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Land Use Action Plan
" Even in those towns where a comprehensive plan .....has been adopted......[it] fails to address one of the most critical questions facing these towns today: how to grow gracefully, in a manner consistent with the traditional character of the community, so that new development fits harmoniously into the town fabric and helps to reinforce the local sense of place."
Randall Arendt, from Rural by Design
Tips for Environmentally Responsible Design and Construction: Environmental Building News
Design
- Smaller is better.
- Design an energy efficient building.
- Design buildings to use renewable energy.
- Optimize material use.
- Design water-efficient, low-maintenance landscaping.
- Make it easy for occupants to recycle waste.
- Look into the feasibility of graywater.
- Design for durability.
- Design for future reuse and adaptability.
- Avoid potential health hazards.
Land Use & Site Issues
- Renovate older buildings. Create community.
- Encourage in-fill and mixed-use development.
- Minimize automobile dependence.
- Value site resources.
- Locate buildings to minimize impact.
- Provide responsible on-site water management.
- Situate buildings to benefit from existing vegetation.
- Protect tress and topsoil during sitework.
- Avoid use of pesticides and other chemicals that may leach into the groundwater.
Materials
- Use durable products & materials.
- Choose low-maintenance building materials.
- Choose building materials with low embodied energy.
- Buy locally produced building materials.
- Use building products made from recycled materials.
- Use salvaged building materials when possible.
- Seek responsible wood supplies.
- Avoid materials that will offgas pollutants.
- Minimize use of pressure-treated lumber.
- Minimize packaging waste.
Equipment
- Install high-efficiency heating and cooling equipment.
- Avoid ozone-depleting chemicals inmechanical equipment and insulation.
- Install high-efficiency lights and appliances.
- Install water-efficient equipment.
- Install mechanical ventilation equipment.
Business Practices
- Minimize job-site waste.
- Make your business operations more environmentally responsible.
- Make education a part of your daily practice.
Key Design Elements of Traditional Towns and Traditional Neighborhoods*
Institutional "Anchor" in the Town Center: provides a place for special events.
Mix of Uses: combines residential, institutional, recreational, commercial, limited industrial, and open space in a seamless arrangement.
Park, Open Space, Countryside: creates the green, square or park to help "anchor" the Town Center.
Network System of Interconnecting Streets: street vistas terminate with public space, landmark structures or civic buildings.
On-Street/Parallel Parking: provides a separator between vehicular and pedestrian traffic.
Lanes(Alleys): allows for preservation of frontage streetscape.
Shallow Setbacks: helps to create an "outdoor room" sense of space.
Building Types: focuses on buildings designed by type, not solely by function to allow for adaptations.
Porch/Portico/Colonnade:
serves as a transition element from the private realm of the
building to the public realm of the sidewalk and streets.
Sidewalks/Crosswalks/ Pedestrian Paths/Walkways: serves to link uses, buildings and lots together.
Shade Trees: provide (as street trees) the canopy/overhead plane to help create an "outdoor room".
Other Vertical Infrastructure: includes fences, hedges,walls, street lamps, benches, gazebo or like features.
*Adapted from Thomas Comitta Associates, Inc. - West Chester, Pennsylvania
Conservation Planning
and Growth Management
Green Development
Historic Preservation
Traffic Congestion
Brownfields
Conservation Planning and Growth Management
Growth management, sometimes known as Smart Growth, is a key ingredient in effective land use management. Growth is important to the community but it should be managed so that it keeps pace with the provision of public services and occurs in the optimal geographic locations. This section offers a variety of tools and techniques for the planning and implementation of effective growth management in your community.
For examples of model ordinances prepared by Minnesota's Office
of Planning, click
here. 
For a listing of Smart Growth publications, check out the EPA's Smart Growth homepage.
To help preserve farmland, the American
Farmland Trust's web site describes a variety of tools.
Policy and Planning Tools
There are a number of excellent resources available for policy and planning tools related to growth management.
