Community Planning

Whether relocating an entire town or rebuilding a section for disaster mitigation, sustainable redevelopment requires careful planning and design. Collective decisions must be made on factors that directly determine sustainability such as land use or "city shape," buildings, transportation, energy supply and efficiency, waste management, and water supply and efficiency.

The Wingspread Principles were developed by attendees of the Wingspread '98 conference, "Communities in Harm's Way: A Leadership Dialogue on Designing Disaster-Resistant Settlements," to help communities and government agencies enhance sustainability in disaster-prone communities. The principles include a checklist for disaster mitigation and a policy action framework. A July 1998 Progress Report details the direct outcomes of the Wingspread '98 conference.

In relocating after a disaster, the pioneering town of Soldiers Grove, Wisconsin identified the following four part process to community planning and design for sustainable redevelopment:

• Focusing Responsibility for Coordination — selecting a single point of contact for community redevelopment efforts.
• Inventorying Community Assets and Opportunities — examining past energy consumption patterns, identifying potentials for energy efficiency in new designs, assessing potential relocation sites, and assessing barriers to sustainable redevelopment.
• Finding Technical Help — determining optimal resources for technical assistance in feasibility studies and technical design issues.
• Fostering Community Involvement — ensuring a "bottom-up" planning approach that spreads responsibility, strengthens support for the efforts, avoids misinformation, and educates citizens on sustainability issues.

Inventorying Community Assets and Opportunities

Sustainable development emphasizes the direct connections between a community's built environment and the quality of the surrounding natural environment. These connections can be complex and require that communities consider an array of environmental, social, and economic factors. The resources below can help your community gather and analyze the data required to make sustainable planning decisions:

AIA Center of Communities by Design
A project of the American Institute of Architects that helps members work with citizens and other stakeholders to envision and create more livable communities. The Sustainable Design Assessment Team (SDAT) Program
is a community assistance program that focuses on the principles of sustainability. SDATs will bring a team of volunteer professionals (such as architects, urban designers, planners, hydrologists, economists, attorneys, and others) to work with community decision-makers and stakeholders to help them develop a vision and framework for a sustainable future. Applications for 2006 SDATs must be received at the AIA by 5pm on January 6, 2006.

Planning for Community, Energy, Economic, and Environmental Sustainability (PLACE3S)
A land use and urban design method created specifically to help communities understand how their growth and development decisions can contribute to improved sustainability.

Smart Growth Network / Smart Growth Online
An information network coordinated by US EPA to assist private sector, public sector, and NGO partners in creating sustainable development in neighborhoods, communities, and regions throughout the country.

Community Energy Opportunity Finder
The Community Energy Opportunity Finder is an interactive tool developed by energy experts at Rocky Mountain Institute that will help you determine your community's best bets for energy solutions that benefit the local economy, the community, and the environment.

City Green
CITYgreen is a powerful GIS application for land-use planning and policy-making, developed by American Forests. The software conducts complex statistical analyses of ecosystem services provided by trees, such as air quality, stormwater runoff, and summer energy savings and creates easy-to-understand maps and reports.

"Mitigation from the Ground Up: Sustainable Cities in California"
An article discussing disaster-resistant community design as the first key step in building sustainable communities.

"An Action Plan for Reducing Flood Risk in the West"
A December 1997 report from the Western Governors' Association that outlines recommendations to reduce flood risk in western states, improve future floodplain management, and improve the coordination of flood-related issues.

Cooperating With Nature: Confronting Natural Hazards With Land-Use Planning for Sustainable Communities. 1998. Joseph Henry Press.
Chapters of the book are available for online purchase as PDF files.

Finding Technical Help

The expertise and experience of select agencies, organizations, and institutions can provide invaluable input and guidance in the redevelopment process. The following organizations and resources can help identify the appropriate technical assistance available in your area for sustainable redevelopment of your community:

Smart Communities Network
Promotes the use of sustainable technologies and practices in community development by offering links and resources on sustainable development topics. Topic areas include Disaster Planning and Land Use Planning. An online "Sustainable Development Toolkit" provides access to a wide range of general and technical information on planning and design for sustainability.

U.S. Department of Energy's Building Technologies Program
Provides technology leadership, promotes energy efficiency, and stimulates collaborative activities to make U.S. buildings more efficient, comfortable, affordable and sustainable.

