of Its Genre, A Valuable Resource
The Pittsburgh-based firm Urban Design Associates has been in practice for nearly 40 years, over the decades accumulating quite a lot of experience in urban design. This is UDA's in-house training manual, polished and augmented for public use. If you are starting out in the urban design field, or are just curious about the methods of a successful firm, this is a good place to begin your investigations.

The first section introduces some basic principles and organizing concepts. Ideas like the "Urban X-Ray" and "Urban Assembly Kit" are easy to understand but at the same time provide a powerful means of evaluating locations and organizing the design process.

The second section, taking up one-third of the book, is a case study of the design process from beginning to site plan. It's really the heart of the manual. This section takes you through information collection, analysis, charrettes, preliminary design, negotiation, and final presentation. UDA can be justifiably proud of their work here, as the site (a housing project in Winston-Salem) was extremely challenging, yet the final plan was quite good from a number of perspectives. You get some idea of the politics, persuasion and patience necessary when working with established residents, officials, engineers and developers.

The following two sections cover pattern books and architecture. These sections are mostly about basic concepts and the firm's standardized methods, which can be dry reading. The information is sound, but presented in a rather generic way, and so is less engrossing than the earlier section. It will be of interest to students wanting to understand how one firm tackles contextual residential design.

In the extensive appendices, the roots of the manual become more apparent. These cover everything from filing system notation to line weight (how to draw a block of houses). Mainly of interest to those wanting to compare office administration procedures, students, and new UDA employees.

The Urban Design Manual delivers the goods in a concise format, focusing on UDA's methods rather than trying to encompass a variety of possible approaches. The illustrations are a treat to look at, and convey at least as much information as the text. The writing is clear and professional, yet also conversational and even a bit lighthearted. Mini "war story" vignettes in the margins bespeak the writers' understated humor. It is the first step-by-step manual of urban design (hopefully the first of many by various authors), and is valuable resource for students and practitioners.

Solid Technical Resource
Gindros and Company at UDA distilled the stuff they do every day (-designing buildings, neighborhoods and towns), into a manual for their own new hires. Then they expanded this information into a handbook for publication. The book presents an excellent framework for design work at several scales, from the individual building through the building blocks of great neighborhoods, the street, the block, the public spaces.

Solid Technical Reference
UDA's Urban Design Handbook is a good reference for architects, planners, community activists, and real estate developers. Gindros and Co. explain how their firm designs neighborhoods and towns is a wide range of settings.

Folks who are in this business will appreciate the step by step approach which extends right down to UDA's conventions for organizing slides and computer files. -always a challange in a collaborative work environment.

The book grew from the firm's internal training material. If your approach to design differs from UDA's, the Urban Design Handbook is still a valuable framework for developing your own tools for communicating the mechanics of your firm's technique and vision to new employees effectively.

John Anderson
Chico, CA...

The Urban Design Handbook
I was extremely disappointed in the book. I was expecting a book to learn from, but found that the whole thing read like a sales pitch / qualifications for the firm that wrote the book. I think if I had paid more attention to the fact that the "author" was a firm, I would not have bought it.

It is geared toward residential development, rather than overall urban design issues. ... Read more

Book Description

What does the city's form actually mean to the people who live there? What can the city planner do to make the city's image more vivid and memorable to the city dweller? To answer these questions, Mr. Lynch, supported by studies of Los Angeles, Boston, and Jersey City, formulates a new criterion--imageability--and shows its potential value as a guide for the building and rebuilding of cities.

The wide scope of this study leads to an original and vital method for the evaluation of city form. The architect, the planner, and certainly the city dweller will all want to read this book. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

A Great Help in Forming a Design Perspective
The urban setting is a composition of nodes, landmarks, paths, edges and districts, accorsing to Lynch. This physical summary of urban landscape may not be satisfactory for some. However, for others, including me, this book is a great help in forming a design perspective at the city level. It does not matter at all if you have just started forming your perspective or working on the final details. The book should be in your library, and the design guidelines should be in your mind, not only when designing a peace of urban space, but also when you are just wondering around.

