Green Infrastructure: Linking Landscapes and Communities

Green Infrastructure is a practical and inspiring guide to rethinking how we plan, protect, and manage the landscapes around us. With detailed examples from across the country, this book introduces a forward-looking approach to land conservation—one that connects natural systems across scales, from individual parcels to entire regions, and integrates ecological health with human needs.

Written by leading experts in planning, design, and conservation, this wide-ranging resource helps readers understand how to evaluate the full range of potential uses for a landscape—recreation, biodiversity, flood mitigation, habitat connectivity, or community development—and identify which uses offer the greatest long-term value. The book equips professionals and advocates alike with a toolkit for implementing conservation strategies that serve both people and nature.

From greenway design to regional watershed planning, Green Infrastructure presents real-world strategies and decision-making frameworks that can be tailored to a variety of urban, suburban, and rural settings. It also shows how to build partnerships, navigate policy, and align conservation goals with economic and social priorities.

Clear, accessible, and rich with illustrations, this book empowers planners, landscape architects, and engaged citizens to design landscapes that are resilient, functional, and meaningful—advancing a smarter, more connected vision for land stewardship in the 21st century.

Ed McMahon is the Urban Land Institute/Charles Fraser Senior Resident Fellow for Sustainable Development. As the Senior Resident Fellow for Sustainable Development, McMahon’s responsibilities include leading ULI’s efforts to conduct research and educational activities related to green and sustainable development practices.

McMahon, a nationally renowned authority on sustainable development, land conservation and urban design, was formerly the Vice President and Director of land use programs at The Conservation Fund. McMahon is an attorney, community planner, lecturer, author and expert on the topics of sustainable development, land conservation, urban design and historic preservation.

Other recent books include Land Conservation Finance and Better Models for Commercial Development. He has organized successful efforts to acquire and protect urban parkland, wilderness areas and other conservation properties, and he has made numerous presentations on the topics of tourism, conservation, land use planning and historic preservation. McMahon is also the Cofounder and former President of Scenic America, a national non-profit organization devoted to protecting America’s scenic landscapes.

McMahon has an M.A. in Urban Studies from the University of Alabama and a J.D. from Georgetown University Law School, where he taught law and public policy from 1976-1985.
 

The Conservation Fund, a national nonprofit organization, acts to protect the nation's legacy of land and water resources in partnership with other organizations, public agencies, foundations, corporations, and individuals. Since its founding in 1985, the Fund has helped its partners safeguard wildlife habitat, working landscapes, community greenspace and historic sites totaling more than 3.4 million acres throughout the nation. Its headquarters are in Arlington, Virginia.