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 101-120 of 322 items.
Blueprint for Greening Affordable Housing, Revised Edition
Island Press
Blueprint for Greening Affordable Housing is the most comprehensive resource on how green building principles can be incorporated into affordable housing design, construction, and operation. In this fully revised edition, Walker Wells and Kimberly Vermeer capture the rapid evolution of green building practices and make a compelling case for integrating green building in affordable housing. The Blueprint offers guidance on innovative practices, green building certifications for affordable housing, and the latest financing strategies. The completely new case studies share detailed insights on how the many elements of a green building are incorporated into different housing types and locations.
Every affordable housing project can achieve the fundamentals of good green building design. The Blueprint gives project teams what they need to push for excellence.
Every affordable housing project can achieve the fundamentals of good green building design. The Blueprint gives project teams what they need to push for excellence.
Beyond Polarization
Public Process and the Unlikely Story of California's Marine Protected Areas
Island Press
Beyond Polarization is a story of hope about positive collective action. Written from an insider’s perspective, it tells the story of California’s Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative—groundbreaking legislation passed after a ten-year public process that left an enduring legacy. The MLPA process provides a blueprint for successful public policy to conserve not just marine life, but any natural resource in contention across jurisdictions. The book is organized by geographical region, each with its unique stakeholders and concerns. Steven Yaffee, an expert on collaborative decision making, explains how its lessons can be applied to similar initiative processes across the country and internationally.
Beyond Polarization offers an optimistic message about the public policy process in a time of civic division: that policymakers, scientists, and local citizens can successfully collaborate to protect natural resources we all have a stake in.
Beyond Polarization offers an optimistic message about the public policy process in a time of civic division: that policymakers, scientists, and local citizens can successfully collaborate to protect natural resources we all have a stake in.
DIY City
The Collective Power of Small Actions
By Hank Dittmar
Island Press
Hank Dittmar, urban planner, friend of artists and creatives, sometime rancher, “high priest of town planning” to the Prince of Wales, believed in letting small things happen. Looking at the global cities of the world, he saw a crisis of success, with gentrification and global capital driving up home prices in some cities, while others decayed for lack of investment.
In DIY City, Dittmar explains why individual initiative, small-scale business, and small development matter, with lively stories from his own experience and examples from recent history.
Dittmar’s timely response to the challenges many cities face today is to make Do-It-Yourself the norm rather than the exception by removing the barriers to small-scale building and local business. The message of DIY City can offer hope to anyone who cares about cities.
In DIY City, Dittmar explains why individual initiative, small-scale business, and small development matter, with lively stories from his own experience and examples from recent history.
Dittmar’s timely response to the challenges many cities face today is to make Do-It-Yourself the norm rather than the exception by removing the barriers to small-scale building and local business. The message of DIY City can offer hope to anyone who cares about cities.
Precision Community Health
Four Innovations for Well-being
Island Press
When Bechara Choucair was a young doctor, he learned an important lesson: treating a patient for hypothermia does little good if she has to spend the next night out in the freezing cold. As health commissioner of Chicago, he was determined to address the societal causes of disease and focus the city's resources on its most vulnerable populations. That targeted approach has led to dramatic successes, such as lowering rates of smoking, teen pregnancy, breast cancer mortalities, and other serious ills.
In Precision Community Health, Choucair shows how those successes can be replicated and expanded around the country. The key is to use advanced technologies to identify which populations are most at risk for specific health threats and avert crises before they begin. Using this strategy can make a wholesale change in the way public health is practiced and in the well-being of all our communities.
In Precision Community Health, Choucair shows how those successes can be replicated and expanded around the country. The key is to use advanced technologies to identify which populations are most at risk for specific health threats and avert crises before they begin. Using this strategy can make a wholesale change in the way public health is practiced and in the well-being of all our communities.
Valuing Nature
A Handbook for Impact Investing
By William Ginn
Island Press
Valuing Nature presents a new set of nature-based investment areas to help conservationists and investors work together to tackle problems such as climate change. The book examines the scope of nature-based impact investing, offers tools for investors and organizations to consider as they develop their own projects, and shares tips on how nonprofits can successfully navigate this new space. Case studies from around the world demonstrate how we can utilize private capital to achieve more sustainable uses of our natural resources.
William Ginn provides a roadmap for conservation professionals, nonprofit managers, and impact investors to improve the management of natural systems.
William Ginn provides a roadmap for conservation professionals, nonprofit managers, and impact investors to improve the management of natural systems.
