Search results

Collectively, cities take up a relatively tiny amount of land on the earth, yet emit 72 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. Clearly, cities need to be at the center of any broad effort to reduce climate change. This text argues that too many cities are only implementing random acts of greenness that will do little to address the climate crisis. It instead calls for 'greenovation' - using the city as a test bed for adopting and perfecting green technologies for more energy-efficient buildings, transportation, and infrastructure more broadly. Further, the work contends that while many city mayors cite income inequality as a pressing problem, few cities are connecting climate action and social justice-another aspect of greenovation.

Introduction -- Cities and the green economy -- Renewable energy -- Building the energy efficient city -- Trash or treasure -- Transportation -- Only connect

In Economic Revitalization: Cases and Strategies for City and Suburb Fitzgerald and Leigh answer the need for a text that incorporates social justice and sustainability into how we think about and practice economic development. It is one of the first to talk about how revitalization strategies are implemented in both cities and suburbs, particularly inner-ring suburbs that are experiencing decline previously associated only with inner-city neighborhoods. After setting the context with a brief history of economic development practice and its shortcomings, Fitzgerald and Leigh focus on

Despite signing the Mayors Climate Change Agreement, few US cities have made significant progress in either climate mitigation or adaptation. For the most part, European cities have been more effective, albeit with assistance from the European Union and their national governments. Several of the most successful European cities have implemented eco-districts, which have offered many lessons for overall sustainability planning. Using Malmö, Sweden as a case study, we ask how planners and elected officials learned from implementing an eco-district, focusing on experimentation with new technologies and approaches to planning. We identify how "double-loop learning", a term coined by Argyris and Shön, was at play in changing planning practice. As eco-districts are catching on in North American cities, there is much to be learned from European practice.

This article examines barriers to implementing government programs designed to redress racial economic exclusion. The authors review the current urban employment environment, and the need for more extensive job training and education programs targeting young African Americans. A case study is presented of the implementation of one such program in Ohio, the High Unemployment Population Program. It demonstrates that the most well designed program can fail if staff charged with implementation are not committed to its goals. In the current racially charged environment of the country, this barrier to implementation is likely to affect many new government programs throughout the 1990s. The article concludes with several recommendations for successful program implementation.

The authors examine the response of labor-community organizations in local economic development policy decisions. Case studies of labor-community organizations in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Hartford, Connecticut, are presented to support the authors' conclusion that grass-roots participation can lead to development policies that reflect working-class interests. Further, the organization in Pittsburgh has been active in creating a national-level organization to assist other places in developing similar responses. Accordingly, the authors suggest that such movements cannot be judged exclusively in terms of their immediate gains but must also be evaluated in terms of the extent to which the strategies developed promote conditions for future progressive social change.

Cities on the front lines -- Energy efficiency : from buildings to districts and neighborhoods -- Beyond the building : district heating and cooling -- Renewable cities -- Electrifying transportation -- Liberating cities from cars -- Eco-innovation districts accelerating urban climate action -- Cities and a green new deal -- The elements of greenovation.