The psychology of urban designs
This book describes mental maps obtained from residents in several cities such as Boston, Los Angeles and Jersey City. The mental maps were materialized on paper through an interview process and combined with maps from many individuals. And the results are surprising. Each map is a composite image of the city (and hence, the book's title) that reveals not only the character of the place, but gives you a feeling for it. In Boston for example, the streets are very disorganized, so people give directions by using landmarks almost exclusively. On the other hand, in Jersey City, with extremely uniform architecture, directions are given by street number and points of the compass. An unusual discovery concerns very long streets in Boston. They appear on the map with missing sections - these sections are totally invisible to the people interviewed. In many cases individuals were unaware that Washington street in one neighborhood is a continuation of Washington Street in another neighborhood. These blind spots affect how people move around, it affects the directions they give to others and it contributes or reinforces fears they may have about certain neighborhoods. The book moves from these maps and observations and tries to develop rules of thumb for urban design. People feel more comfortable and perhaps more anchored if they know where they are in space and in relation to visible landmarks. Some cities provide this comfort level more effectively than others - this book tries to find root causes. It's no wonder this is a classic.

Excellent book on urban design
Kevin Lynch descibes the visual attributes of cities and towns, paying special attention to how we find our way around, how we build a mental image of these places. It is not only relevant to city dwellers, but to anyone interested in the subject of creating communities, real or virtual. A truly wonderful book, with lots of insightful drawings and images. Highly recommended. ... Read more

Book Description

With a distinct emphasis on human cooperation and biological partnership in design, the author explores the relationship between the built environment and nature to illustrate how both can be used to their full potential without being detrimental or destructive to each other. Provides a combination of scientific insight and constructive design, and shows how to employ what nature offers to the fullest extent without imposing limitations or design constraints to create a balanced and self-renewing environment. ... Read more

Reviews (7)

not as good as i expected
this highly recommended book started out as a compelling read, but became something i had to force myself to finish. it seems to be a series of lectures strung together, which may have been interesting as lectures, but is not cohesive enough to be a book. the good information is lost amidst the rambling style.

A must read for Landscape Architects
Anyone studying environmental planning or LA should read this book.

Significant Book for Architects - Though a Little Slow
While it's not the kind of book you want to lounge around the fireplace reading, it is a book that is frequently referred to by architects. It is significant in designing and ecologially friendly building in today's built-up environment. Summary: Not a great book, but a useful resource for architects.

Excellent - A Must Have
I am a new student in a landscape architecture program and this was a required book for my class. I found this book to be very enlightening and couldn't put the book down.

Ian McHarg's _Design With Nature_
Recently re-issued in a 25th-anniversary edition, this book has obviously retained its position. Why? Because it is *the* place to begin an environmental impact statement. It should be on the bookshelf, and engraved in the heart and mind, of anyone connected with, or concerned about, planning for the future.

McHarg takes the simple idea of overlay maps--which may contain any type of information--and builds up a procedure for making the difficult trade-offs involved in resolving competing ideas about land use.

No local community should be without a set of McHarg overlays. Any citizen group concerned about the actions of a 'developer' should be able to prepare its own overlay for the town's McHarg base map, showing its assessement of areas that need protection and areas that are suitable for the proposed use. This may not make everyone happy, but it at least guarantees that the issues and specific sites are understood by all, and that specific concerns have been fairly addressed.

Buy this book for your town planner. ... Read more

Amazon.com

David Macaulay's hit PBS series by the same name cannot take you as far as this book does into the wonders of the constructed world: dams, domes, skyscrapers, tunnels, and bridges. It's also a trip through time, transporting you, for instance, from Rome's Ponte Fabricio (built in 62 B.C.) to the 1930s Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco to France's Ponte de Normandie across the Seine, which was the longest bridge on earth when completed in 1994. Some of the wires that so ingeniously hold up the Golden Gate are depicted in their intricate engineering context--and at their actual size. As you pore over Macaulay's crystal-clear text and profuse illustrations, the mental fog lifts and you get a sense of what a marvelous act of imagination the bridge is.

