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Island Press began with a simple idea: knowledge is power—the power to imagine a better future and find ways for getting us there. Founded in 1984, Island Press’ mission is to provide the best ideas and information to those seeking to understand and protect the environment and create solutions to its complex problems.

Showing 181-200 of 311 items.

Global Street Design Guide

By Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, Inc./Global Designing Cities Initiative
Island Press

The Global Street Design Guide is a timely resource that sets a global baseline for designing streets and public spaces and redefines the role of streets in a rapidly urbanizing world. The guide will broaden how to measure the success of urban streets to include: access, safety, mobility for all users, environmental quality, economic benefit, public health, and overall quality of life. The first-ever worldwide standards for designing city streets and prioritizing safety, pedestrians, transit, and sustainable mobility are presented in the guide. Participating experts from global cities have helped to develop the principles that organize the guide. 
 
This innovative guide will inspire leaders, inform practitioners, and empower communities to realize the potential in their public space networks. It will help cities unlock the potential of streets as safe, accessible, and economically sustainable places.

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Global Atlas of Marine Fisheries

A Critical Appraisal of Catches and Ecosystem Impacts

Island Press

The Global Atlas of Marine Fisheries is the first and only book to provide accurate, country-by-country fishery catch data. This groundbreaking information has been gathered from independent sources by the world’s foremost fisheries experts. Edited by Daniel Pauly and Dirk Zeller of the Sea Around Us Project, the Atlas includes one-page reports on 273 countries and their territories, plus fourteen topical global chapters. Each national report describes the current state of the country’s fishery; the policies, politics, and social factors affecting it; and potential solutions. The global chapters address cross-cutting issues, from the economics of fisheries to the impacts of mariculture. Extensive maps and graphics offer attractive and accessible visual representations. 

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Global Atlas of Marine Fisheries

A Critical Appraisal of Catches and Ecosystem Impacts

Island Press

The Global Atlas of Marine Fisheries is the first and only book to provide accurate, country-by-country fishery catch data. This groundbreaking information has been gathered from independent sources by the world’s foremost fisheries experts. Edited by Daniel Pauly and Dirk Zeller of the Sea Around Us Project, the Atlas includes one-page reports on 273 countries and their territories, plus fourteen topical global chapters. Each national report describes the current state of the country’s fishery; the policies, politics, and social factors affecting it; and potential solutions. The global chapters address cross-cutting issues, from the economics of fisheries to the impacts of mariculture. Extensive maps and graphics offer attractive and accessible visual representations. 

  • Copyright year: 2016
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The Past and Future City

How Historic Preservation is Reviving America's Communities

Island Press

In The Past and Future City, Stephanie Meeks, the president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, describes in detail, and with unique empirical research, the many ways that saving and restoring historic fabric can help a city create thriving neighborhoods, good jobs, and a vibrant economy. She explains the critical importance of preservation for all our communities, the ways the field of historic preservation has evolved to embrace the challenges of the twenty-first century, and the innovative work being done in the preservation space now.
 
This book is for anyone who cares about cities, places, and saving America’s diverse stories in a way that will bring us together and help us better understand our past, present, and future. 

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Biting the Hands that Feed Us

How Fewer, Smarter Laws Would Make Our Food System More Sustainable

Island Press

Today in the United States, laws exist at all levels of government that exacerbate problems such as food waste, hunger, inhumane livestock conditions, and disappearing fish stocks. Baylen Linnekin argues that government rules often handcuff America’s most sustainable farmers, producers, sellers, and consumers, while rewarding those whose practices are anything but sustainable. Biting the Hands that Feed Us introduces readers to the perverse consequences of many food rules, from crippling organic farms to subsidizing monocrops. Linnekin also explores what makes for a good law—often, he explains, these emphasize good outcomes over rigid processes. But he urges readers to reconsider efforts to regulate our way to a greener food system, calling instead for empowerment of those working to feed us—and themselves—sustainably. 


