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 211-220 of 322 items.
Start-Up City
Inspiring Private and Public Entrepreneurship, Getting Projects Done, and Having Fun
By Gabe Klein
Island Press
In Start-Up City, Gabe Klein, with David Vega-Barachowitz, demonstrates how to effect big, directional change in cities—and how to do it fast. Klein's objective is to inspire what he calls “public entrepreneurship,” a start-up-pace energy within the public sector, brought about by leveraging the immense resources at its disposal. Klein offers guidance for cutting through the morass, and a roadmap for getting real, meaningful projects done quickly and having fun while doing it.
This book is for anyone who wants to change the way that we live in cities without waiting for the glacial pace of change in government.
This book is for anyone who wants to change the way that we live in cities without waiting for the glacial pace of change in government.
The Nature of Urban Design
A New York Perspective on Resilience
Island Press
New in paperback, this visually rich book by Alexandros Washburn, former Chief Urban Designer of the New York Department of City Planning, redefines urban design. The Nature of Urban Design empowers urbanites and lays the foundation for a new approach to design that will help cities to prosper in an uncertain future. Washburn asks his readers to consider how cities shape communities, for it is the strength of our communities that will determine how we respond to crises like Hurricane Sandy. Washburn draws heavily on his experience within the New York City planning system while highlighting forward-thinking developments in cities around the world. By discussing projects like the High Line and the Harlem Children's Zone as well as examples from Seoul to Singapore, he explores the nuances of the urban design process while emphasizing the importance of individuals with the drive to make a difference in their city.
Throughout the book, Washburn shows how a well-designed city can be the most efficient, equitable, safe, and enriching place on earth. The Nature of Urban Design provides a framework for participating in the process of change and will inspire and inform anyone who cares about cities.
Throughout the book, Washburn shows how a well-designed city can be the most efficient, equitable, safe, and enriching place on earth. The Nature of Urban Design provides a framework for participating in the process of change and will inspire and inform anyone who cares about cities.
Strategic Green Infrastructure Planning
A Multi-Scale Approach
Island Press
From New York City's urban forest and farmland in Virginia to riverside parks in Vancouver, Washington, green infrastructure is becoming a priority across America.
A practical guide to creating effective plans and then implementing them, Strategic Green Infrastructure Planning presents a six-step process developed by the Green Infrastructure Center in Charlottesville, Virginia. Each step, from setting goals to implementing opportunities, can be applied to a variety of scenarios, customizable to the reader's target geographical location. Chapters draw on diverse case studies, from the Sonoran Desert to Jersey City. Abundant full color maps, photographs, and illustrations complement the text.
The book is essential reading for planners, elected officials, developers, conservationists, and others interested in the creation and maintenance of open space lands and urban green infrastructure projects or promoting a healthy economy.
A practical guide to creating effective plans and then implementing them, Strategic Green Infrastructure Planning presents a six-step process developed by the Green Infrastructure Center in Charlottesville, Virginia. Each step, from setting goals to implementing opportunities, can be applied to a variety of scenarios, customizable to the reader's target geographical location. Chapters draw on diverse case studies, from the Sonoran Desert to Jersey City. Abundant full color maps, photographs, and illustrations complement the text.
The book is essential reading for planners, elected officials, developers, conservationists, and others interested in the creation and maintenance of open space lands and urban green infrastructure projects or promoting a healthy economy.
Vital Signs Volume 22
The Trends That Are Shaping Our Future
By The Worldwatch Institute
Island Press
What we make and buy is a major indicator of society’s collective priorities. Among twenty-four key trends, Vital Signs Volume 22 explores significant global patterns in production and consumption. The result is a fascinating snapshot of how we invest our resources and the implications for the world’s well-being. The book examines developments in energy, environment and climate, transportation, food and agriculture, global economy and resources, and population and society. Readers will learn how aquaculture is making gains on wild fish catches, where high speed rail is accelerating, who is escaping chronic hunger, and who is still suffering. The analysis in Vital Signs teaches us both about our current priorities and how they could be shaped to create a better future.