In books about building, the whole art lies in the details. Macaulay gives you a glimpse into the minds of the designers, too: in making a tunnel under the Thames River in London, Marc Brunel was inspired by shipworms, "the scourge of the Royal Navy," mollusks who used shieldlike shells to bore holes through timber "and then had the audacity to create a rigid lining in the wood with material they excreted." Though the poor workers who created Brunel's tunnel shields had to brave fiery explosions of methane gas and vile fumes from centuries of sewage--and as Macaulay rather rudely puts it, "Brunel's shield now seems a bit like a platoon of creaking Star Wars robots leaning against each other for support as they inch their way nervously through the muck"--the construction did the trick. That tunnel begun in 1825 is still part of the London Underground subway system.

Macaulay can construct a sound sentence: a child can grasp his celebration of the art of engineering, and a grownup can read him with childlike glee. --Tim Appelo ... Read more

Reviews (5)

A Great Gift for Someone Who Loves Architecture
I gave this book as a gift to someone who loves and understands architecture. He found it most interesting. It contains many facts that are not generally know about large, historical structures.

A BIG success
David Macaulay takes the reader on a tour of some of the really big civil engineering structures of our time. Building Big has sections on Bridges, Tunnels, Dams, Domes, and Skyscrapers. Each part of the book describes the design and construction of from four to ten outstanding examples of the structure highlighted. The examples in each category are described in chronological order with some going back to the time of ancient Rome. The drawings that accompany the text are excellent at focusing on the details and techniques described. The integration of text and graphics is wonderful. In each case, Macaulay describes the design objectives, the interplay between the structure and the environment, and the engineering solutions used to bring the structures into being. This is a wonderful book for anyone interested in structural engineering and design. I have not seen the related PBS video series, but I can say that the book stands on its own very well. Highly recommended.

Awesome
Macaulay fans are going to be amazed and impressed by this, his best book yet. It's a companion to the PBS series that's better than the films! A must see and better yet, must buy.

Brilliance and accessibility
Once again, David Macaulay provides artistry and specialized knowledge in a medium that readers of all ages can appreciate. He explains complicated architectural structures with striking clarity, and his illustrations perfectly complement his engaging narrative tone. Macaulay joins fact and story beautifully -- rather than "lobotomized Sendak," I see conversational Da Vinci.

Big if you read at a 5th Grade level
Building Big reminds me of a book I owned as a boy called "How do they build it?" Slick pictures of giraffes and elephants building dams and skyscrapers. This book isn't much different. Skinny on the details, full of colorful pictures you might get from Maurice Sendak with a lobotomy. In other words, I'm dissapointed that a subject of such scope has been slighted here. ... Read more

Book Description

This book explores the relationship between the arrangements for metropolitan decision-making and the co-ordination of spatial policy and compares approaches across a wide range of European Cities. ... Read more

Book Description

When Not to Build has helped numerous churches find wise and creative solutions to their space problems. The first edition garnered a Recommended Resource Award from Your Church magazine and won favorable reviews:

Now this expanded edition takes into account the changing shape of the contemporary church with four new chapters, a new appendix, an added preface, and updated information throughout.