  • Copyright year: 2016
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What Makes a Great City

Island Press

One of Planetizen's Top Planning Books for 2017 • San Francisco Chronicle's 2016 Holiday Books Gift Guide Pick

What makes a great city? City planner and architect Alexander Garvin set out to answer this question by observing cities, largely in North America and Europe, with special attention to Paris, London, New York, and Vienna.

For Garvin, greatness is about what people who shape cities can do to make a city great. A great city is a dynamic, constantly changing place that residents and their leaders can reshape to satisfy their demands. Most importantly, it is about the interplay between people and public realm, and how they have interacted throughout history to create great cities.

What Makes a Great City will help readers understand that any city can be changed for the better and inspire entrepreneurs, public officials, and city residents to do it themselves.

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Restoring Neighborhood Streams

Planning, Design, and Construction

Island Press

Thirty years ago, urban streams were perceived as little more than flood control devices designed to hurry water through cities and neighborhoods with scant thought for aesthetics or ecological considerations. But stream restoration pioneers like hydrologist Ann Riley argued that by restoring ecological function, and with careful management, streams and rivers could be a net benefit to cities, instead of a net liability. Riley has since spearheaded numerous urban stream restoration projects and put to rest the long-held misconception that degraded urban streams are beyond help.
What has been missing, however, is detailed guidance for restoration practitioners wanting to undertake similar urban stream restoration projects that worked with, rather than against, nature. This book presents the author’s thirty years of practical experience managing long-term stream and river restoration projects in heavily degraded urban environments.  Although the case studies are local, the principles, methods, and tools are universal, and can be applied in almost any city in the world.

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Climate Change in Wildlands

Pioneering Approaches to Science and Management

Island Press

Scientists have been warning for years that human activity is heating up the planet and climate change is under way. We are only just beginning to acknowledge the serious effects this will have on all life on Earth. The federal government is crafting broad-scale strategies to protect wildland ecosystems from the worst effects of climate change. One of the greatest challenges is to get the latest science into the hands of resource managers entrusted with vulnerable wildland ecosystems. This book examines climate and land-use changes in montane environments, assesses the vulnerability of species and ecosystems to these changes, and provides resource managers with collaborative management approaches to mitigate expected impacts.

Climate Change in Wildlands proposes a new kind of collaboration between scientists and managers—a science-derived framework and common-sense approaches for keeping parks and protected areas healthy on a rapidly changing planet.

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Our Renewable Future

Laying the Path for One Hundred Percent Clean Energy

Island Press

One of GreenBiz's Six Best Sustainability Books of 2016 

The next few decades will see a profound energy transformation throughout the world, as we shift from fossil fuels to rely primarily on renewable sources like solar, wind, biomass, and geothermal power. What might a 100% renewable future look like, and what challenges might we face in the transition? In Our Renewable Future, energy expert Richard Heinberg and scientist David Fridley explore the challenges and opportunities presented by the shift to renewable energy. Beginning with a comprehensive overview of our current system, the authors survey issues of energy supply and demand in key components of society, including electricity generation, transportation, buildings, and manufacturing. The book concludes with a discussion of energy and equity and a summary of key lessons and steps forward at the individual, community, and national level. Our Renewable Future is a clear-eyed and urgent guide to the renewable energy transformation that will be a crucial resource for policymakers and energy activists.

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Aldo Leopold's Odyssey, Tenth Anniversary Edition

Rediscovering the Author of A Sand County Almanac

Island Press

In 2006, Julianne Lutz Warren (née Newton) asked readers to rediscover one of history’s most renowned conservationists. Aldo Leopold’s Odyssey was hailed by The New York Times as a “biography of ideas,” making “us feel the loss of what might have followed A Sand County Almanac by showing us in authoritative detail what led up to it.” Warren’s astute narrative quickly became an essential part of the Leopold canon, introducing new readers to the father of wildlife ecology and offering a fresh perspective to even the most seasoned scholars. A decade later, as our very concept of wilderness is changing, Warren frames Leopold’s work in the context of the Anthropocene. With a new preface and foreword by Bill McKibben, the book underscores the ever-growing importance of Leopold’s ideas in an increasingly human-dominated landscape. 