Unnatural Companions
Rethinking Our Love of Pets in an Age of Wildlife Extinction
Island Press
"Highly compelling...page-turning read" — TNC's Cool Green Science
We love our pets. But there is a dark side to our domestic connection with animal life. The pet industry is contributing to a global conservation crisis for wildlife—often without the knowledge of pet owners. In Unnatural Companions, journalist Peter Christie argues that to reverse the alarming trend of wildlife decline, pet owners must acknowledge the pets-versus-conservation dilemma. Our well-fed and sheltered cats too often prey on small backyard wildlife, seemingly harmless reptiles released into the wild might be the next destructive invasive species, and the popular trend of designer pet food may have deleterious effects on the environment.
Christie's book is a cautionary tale to responsible pet owners, but he concludes with the positive message that the small changes we make at home can foster better practices within the pet industry that will ultimately benefit our pets’ wild brethren.
Designing Streets for Kids
By National Association of City Transportation Officials
Island Press
Building on the success of their Global Street Design Guide, the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO)-Global Designing Cities Initiative (GDCI) Streets for Kids program has developed child-focused design guidance to inspire leaders, inform practitioners, and empower communities around the world to consider their city from the eyes of a child.
Designing the Megaregion
Meeting Urban Challenges at a New Scale
Island Press
In Designing the Megaregion, planning and urban design expert Jonathan Barnett takes a fresh look at designing megaregions. Barnett argues that planning megaregions requires ecological literacy and a renewed commitment to social equity in order to address the increasing pressure that growth puts on natural, built, and human resources. If current trends continue, new construction in megaregions will put additional stress on natural resources, make highway gridlock and airline delays much worse, and cause each region to become more separate and unequal. Barnett offers an incremental approach to designing at the megaregional scale that will help prepare for future economic and population growth.
There is an urgent need to begin designing megaregions, and Barnett offers a hopeful way forward using systems that are already in place.
There is an urgent need to begin designing megaregions, and Barnett offers a hopeful way forward using systems that are already in place.
Replenish
The Virtuous Cycle of Water and Prosperity
Island Press
"Nothing is more important to life than water, and no one knows water better than Sandra Postel. Replenish is a wise, sobering, but ultimately hopeful book." —Elizabeth Kolbert
"Remarkable." —New York Times Book Review
"Clear-eyed treatise...Postel makes her case eloquently." —Booklist, starred review
"An informative, purposeful argument." —Kirkus
We spend billions of dollars on irrigation, dams, sanitation plants, and other feats of engineering to control water for our own prosperity. What if the answer was not control, but replenishment? Sandra Postel takes readers around the world to explore water projects that work with, rather than against, nature’s rhythms. Forest rehabilitation is safeguarding drinking water, farmers are planting cover crops to reduce polluted runoff, and “sponge cities” are capturing rainwater to curb urban flooding. Postel argues that efforts like these will be essential as we adjust to a hotter, wilder climate. Will we continue to fight the water cycle, endangering ourselves and the planet, or recognize our place in it and take advantage of the inherent services nature offers?
"Remarkable." —New York Times Book Review
"Clear-eyed treatise...Postel makes her case eloquently." —Booklist, starred review
"An informative, purposeful argument." —Kirkus
We spend billions of dollars on irrigation, dams, sanitation plants, and other feats of engineering to control water for our own prosperity. What if the answer was not control, but replenishment? Sandra Postel takes readers around the world to explore water projects that work with, rather than against, nature’s rhythms. Forest rehabilitation is safeguarding drinking water, farmers are planting cover crops to reduce polluted runoff, and “sponge cities” are capturing rainwater to curb urban flooding. Postel argues that efforts like these will be essential as we adjust to a hotter, wilder climate. Will we continue to fight the water cycle, endangering ourselves and the planet, or recognize our place in it and take advantage of the inherent services nature offers?
Primer of Ecological Restoration
By Karen Holl
Island Press
The Primer of Ecological Restoration is a succinct introduction to ecological restoration. The book introduces readers to the basics of restoration project planning, monitoring, and adaptive management, as well as ecological principles to guide ecosystem recovery. It explains abiotic factors such as landforms, soil, and hydrology that are the building blocks to recovering microorganism, plant, and animal communities. Other chapters cover invasive species and legal and financial considerations. Each chapter concludes with recommended reading and reference lists. Extensive pedagogic resources are available online for instructors.
This timely primer summarizes recent trends in the field suitable for introductory ecological restoration classes or for practitioners seeking constructive guidance for real-world projects.
This timely primer summarizes recent trends in the field suitable for introductory ecological restoration classes or for practitioners seeking constructive guidance for real-world projects.
Strategic Corporate Conservation Planning
A Guide to Meaningful Engagement
Island Press
Industries that drive economic growth and support our comfortable modern lifestyles have exploited natural resources to do so. But now there’s growing understanding that business can benefit from a better relationship with the environment. Leading corporations have begun to leverage nature-based remediation, restoration, and enhanced lands management to meet a variety of business needs, such as increasing employee engagement and establishing key performance indicators for reporting and disclosures. Strategic Corporate Conservation Planning offers fresh insights for corporations and environmental groups looking to create mutually beneficial partnerships that use conservation action to address business challenges and realize meaningful environmental outcomes. Myriad case studies featuring programs from habitat restoration to environmental educational initiatives at companies like Bridgestone USA, General Motors, and CRH Americas are included to help spark new ideas.