In the authors' experience, nine out of ten churches that consider building have a better alternative. When Not to Build helps pastors, church leaders, building committees, and laypeople find those alternatives and avoid unnecessary expense. It also offers practical advice for keeping building costs at a minimum when it is the right time to build, as well as maintaining focus on ministry through a building program. Self-tests are included at the end of each chapter. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

Most churches thinking of building have better alternatives.
After 30 years as a church architect and almost 20 as a church facilities consultant, Ray Bowman estimates that 90% of the churches that contact him thinking they need to build have a better alternative--one that requires less of the churches time, money, and energy. Since turning consultant in 1980, Bowman has pioneered a new way of thinking about, using, and modifying traditional church buildings so that a congregation that uses his approach can usually grow to three times or more the size for which the building was originally designed before needing a major building program. This book describes this revolutionary approach to church facility planning giving many examples of how churches are putting these concepts to practical use. I worked with Bowman for ten years as his writer before joining Ray as an associate in his church consulting work. I am now putting these concepts to use in my work as a full-time church consultant and can testify from my own experience that they really work. This book is changing how North American churches think about, use, and pay for church buildings.

Useful, Helpful, Practical, Perspective
An excellent book.
This book advocates that:
churches should use their space intensively;
design for a growing church is different than design for a static church;
flexible multi-use space is preferred to dedicated space (e.g. a sanctuary used once a week);
a church should not build if building will take resources from ministry;
a church should build debt free to the extent possible.
A quote,"Most of a church's ministry takes place not when the church is gathered, but when it is scattered. If we truly understand this, we will no longer feel compelled to keep expanding the church's buildings."

A "must read" for building committees.
Ray Bowman and Eddy Hall have asked all the right questions here. The answers may surprise you! I wanted a straight forward look at the big question of when to build a church and found a lot of little questions along the way. I had to ask questions like; "Will more people come if we build?", and "Can we afford to build?". Without asserting their religious views excessively or to the point of distraction, the authors were a big help in this regard. The same thought process goes on for people all over the world when they aspire to or are thrust into a leadership position in a building project. Also, there is nothing new here. People have been building churches for an awful long time, you know. Why try to reinvent the wheel? I recommend reading this book to help answer your questions and to know what quetions to ask.

Excellent unconventional advice
Bowman & Hall make a solid case for examining every possible option before deciding to build or expand your facilities. Convicing arguments with good supporting data. Recommended for any church considering investing in facilities. (Companion book, When Not To Finance, is in the works.) ... Read more

Book Description

The move to liveable communities--ideal ``small towns'' and neighborhoods where people work, live, play, and walk from place to place--is on. Profit from what a visionary group of architects leading this movement has learned about designing new ``small towns'' in Peter Katz's The New Urbanism. You'll discover the amazing potential for this kind of work as well as case studies, site plans, project analyses, and 180 beautiful photographs. This unique reference also tackles--and answers--the critical issues of crime, health, traffic, environmental degradation, and economic vitality and opens a startling window on the look and feel of future communities. Every designer can profit from this guide to building the utopias of tomorrow--today! ... Read more

Reviews (6)

Community is not Architecture
I grew up in what new urbanists would probably call a paradise. It was a real community in which neighbours were really neighbours. People did sit on their verandahs and converse with their neighbours on the street. There was an understanding that one could borrow things if the owner wasn't using them. It was considered polite to tell the owner if he was there but if he was away one could just borrow the thing and tell him when he came home if one was still using it. In short it was everything new urbanism wants. This was in a moderately large city in Canada.

There were two things wrong with this paradise:

a) it was not about verandahs, facing the street etc. It was about control and conformity. The neighbourhood protected itself by frowning on unexpected behavior. There was an expected range of interests and an expected range of activity. If someone went out of this range, one could expect social sanctions unfailingly. The dark side of Jacobs 'eyes-on-the-street' is Foucault's 'gaze.' The neighbourhood worked as an exercise in power. The verandahs and street life were instruments of that power. Heaven help anyone who had non-standard interests.

b) the neighbourhood was unsustaining. With the growth of the personal rights ethos, the ability of the neighbourhood to control its inhabitants fell away. No longer could the neighbourhood fathers take action to control petty teenage misbehaviour. Instead personal rights and social policy took these controls away from the neighbourhood and gave them to government agencies. As a result the neighbourhood is now perhaps not unsafe but definitely uncomfortable. No one leaves tools or equipment out now in case a neighbour needs to borrow it. Everything is locked up. The doors are firmly closed and neighbours now complain to the police instead of discussing thier joint problems.