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Can a City Be Sustainable? (State of the World)

By The Worldwatch Institute
Island Press

Cities are the world’s future. Today, more than half of the global population—3.7 billion people—are urban dwellers, and that number is expected to double by 2050. There is no question that cities are growing; the only debate is over how they will grow. Will we invest in the physical and social infrastructure necessary for livable, equitable, and sustainable cities? In the latest edition of State of the World, the flagship publication of the Worldwatch Institute, experts from around the globe examine the core principles of sustainable urbanism and profile cities that are putting them into practice. From Ahmedabad, India to Freiburg, Germany, local people are acting to improve their cities, even when national efforts are stalled. Issues examined range from the nitty-gritty of handling waste and developing public transportation to civic participation and navigating dysfunctional government. The result is a snapshot of cities today and a vision for global urban sustainability tomorrow.     

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Modern Poisons

A Brief Introduction to Contemporary Toxicology

Island Press

Modern Poisons bridges the gap between traditional toxicology textbooks and journal articles on cutting-edge science. This accessible book explains basic principles in plain language while illuminating the most important issues in contemporary toxicology. Kolok begins by exploring age-old precepts such as the dose-response relationship and goes on to show exactly how chemicals enter the body and elicit their toxic effect. Kolok then traces toxicology’s development, from studies of endocrine-disrupting chemicals in toiletries to the emerging science on prions and epigenetics. Whether studying toxicology itself, public health, or environmental science, readers will develop a core understanding of—and curiosity about—this fast-changing field. 

  • Copyright year: 2014
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Transit Street Design Guide

By National Association of City Transportation Officials
Island Press

The Transit Street Design Guide is a well-illustrated, detailed introduction to designing streets for high-quality transit, from local buses to BRT, from streetcars to light rail. Drawing on the expertise of a peer network and case studies from across North America, the guide provides a much-needed link between transit planning, transportation engineering, and street design. The Transit Street Design Guide presents a new set of core principles, street typologies, and design strategies that shift the paradigm for streets, from merely accommodating service to actively prioritizing great transit. 
 
The Transit Street Design Guide is a vital resource for every transportation planner, transit operations planner, and city traffic engineer working on making streets that move more people more efficiently and affordably.
            

  • Copyright year: 2016
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The Future of the Suburban City

Lessons from Sustaining Phoenix

Island Press

In The Future of the Suburban City, Phoenix native Grady Gammage, Jr. argues that the suburban city, which grew up based on the automobile and the single-family home, needs to dramatically change and evolve in an era of climate change. He shows how this is possible, and that many suburban cities are already making strides in increasing their resilience. Gammage focuses on the story of Phoenix, which shows the power of collective action — government action — to confront the challenges of geography and respond through public policy. He examines issues facing most suburban cities around water supply, heat, transportation, housing, density, urban form, jobs, economics, and politics.
The Future of the Suburban City is a realistic yet hopeful story of what is possible for any suburban city. 

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Wild By Design

Strategies for Creating Life-Enhancing Landscapes

Island Press

Can nature—in all its unruly wildness—be an integral part of creative landscape design? In her beautifully illustrated book, Wild by Design, award-winning designer Margie Ruddick stretches the boundaries of landscape design, offering readers a set of principles for a more creative and intuitive approach to sustainable landscapes—one that looks beyond the rules often imposed by both landscaping convention and sustainability checklists.
 
Wild by Design defines and explains the five fundamental strategies Ruddick employs, often in combination, to give life, beauty, and meaning to landscapes: Reinvention, Restoration, Conservation, Regeneration, and Expression. Drawing on her own projects—from New York City to Chengdu, China—she offers guidance on creating beautiful, healthy landscapes that successfully reconnect people with larger natural systems.