Center for Livable Communities
Helps local governments and community leaders be proactive in their land use and transportation planning, and adopt programs and policies that lead to more livable and resource-efficient land use patterns. Provides an especially useful vision document on sustainable communities entitled "The Ahwahnee Principles"

American Planning Association
Encourages planning that will contribute to public well-being by developing communities and environments that meet the needs of people and of society more effectively. APA has compiled a special list of Disaster and Hazards Resources, including the APA workbook Planning for a Disaster-resistant Community (PDF).

Cyburbia Planning Resource Directory
Provides a comprehensive directory of Internet resources relevant to planning, architecture, urbanism and other topics related to the built environment. Offers compendiums of links specific to Sustainable Development, Geographic Information Systems, Community Development, Land Use, and Natural Resources and Energy.

The Urban Land Institute (ULI)
Provide leadership in the use of land in order to enhance the total environment. The ULI website offers extensive resources for sustainability planning.

Rocky Mountain Institute's Community Services (Economic Renewal) Program
Offers introductory discussions, training seminars and workshops, consultation, and customized packages to communities for sustainable development initiatives. RMI's Economic Renewal Guide provides a step-by-step community decision-making process that defuses factionalism, encourages collaborative citizen involvement and self-reliance, and leads to sustainable development that benefits everyone.

The Environmental Simulation Center
The Center assists architects, community planners, government agencies, and preservationists in employing computer modeling techniques to analyze the physical and visual impact of proposed projects.

Rebuilding for the Future: A Guide to Sustainable Redevelopment for Disaster-Affected Communities
Discusses the experience and success of Soldiers Grove, Wisconsin in sustainable redevelopment of the town in a different location after a series of floods.

Addressing Your Community's Flood Problems: A Guide for Elected Officials (PDF)
Created as a joint project of the Association of State Floodplain Managers, Inc. and the Federal Interagency Floodplain Management Task Force, this is an excellent planning guide for communities which may be faced with flooding. It offers officials a planning tool for proactive responses to potential flooding. The manual also contains a section of success stories providing models of other communities' efforts, emergency response and mitigation guidelines and a list of resources for use in preventative planning and flood recovery. ASFPM also offers other free online publications, including mitigation success stories.

Fostering Community Involvement

The benefits of wide community involvement in the planning process are many: two-way communication between citizens and local government, increased state and federal support, a wide range of opinions and points of view, and shared responsibility for project success, and others. The following resources can help your community foster an inclusive redevelopment planning process:

"Participatory Processes in Disaster Recovery," Chapter 3 in Holistic Disaster Recovery: Ideas for Building Local Sustainability After a Natural Disaster
Part of a handbook by the Natural Hazards Research and Applications Information Center that describes ways in which a local community can incorporate various aspects of a sustainable society (e.g., environmental quality, economic vitality, social equity, etc.) into all the decisions it must make during the recovery period following a disaster.

National Charrette Institute
A nonprofit educational institution that helps people build community capacity for collaboration to create healthy community plans by teaching professionals and community leaders the art and science of Dynamic Planning, a holistic, collaborative planning process that harnesses the talents and energies of all interested parties to create and support a feasible plan, and by advancing the fields of community planning and public involvement through research, publications and facilitation.

Building Great Neighborhoods: A Citizens' Guide for Neighborhood Planning (PDF)
This manual made available online by Michigan State University covers an introduction to neighborhood planning, how to get started, conducting an analysis, developing a vision, conducting a neighborhood survey, and holding a neighborhood summit.

Participation Tools for Better Land Use Planning
Provides descriptions and resources for a range of civic participation techniques including Computer Simulation, Simulation Games, Guided Tours, Design Charettes, Visual Preference Survey, Visioning, Media Strategies, Facilitated Meetings, and Formal Neighborhood groups.

Available from The Center for Livable Communities, 1414 K Street, Suite 250, Sacramento,CA 95814. Phone: (916) 448-1198; FAX (916) 448-8246

Putting the People into Planning: A Primer on Public Participation in Planning
A "how to" manual for developing and managing successful programs for citizen involvement.

CUBE: The Center for Understanding the Built Environment
Sponsors Box City and Walk Around the Block, programs to provide children with hands-on introduction to community design and planning principles. The Box City program is also used to teach design and planning principles to adults.

Integrative Strategies Forum
Sponsors a Sustainable Communities Program with an emphasis on citizen participation in developing and implementing local visions of a sustainable future.