New urbanism seems to miss this point. Neighbourhoods are about local power. For some people this produces a comfortable paradise. For those slightly different it creates a jail of conformity. Some people thrive in it. Some peole will be stifled. Neighboourhoods are an exercise in hopefully beneficent control. Architecture does not create this control. It can destroy it certainly and make it impossible but it cannot create it.

Every library in the country should have this book!
I have only had the book a day and already it has given me great pleasure and joy. I love the fantastic pictures and diagrams. The computer digitalizations on a few existing towns today and what they could be like were truely fasinating. I couldn't help not liking the indepth descriptions of numourous cities, towns, and villages from around the country and canada as well. This book had colorful photos and diagrams, this book to me is pure genus!

how to design urban spaces in small communities
A very good appraisal of design examples of new communities with also a consistent theoretical approach to New Urbanism concepts. This is a necessary reading to those that want to be updated with the best design practices of integrated urban spaces.

New Urbanism: This is how/where I want to live
The basic principles presented in this book are the stuff that dreams are made of. I have shared the ideas presented in this book with many of my friends and they all want to live in communities such as this. We've been strip-malled, mega-malled and automobilized to near-death. New Urbanism as presented here is like a million breaths of fresh air.

It is best to read the basic principles presented in the front of the book first. It may look like dry reading at first but as you get into it, your interest will be piqued at first, then grabbed, and you won't want to put it down till you've read it all. Having read this part you will be armed with the knowledge that, to date, no development or developer has had the guts to follow the principles completely. All of the projects presented include some elements of New Urbanism but none of them have it right. One of the other customer reviewers of this book, Ken Wing, missed this entirely. Hey Ken, there is no people in the Seaside pictures because they want the reader to see the architecture! Those who don't get it, or are afraid of change, tend to trivialze New Urbanism and mis-represent it.

Once you have read this book, you, like myself will want to immediately pack up and move to a New Urbanist community. Better ones are coming out of the ground each year and I hope to see one near me real soon.

Dangerous Ideas That Must Be Read
This is a good book about bad ideas which-because of their influence-simply must be read. The problems with New Urbanism stem from five implicit premises it shares with other approaches to city planning. Consider them in turn.

1. The same design approach is appropriate for both cities and suburbs.

Peter Calethorpe claims the application of urban design principles "regardless of location: in suburbs and new growth areas as well as within the city" is a "simple but unique contribution of this movement." City planning, however, has often applied suburban principles-such as buildings as islands in a sea of grass-in both cities and suburbs. New and old share the underlying belief that the design problem of cities and suburbs is similar. Yet 40 years ago, Jane Jacobs showed us that cities were places where people had to feel safe amidst strangers, which fundamentally distinguished them from suburbs and small towns. The result when premise meets reality is laughable.

For example, the chapter on the upscale, private golf community of Windsor, FL devotes four full pages to the castle-like entrance building where visitors must pass a security checkpoint. Perimeter walls form an important design element of South Brentwood Village, CA. The text and captions don't mention them, but they show clearly in the illustrations. Unless New Urbanism's model is the medieval walled city, it is hard to see these as urban.

2. Community is primarily a matter of buildings and their arrangement.

Those who have not received years of professional training easily fall into the trap that community has to do with people. Planners know better. Community is about buildings and the spaces they enclose. The planners' view is most apparent in the illustrations they choose. Seaside, FL's chapter is typical. Seaside requires front porches, because they supposedly encourage sociability. Seaside's front porches appear in 17 photos. Exactly one porch is in use. Of the six photos showing Seaside's public pavilions and gazebos, but one is in use. The photo of the pedestrian-friendly sand walkway is empty. The planners are proud of their porches, pavilions, paths and gazebos. They constitute "community." Who needs people?

