The Sustainable Urban Design Handbook (Paperback)

The Sustainable Urban Design Handbook gathers the best sustainability practices and latest research from the fields of architecture, landscape architecture, planning, development, ecology, and environmental engineering and presents them in a graphically rich and accessible format that can help guide urban design decisions in cities of all sizes.

The book presents a comprehensive framework that organizes more than 50 elements of sustainable urban design under five main topics–Energy Use & Greenhouse Gas, Water, Ecology & Habitat, Energy Use & Production, and Equity & Health–and relative to four project scales: Region & City, District & Neighborhood, Block & Street, and Project & Parcel. Each element chapter includes a summary of importance and background, compares typical practices and recommended approaches, explains connections to other elements, and concludes with urban design guidelines that can be used to directly inform projects and decisions.

Easy to use and reference, The Sustainable Urban Design Handbook provides both an in-depth introduction to topics across sustainable urban design and serves as an on-going reference for anyone involved in the creation of sustainable urban environments. This resource will be useful to design and planning professionals, community members, students, and elected officials in guiding decisions about our sustainable future.

Nico Larco, AIA, is an urban designer, architect, and Professor of Architecture and Urban Design at the University of Oregon where he is the Director of the Urbanism Next Center and Co-Director of the Sustainable Cities Institute. He leads ELEMENT/Urban Design, a design and consulting firm.

Kaarin Knudson, AIA, is a civic leader, architect, and educator with more than 20 years’ experience working to advance sustainable urban design and community-led solutions. She is principal of BETTER PRACTICE, and teaches the graduate workshop in urban design at the University of Oregon.