Check out the Sprawl
Guide as a starting point.
- Check out the Sierra Club's Challenge
to Sprawl Campaign. This site includes information on root
causes and solutions to encourage Smart Growth.
- The Smart Growth
Network provides many tools to combat sprawl and ways to encourage
smart growth.
- Washington Center
for Real Estate Research
- Planning Institute of British
Columbia .
- The EcoVillage
Project:Working Book for Sustainable Communities
- City
of Baltimore's comprehensive master planning efforts.
- The New Urban News is a 20-page periodical covering traditional
town planning and development.
Contact New Urban News, PO Box 6515, Ithaca, NY (607) 275-3087 - Smart Growth Home Page
- The Urban
Land Institute
- The Smart Communities Network for Sustainable Development .
- The Sustainable Development Strategies Program at SEI-Boston
- In 1998, more than a dozen governors from both parties advanced smart
growth ideas in their state-of-the-state or inaugural speeches.
- Neighborhood
Conservation Smart Growth.
- For an alternative to urban sprawl, check out the idea of Infill
Development
- 25 selected Internet sites in urban history or urban design.
- The Community
Image Survey
- Sustainable
Development Tools
- EPA's Office of Policy and Reinvention has a limited number of copies of the Defenders of Wildlife publication, "National Stewardship Incentives: Conservation Strategies for US Landowners" available free of charge. Contact Dr. Gerald Filbin at filbin.gerald@epamail.epa.gov.
- LUFNET, A Collaborative Land
Development Planning System, enables neighbors, developer,
and environmentalists to become one team to create the best plan
for the community.
- The goal of LUPIN,
California's Land Use Planning Information Network, is to formulate
and implement an information service to support and address land
use and planning via the CERES web.
Regulatory Tools
- State of Oregon, offers
information on urban growth boundaries.
- Department of Energy's Smart Communities Network,
- State of Washington
Growth Management Act
- The State of California
Governor's Office of Planning and Research
- Growing
Greener:
Technical Tools
- The Lincoln Institute
- SEI's PoleStar Software
System
- Sustainable
City - A collaborative research endeavor to create a computer
simulation program for any town or city to see itself - and its
surrounding environment - as a whole system.
- CITYgreen: measuring urban ecosystem values with GIS technology.
- The EPA Landscape Atlas lets you compare your watershed to other watersheds.
- SCALDS, the Social Cost of Alternative Land Development Scenarios, is
a full cost accounting framework using average cost data, derived
from a variety of national studies, as the default values for
the calculation of costs.
- The Environmental Simulation
Center of the New School for Social Research employs a variety
of computer modeling techniques for environmental simulation.
Financial Tools
Green Development
Policy and Planning Tools
- Smart Growth Library's Green
Development Literature Search.
- Residential Environmental Design
- Sustainable
Building Sources includes a directory of green builders and
sources of green building materials and more.
- Smart Communities Network, Green Buildings
- Built Green, the Green
Builder Program of Colorado.
- Green
Building Links website.
- Leadership
in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating
System Criteria
- For other Green Building information, go to the U.S.
Green Building Council's web site.
- The
Green Building Alliance (GBA) is a Pittsburgh-based non-profit
organization providing expert services and reliable information
to facilitate green building solutions.
- National
Pollution Prevention Center for Higher Education
- Sustainable
Building Sourcebook
- Cyburbia Planning
Resource Directory
- Arizona
State University, Online Planners Forum
- Planning Commissioners
Journal's Planners Web: City & Regional Planning Resources
- Golf and the Environment - Planning to advance golf course environment responsibility.
- Sustainable
Development Toolkit
- Tree
City USA, sponsored by The National Arbor Day Foundation in
cooperation with the USDA Forest Service and the National Association
of State Foresters, provides direction, technical assistance,
public attention, and national recognition for urban and community
forestry programs in thousands of towns and cities that more than
93 million Americans call home.