3. Appearance is more important than functionality.

Planners design and evaluate with primary reference to aesthetic standards. The design must work at some level, but that limits rather than drives what the planner does.

For example, the proposed conference center entrance in Montreal is a grand staircase, but it is hard to imagine anyone using it except joggers seeking a challenging exercise regimen. A large stair is also proposed for a park in Communications Hill, CA, not to get up and down, but to "terminate the view from a nearby street."

The plan for part of Brooklyn, NY, shows a seven block length of Atlantic Avenue taken up by five buildings with nearly identical facades, three one-block long, and two two-blocks long, blocking two cross streets. The centerpiece of this stretch? A two-block-long parking garage. Does anyone really believe vibrant street life could exist here?

4. Inside the boundary, plan. Outside, ignore or conquer.

A convention of the planning field concerns how the area surrounding that planned for is portrayed in plans and renderings. Of course, the planner's work is always shown in living color and full detail. Two basic approaches are followed in showing surroundings. In one, surroundings are simply left out, as if the planned area were a space station, or the sole settlement on a virgin continent. In the second, surroundings appear in monochromatic outline, making the viewer aware there is a context, but giving little information about it. Whether this convention is cause, effect, or coincidence, what is clear is that it strongly parallels planners' values and thought process.

This premise can be seen in action in what is perhaps the worst single design feature in the book. A "major goal" for the Clinton area of New York City was preservation of the few remaining low-rise buildings, including a corner gas station. To the planner, this meant the gas station was "outside" the planning area. Not content with surrounding it with an eight-story building taking the rest of the block along both street frontages, the planner proposed building a canopy on air rights over the gas station, thus engulfing it, amoeba style. Such bizarre design makes sense only when one starts from the planner's premise that what is outside the plan is at best something to be ignored, and at worst an obstacle to be overcome.

5. Give planners complete control. They know best.

The desire of planners for complete control is evident from the opening essays, where the wants and ideas of "businesses and public officials" are referred to as "hurdles," and the changes a planner makes to incorporate others' ideas are called "accommodations" and "compromises." Examples of building codes to limit architects and builders to the planners' vision grace several chapters. The pinnacle of control is achieved in Mashpee Commons, MA, where the developer retained ownership of streets to avoid zoning setback requirements.

The premise that we would all be better off if we would just do what the planners want stems from their deep seated belief that they know best. I hope it is apparent by now that this hubris has no basis in ability or performance.

As horrifying as these five premises are, it hasn't stopped New Urbanist planners from getting plenty of work, and in many cases getting their plans built. For suburban developers trying to create a simulacrum of pre-WWII, small-town America ala Disneyland's Main Street, the New Urbanism is probably harmless. For cities, the stakes are considerably higher. Cities have already suffered immensely at the hands of planners, and in their current state can hardly afford another round of arrogant ignorance. New Urbanist planners have already been to work on New York, Los Angeles, and Montreal. Read this book before they come to a city near you. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

A 'must have' book!
I fully recommend this book for any new user of P3. I considered it as a "must have" title.

Not so hot
This book and the reviews I had read about it made it sound like a stand-alone guide to Project Planner. I found it to be inconsistent in its presentation, ranging anywhere from speaking to a infant in the computer world to assuming I already knew what I was doing. The detail in it's instruction was just not what it appeared to be, and that hurt my overall rating of the book. If you have the book right next to you and you've already gone through the tutorial, then you've got a fighting chance to get through this book without wasting your money or your time.