  • Copyright year: 2016
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Human Ecology

How Nature and Culture Shape Our World

Island Press

Humans have always been influenced by natural landscapes, and always will be—even as we create ever-larger cities and our developments fundamentally change the nature of the earth around us. In Human Ecology, noted city planner and landscape architect Frederick Steiner encourages us to consider how human cultures have been shaped by natural forces, and how we might use this understanding to contribute to a future where both nature and people thrive.

Human ecology is the study of the interrelationships between humans and their environment, drawing on diverse fields from biology and geography to sociology, engineering, and architecture. Steiner admirably synthesizes these perspectives through the lens of landscape architecture, a discipline that requires its practitioners to consciously connect humans and their environments.  After laying out eight principles for understanding human ecology, the book’s chapters build from the smallest scale of connection—our homes—and expand to community scales, regions, nations, and, ultimately, examine global relationships between people and nature.
 

  • Copyright year: 2002
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America's Urban Future

Lessons from North of the Border

Island Press

As demographic shifts change housing markets and climate change ushers in new ways of looking at settlement patterns, pressure for change in urban policy is growing. More and more policy makers are raising questions about the soundness of policies that squander our investment in urban housing, built environment, and infrastructure while continuing to support expansion of sprawling, auto-dependent development. Changing these policies is the central challenge facing US cities and metro regions, and those who manage them or plan their future.

In America’s Urban Future, urban experts Tomalty and Mallach show how Canada, a country similar to the US in many respects, has fostered healthier urban centers and more energy- and resource-efficient suburban growth. They call for a rethinking of US public policies across those areas and look closely at what may be achievable at federal, state, and local levels in light of both the constraints and opportunities inherent in today’s political systems and economic realities.

  • Copyright year: 2016
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What Should a Clever Moose Eat?

Natural History, Ecology, and the North Woods

By John Pastor; Foreword by Bernd Heinrich
Island Press

In What Should a Clever Moose Eat?, John Pastor explores the natural history of the North Woods, an immense and complex forest that stretches from the western shore of Lake Superior to the far coast of Newfoundland. From the geological history of the region to the shapes of leaves and the relationship between aspens, caterpillars, and predators, Pastor delves into a fascinating range of topics as diverse as the North Woods themselves. Through his meticulous observations of the natural world, scientists and nonscientists alike learn to ask natural history questions and form their own theories, gaining a greater understanding of and love for the North Woods—and other natural places precious to them.

  • Copyright year: 2015
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Markets and the Environment, Second Edition

Island Press

A clear grasp of economics is essential to understanding why environmental problems arise and how we can address them. So it is with good reason that Markets and the Environment has become a classic text in environmental studies since its first publication in 2007. Now thoroughly revised with updated information on current environmental policy and real-world examples of market-based instruments, the primer is more relevant than ever. The authors provide a concise yet thorough introduction to the economic theory of environmental policy and natural resource management. They begin with an overview of environmental economics before exploring topics including cost-benefit analysis, market failures and successes, and economic growth and sustainability.

  • Copyright year: 2015
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Resilient by Design

Creating Businesses That Adapt and Flourish in a Changing World

Island Press

As managers grapple with the challenges of the global economy, they are paying increasing attention to their organization’s resilience—its capacity to survive, adapt, and flourish in the face of turbulent change. Volatile conditions can quickly overwhelm a business that, on the surface, seems solid. Managers need a new paradigm, one that takes into account the hyper-connected world in which they operate.
Rich with case studies of organizations that are designing resilience into the very fabric of their organizations, Resilient by Design offers them a better way to adapt and thrive. Resilient by Design explains how to connect the health and viability of important external systems—stakeholders, communities, infrastructure, supply chains, and natural resources—to create innovative, dynamic organizations that will find a way to survive and prosper.

  • Copyright year: 2015
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