Technical Tools
- Rocky Mountain Institute's Green
Development Services(GDS)
- Sustainable
Building Sources includes a directory of green builders and
sources of green building materials and more.
- Green Building Resource
Guide
- Pennsylvania's
Green Buildings web site.
Financial Tools
Historic Preservation Districts
Historic preservation districts are important in preserving the history of our communities. Historic preservation allows the reuse of older neighborhoods and improving them in a manner that is consistent with historic architectural practices. It is also a vital part of renewing the community and encouraging residents and businesses to remain in the community. The following tools and techniques can be helpful in implementing historic preservation in your community.
Policy and Planning Tools
Regulatory Tools
The following resources and tools represent historic preservation districts and agencies who regulate historic preservation.
- Maryland Historic Trust .
- Preserve and Protect. A
New York non-profit corporation
- Preservation Action Council
of San Jose. Historic preservation in California.
- Preservation
League of Staten Island. Historic preservation in New York
City.
Other Tools
Traffic Congestion
Traffic congestion tools focus on reducing the vehicle miles traveled by auto and on spreading out those miles over time. Here are some tools which may help your community reduce its traffic congestion.
Policy and Planning Tools
- EPA's Transportation Partners Program
- Check out San Francisco's USA's Transit
First Policy.
- The International
Downtown Association (IDA)
Regulatory Tools
The Transportation
Equity Act for the 21st Century
Technical Tools
- Mass Transit Alternatives (buses, rail, boats,
etc.)
- Computerized Toll Systems
- Smart Traffic Flow Systems (timing of lights, lane changes, etc.)
Financial Tools
- Public Transit Subsidies (bus, rail)
- Car Pooling Subsidies
- Development Impact Fees
- Road Tolls
- Bonds
- Taxes (energy / auto / etc.)
- The Transportation
Equity Act for the 21st Century
- Preferential Auto Insurance Rates
Other Tools
The following web sites have a wealth of information:
- American Public Transit Association
- Multi-state Technical Assistance
Program
- Transportation Action Network
Brownfields
Brownfields are vacant, abandoned, or under-utilized commercial and industrial properties where fear of unknown environmental liability is an obstacle to redevelopment or improvement. Urban areas afflicted with industrial sites presenting potential liability for past environmental contamination by pollutants face economic and social penalties as tax revenues are lost, people and jobs leave for "greenfields," and vacant properties create hazards and eyesores.
EPA's Brownfields Initiative aims to empower communities through education and public/private partnerships to reclaim industrial sites in ways protective of human health and the environment. EPA encourages economic redevelopment through environmental cleanup. Cleaning up brownfield properties will help communities to eliminate potential health risks, improve the standard of living and help restore economic vitality to areas where these sites exist. Redevelopment of brownfields can be an important component of land use planning. Here are tools and information that can assist your community in encouraging redevelopment of brownfields and avoid new "greenfield" development. Also see Eco-Industrial Parks for more ideas on the redevelopment of Brownfields.
Policy and Planning Tools
- EPA's Brownfields Homepage is a good place to start.
- If you live in EPA Region III , check out our own brownfields homepage. Industry Profile Fact Sheets
- Handbook of Tools for Managing Federal Superfund Liability Risks
- EPA Brownfields Conferences
- Coming Clean for Economic
Development
Regulatory Tools
- EPA brownfields-related laws and regulations guidance documents.
Financial Tools
- Visit EPA's Brownfields Homepage for more information.
- Cleanup Fact Sheets
- Brownfields funding sources and related financial information.
Other Tools
- Click on a map to go to EPA's Region 3 state brownfield websites.
- EPA Region 3 Brownfields YELLOW PAGES
- Names and phone numbers for EPA Region 3 and state contact persons.
- Institute for Responsible Management
- Carnegie Mellon
University's homepage.
- Click here for links to other Brownfield
sites .
- Northeast-Midwest
Institute