Excellent!
This book provides an overview of the scheduling process first. Then, the author starts to tie P3 into puzzle. The end result is that you have resource that you can read from start to finish, and also use it as a reference once you have finished reading the book. The author also touches on many of the advanced capabilities of P3. I am somewhat biased toward this book. The author is the one who actually taught me how to use P3 while developing this book. He teaches a class on scheduling at Texas A&M University. I am currently recommending my coworkers who are involved in scheduling to read this book. I would highly recommend it to anyone involved in scheduling with P3 or Suretrak. We have had great success with teaching our project managers how to use P3 using this book. The first part of the book is usefull for project managers who are not involved in P3 "hands-on", but who are involved in projects that use P3. It helps the project managers understand the scheduling process. It also helps the project scheduler because the project manager is providing better feedback. ... Read more

Book Description

Density by Design provides innovative solutions to the challenge of developing higher density housing that will be successful in the marketplace. Case studies of 14 projects show how others have implemented the best new ideas in residential develpment and design. Projects covered range in density from single-family subdivisions to downtown high-rise apartments and illustrate many up-to-the minute concepts: new urbanism, transit-oriented development, mixed-income and mixed-housing types, urban infill, and adaptive use.

Each case study is loaded with full color photographs, drawings, site and floor plans, and covers project data such as development costs, sales prices, lot sizes, setback standards, street and alley dimensions, and parking ratios. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

good resource
good resource of options for the designer ... Read more

Book Description

An agenda for thriving urban centers, the San Francisco-based Congress for the New Urbanism is a leading force for modern design that encourages viable neighborhoods, conserves natural environments, and preserves our architectural heritage. Charter of the New Urbanism introduces you to the work of the world-class planners, architects and other professionals who are making the new urbanism happen. Charter contributors, including Andres Duany, Peter Calthorpe, and Liz Moule, explain strategies that range from large-scale, regional, to small-scale: blocks, streets and buildings. Revealing case studies help you understand the impact of geography, economics,development and urban patterns, public and private uses, transportation and pedestrian access, housing, building densities and land uses, codes, parks, shared use, safety, preservation and renewal, community identity and much more in this invaluable resource for design professionals. ... Read more

Reviews (6)

An Essential Work on the New Urbanism
The Charter of the New Urbanism not only sets forth a manifesto of what future generations of town planners and residential developers may deem the most significant architectural movement of the late 20th and early 21st centuries, but it does so with clarity, precision, and economy.

This volume is an essential text in an essential field, and should be considered so by municipal planners, developers, builders, architects, and citizens who care about the quality of life in their cities, towns, suburbs, and hamlets.

In addition to rendering their own analyses in compelling and thoughtful prose, McCormick and Leccese have displayed the deftness of master cat herders by wrangling a passel of leading New Urbanists -- by no means the most egregiously agreeable of architectural types -- into presenting their thoughts in a thorough-going and satisfying manner.

The reader who delves into this book and rides it to its conclusion will come away understanding a great deal about how we live today, and how we could -- and perhaps should -- be living.

A very dry treatment of a fantastic topic!
This is a very dry and disjointed work. If you are interested in the topic, have a blast and read Suburban Nation and The Geography of Nowhere. Then if you want more, buy Christopher Alexander's works--and savor them.

Architectural Record says:
"An important work that defines the tenets of New Urbanism, this book serves as the group's manifesto. The charter illustrates the 27 principles of New Urbanism, from the scale of regions to neighborhoods and buildings, and pairs each with an essay by a different author. Now followers of the movement can use the charter to define their work and detractors can refer to it when presenting their side of the debate. ... Graphically pleasing, the book reads well ... When defining the problems of today's development patterns, the text is clear and seductive. ... The test of the Charter of New Urbanism will be its timeless quality. ..."

You must read this book!!
The Charter of the New Urbanism is an absolutely fantastic book. It should be required reading for all planners, architects, public officials, engineers, and citizen activists. It brings together in one book essays from some of today's brightest minds. Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, Peter Calthorpe, Walter Kulash, John Norquist and others describe the Congress for the New Urbanism's (CNU) positions on many important issues, such and traffic congestion, regional planning, environmental issues, affordable housing, civic art, and of course, curbing urban sprawl. New Urbanism is a highly organized and diverse branch of the "Smart Growth" family tree. They have brought a broad range of people together in forming this book, which shows that the problems of sprawl, environmental degregation, inner city decay, and increasing separation by race and income are "one interrelated community-building challenge."