Five Rules for Tomorrow's Cities
Design in an Age of Urban Migration, Demographic Change, and a Disappearing Middle Class
Island Press
As urban designers respond to the critical issue of climate change they must also address three cresting cultural waves: the worldwide rural-to-urban migration; the collapse of global fertility rates; and the disappearance of the middle class. In Five Rules for Tomorrow’s Cities, planning and design expert Patrick Condon offers five rules to help urban designers assimilate these interconnected changes into their work: (1) See the City as a System; (2) Recognize Patterns in the Urban Environment; (3) Apply Lighter, Greener, Smarter Infrastructure; (4) Strengthen Social and Economic Urban Resilience; and (5) Adapt to Shifts in Jobs, Retail, and Wages.
Five Rules for Tomorrow’s Cities provides grounded and financially feasible design examples for tomorrow’s sustainable cities, and the design tools needed to achieve them.
Five Rules for Tomorrow’s Cities provides grounded and financially feasible design examples for tomorrow’s sustainable cities, and the design tools needed to achieve them.
A New Coast
Strategies for Responding to Devastating Storms and Rising Seas
Island Press
“This is a timely book… [It] should be mandatory reading..." — Minnesota Star Tribune
More severe storms and rising seas will inexorably push the American coastline inland with profound impact on communities, infrastructure, and natural systems. In A New Coast, Jeffrey Peterson presents the science behind predictions for coastal impacts and explains how current policies fall short of what’s needed to prepare for these changes. He outlines a framework of bold, new national policies and funding to support local and state governments. Peterson calls for engagement of citizens, the private sector, as well as local and national leaders in a “campaign for a new coast.” This is a forward-looking volume offering new insights for policymakers, planners, business leaders preparing for the changes coming to America’s coast.
More severe storms and rising seas will inexorably push the American coastline inland with profound impact on communities, infrastructure, and natural systems. In A New Coast, Jeffrey Peterson presents the science behind predictions for coastal impacts and explains how current policies fall short of what’s needed to prepare for these changes. He outlines a framework of bold, new national policies and funding to support local and state governments. Peterson calls for engagement of citizens, the private sector, as well as local and national leaders in a “campaign for a new coast.” This is a forward-looking volume offering new insights for policymakers, planners, business leaders preparing for the changes coming to America’s coast.
The Power of Existing Buildings
Save Money, Improve Health, and Reduce Environmental Impacts
Island Press
In The Power of Existing Buildings, academic sustainability expert Robert Sroufe, and construction and building experts Craig Stevenson and Beth Eckenrode, explain how to realize the potential of existing buildings and make them perform like new. This step-by-step guide will help readers to: understand where to start a project; develop financial models and realize costs savings; assemble an expert team; and align goals with numerous sustainability programs. The Power of Existing Buildings will challenge you to rethink spaces where people work and play, while determining how existing buildings can save the world.
The insights and practical experience of Sroufe, Stevenson, and Eckenrode, along with the project case study examples, provide new insights on investing in existing buildings for building owners, engineers, occupants, architects, and real estate and construction professionals.
The insights and practical experience of Sroufe, Stevenson, and Eckenrode, along with the project case study examples, provide new insights on investing in existing buildings for building owners, engineers, occupants, architects, and real estate and construction professionals.
Wildlife Law, Second Edition
A Primer
Island Press
Ten years ago, Wildlife Law: A Primer was the first-ever published survey of wildlife law for lay readers. Since its publication, the legal terrain has increased in complexity and the stakes are higher than ever. As humans encroach further into wildlife habitat, unwanted human-wildlife interactions are occurring more frequently, sometimes with alarming and tragic outcomes.
This revised and expanded second edition retains basic legal concepts from the first edition while offering new chapters that cover new controversial topics such as private wildlife reserves, game ranches, and nuisance species. It also includes expanded coverage of the Endangered Species Act. This is a groundbreaking reference for students in wildlife programs, land owners, and wildlife professionals.
This revised and expanded second edition retains basic legal concepts from the first edition while offering new chapters that cover new controversial topics such as private wildlife reserves, game ranches, and nuisance species. It also includes expanded coverage of the Endangered Species Act. This is a groundbreaking reference for students in wildlife programs, land owners, and wildlife professionals.
Better Buses, Better Cities
How to Plan, Run, and Win the Fight for Effective Transit
Island Press
"Better Buses, Better Cities is likely the best book ever written on improving bus service in the United States." — Beyond Chron
"The ultimate roadmap for how to make the bus great again in your city." — Spacing
"The definitive volume on how to make [the] bus frequent, fast, reliable, welcoming, and respected..." —Streetsblog
Imagine a bus system that is fast, frequent, and reliable—what would that change about your city?