Charter of the New Urbanism
Charter of the New Urbanism should be required reading for every planning commissioner, county commissioner, and anyone else involved in the process of designing communities. The book is a series of 27 essays by prominent new urbanists who explain in detail, copiously illustrated by pertinent photographs and drawings, the principles of the Charter for the Congress for the New Urbanism. The book logically moves through how communities are designed and constructed within levels: The Region (metropolis, city and town; The Neighborhood, district, and corridor; and The Block, street, and building. There are many examples of both old (Alexandria, VA) and new (Seaside, FL) towns that utilize the principles which create beautiful, distinctive, and walkable places that encourage leaving the car in the driveway. The authors thoughtfully and thoroughly describe how, using time tested design, the organization of new communities and infill within old ones can facilitate social interaction by integrating rather than separating land uses. They do so persuasively and without dumbing down the material--it's really quite elegantly written, especially considering that there are 35 contributors in all. There is a selective bibliography with the major recent book titles and classics, such as Jane Jacobs' Death and Life of Great American Cities, for further reading. An index is unfortunately not included, although I would consider this a minor omission, since each chapter/essay is annotated and reasonably short. In addition to local government officials, this book is highly recommended to architects, landscape architects, designers, professional planners, developers, bankers, real estate professionals, and local business leaders. It also should be included as required reading for students in architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, and urban planning. It will become a classic. ... Read more

Book Description

The second edition of this very successful volume examines the current state of planning theory and the new directions it has taken in recent years. The editors have selected a set of classic and contemporary writings to address a central question: What role can planning theory play in making the good city and region within the constraints of a capitalist political economy and a democratic political system? The volume draws on a wide range of authors who address planning history, challenges to public planning, competing planning styles, planning ethics, the public interest and issues such as race and gender. Some contributors also challenge conventional planning theory from postmodernist, communicative and feminist perspectives. Readings new in this edition also examine themes emerging in planning theory, including a critique of the modernist roots of centralized planning, a reemphasis on space in planning, and a discussion of the difficulty of sustainable development. The second edition also features new case studies with a focus on both American and international cases.In the second edition of Readings in Planning Theory the editors retain 10 of the 28 original readings from the first edition. Four other readings have been updated with more recent writings from the same author (the opening introduction; Fainstein; Krumholz; Healey). Thirteen readings are wholly new. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

The cornerstones of planning theory
The autors present a superb choice of classical texts on the field of urban planning. I recommend it to all of those who want a good reference on some of the most important ideas that have shaped this field until now.

A very good selection
This book is a very good beginning for a student interested in urban and regional planning. The selections are great, one example is the classic article from Lindblom "The science of muddling through", with several arguments in favor to 'incrementalism'. Another classic is Davidoff's "Advocacy and pluralism in planning", and the text from Beauregard, Krumholz, Healy and Harvey. ... Read more

Book Description

As a building type, housing represents by far the largest segment of the construction industry. And in this revision of a very important design reference will be found the very latest information-in graphic and text mode-on emerging trends in housing design and technology: new forms of multi-unit housing, new demands from housing owners (e.g., the "home office"), and new zoning and controls on site size and location. This edition is thoroughly updated and refreshed, with some 40% brand new or nearly new pages. Moreover, the remaining graphics will be redrawn where necessary so as to bring up the overall "look-and-feel" of one of the most important members of the TIME-SAVERS family. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

I was a student of J. Panero
I was a student of J. Panero at FIT in NYC in 1975. He and Martin Zelnick were wonderful professors. I was around when they were putting together their first book and was glad to see this one. Keep up the good work

Essential for anyone involved with the built environment.
Have you ever been enthralled with those thick, illustrated books that line the shelves of every architect's office? This isn't one of them...its sitting open next to their cad station. I have few books that have followed me from college into practice, but this revised edition has assisted the design development of many residenti