Buses can and should be the cornerstone of urban transportation. They offer affordable mobility and can connect citizens with every aspect of their lives. But in the US, they have long been an afterthought in budgeting and planning.
Transit expert Steven Higashide uses real-world stories of reform to show us what a successful bus system looks like. Higashide explains how to marshal the public in support of better buses and argues that better bus systems will create better cities for all citizens.
With a compelling narrative and actionable steps, Better Buses, Better Cities describes how decision-makers, philanthropists, activists, and public agency leaders can work together to make the bus a win in any city.
"The ultimate roadmap for how to make the bus great again in your city." — Spacing
"The definitive volume on how to make [the] bus frequent, fast, reliable, welcoming, and respected..." —Streetsblog
Imagine a bus system that is fast, frequent, and reliable—what would that change about your city?
Buses can and should be the cornerstone of urban transportation. They offer affordable mobility and can connect citizens with every aspect of their lives. But in the US, they have long been an afterthought in budgeting and planning.
Transit expert Steven Higashide uses real-world stories of reform to show us what a successful bus system looks like. Higashide explains how to marshal the public in support of better buses and argues that better bus systems will create better cities for all citizens.
With a compelling narrative and actionable steps, Better Buses, Better Cities describes how decision-makers, philanthropists, activists, and public agency leaders can work together to make the bus a win in any city.
Food Town, USA
Seven Unlikely Cities That are Changing the Way We Eat
By Mark Winne
Island Press
Look at any list of America’s top foodie cities and you probably won’t find Boise, Idaho or Sitka, Alaska. Yet they are the new face of the food movement. Healthy, sustainable fare is changing communities across this country, revitalizing towns that have been ravaged by disappearing industries and decades of inequity.
What sparked this revolution? To find out, Mark Winne traveled to seven cities not usually considered revolutionary. He broke bread with brew masters and city council members, farmers and philanthropists, toured start-up incubators and homeless shelters. What he discovered was remarkable, even inspiring. The cities of Food Town, USA remind us that innovation is ripening all across the country, especially in the most unlikely places.
What sparked this revolution? To find out, Mark Winne traveled to seven cities not usually considered revolutionary. He broke bread with brew masters and city council members, farmers and philanthropists, toured start-up incubators and homeless shelters. What he discovered was remarkable, even inspiring. The cities of Food Town, USA remind us that innovation is ripening all across the country, especially in the most unlikely places.
Rainforest
Dispatches from Earth's Most Vital Frontlines
By Tony Juniper
Island Press
Rainforests have long been recognized as hotspots of biodiversity—but they are crucial for our planet in other surprising ways. Not only do these fascinating ecosystems thrive in rainy regions, they create rain themselves, and this moisture is spread around the globe. Rainforests across the world have a powerful and concrete impact, reaching as far as America’s Great Plains and central Europe. In Rainforest: Dispatches from Earth’s Most Vital Frontlines, a prominent conservationist provides a comprehensive view of the crucial roles rainforests serve, the state of the world’s rainforests today, and the inspirational efforts underway to save them.
In Rainforest, Tony Juniper draws upon decades of work in rainforest conservation, bringing readers along on his journeys, from Costa Rica to Indonesia. Rainforest provides a detailed and wide-ranging look at the health of these vital ecosystems. Throughout this evocative book, Juniper argues that in saving rainforests, we save ourselves, too.
In Rainforest, Tony Juniper draws upon decades of work in rainforest conservation, bringing readers along on his journeys, from Costa Rica to Indonesia. Rainforest provides a detailed and wide-ranging look at the health of these vital ecosystems. Throughout this evocative book, Juniper argues that in saving rainforests, we save ourselves, too.
Green Growth That Works
Natural Capital Policy and Finance Mechanisms Around the World
Island Press
Rapid economic development has been a boon to human well-being, but comes at a significant cost to the fertile soils, forests, coastal marshes, and farmland that support all life on earth. If ecosystems collapse, so eventually will human civilization. One solution is inclusive green growth—the efficient use of natural resources. Its genius lies in working with nature rather than against it.
Green Growth That Works is the first practical guide to bring together pragmatic finance and policy tools that can make investment in natural capital both attractive and commonplace. Pioneered by leading scholars from the Natural Capital Project, this valuable compendium of proven techniques can guide agencies and organizations eager to make green growth work anywhere in the world.
Green Growth That Works is the first practical guide to bring together pragmatic finance and policy tools that can make investment in natural capital both attractive and commonplace. Pioneered by leading scholars from the Natural Capital Project, this valuable compendium of proven techniques can guide agencies and organizations eager to make green growth work anywhere in the world.
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