The Carnivore Way
Coexisting with and Conserving North America's Predators
Island Press
What would it be like to live in a world with no predators roaming our landscapes? Would their elimination, which humans have sought with ever greater urgency in recent times, bring about a pastoral, peaceful human civilization? Or in fact is their existence critical to our own, and do we need to be doing more to assure their health and the health of the landscapes they need to thrive?
In The Carnivore Way, Cristina Eisenberg argues compellingly for the necessity of top predators in large, undisturbed landscapes, and how a continental-long corridor—a “carnivore way”—provides the room they need to roam and connected landscapes that allow them to disperse. Eisenberg follows the footsteps of six large carnivores—wolves, grizzly bears, lynx, jaguars, wolverines, and cougars—on a 7,500-mile wildlife corridor from Alaska to Mexico along the Rocky Mountains. Backed by robust science, she shows how their well-being is a critical factor in sustaining healthy landscapes and how it is possible for humans and large carnivores to coexist peacefully and even to thrive.
Quantified
Redefining Conservation for the Next Economy
Island Press
In Quantified, Whitworth draws lessons from the world’s most tech-savvy, high-impact organizations to show how we can make real gains for the environment. The principles of his approach, dubbed quantified conservation, will be familiar to any thriving entrepreneur: situational awareness, bold outcomes, innovation and technology, data and analytics, and gain-focused investment. As President of The Freshwater Trust, Whitworth has put quantified conservation into practice, pioneering the model of a “do-tank” that is dramatically changing how rivers can get restored across the United States. The stories in Quantified highlight the most precious of resources—water—but they apply to any environmental effort. Whether in the realm of policy, agriculture, business, or philanthropy, Whitworth is charting a new course for conservation.
Big, Wild, and Connected
Scouting an Eastern Wildway from the Everglades to Quebec
By John Davis
Island Press
In 2011, adventurer and conservationist John Davis walked, cycled, skied, canoed, and kayaked on an epic 10-month, 7,600-mile journey that took him from the keys of Florida to a remote seashore in northeastern Quebec. Davis was motivated by a dream: to see a continent-long corridor conserved for wildlife in the eastern United States, especially for the large carnivores so critical to the health of the land. In Big, Wild, and Connected, we travel the Eastern Wildway with Davis, viscerally experiencing the challenges large carnivores, with their need for vast territories, face in an ongoing search for food, water, shelter, and mates. On his self-propelled journey, Davis explores the wetlands, forests, and peaks that are the last strongholds for wildlife in the East. This includes strategically important segments of disturbed landscapes, from longleaf pine savanna in the Florida Panhandle to road-latticed woods of Pennsylvania. Despite the challenges, Davis argues that creation of an Eastern Wildway is within our reach and would serve as a powerful symbol of our natural and cultural heritage.
The End of Automobile Dependence
How Cities are Moving Beyond Car-Based Planning
By Peter Newman and Jeffrey Kenworthy
Island Press
In The End of Automobile Dependence, Newman and Kenworthy look at how we can accelerate a planning approach to designing urban environments that can function reliably and conveniently on alternative modes. They consider a refined and more civilized automobile playing a very much reduced and manageable role in urban transportation. The authors examine the rise and fall of automobile dependence using updated data on 44 global cities to better understand how to facilitate and guide cities to the most productive and sustainable outcomes.
This is the final volume in a trilogy by Newman and Kenworthy on automobile dependence (Cities and Automobile Dependence in 1989 and Sustainability and Cities: Overcoming Automobile Dependence in 1999). Like all good trilogies this one shows the rise of an empire, in this case that of the automobile, the peak of its power, and the decline of that empire.
This is the final volume in a trilogy by Newman and Kenworthy on automobile dependence (Cities and Automobile Dependence in 1989 and Sustainability and Cities: Overcoming Automobile Dependence in 1999). Like all good trilogies this one shows the rise of an empire, in this case that of the automobile, the peak of its power, and the decline of that empire.
Nature's Fortune
How Business and Society Thrive By Investing in Nature
By Mark R. Tercek and Jonathan S. Adams
Island Press
In Nature’s Fortune, Mark Tercek, CEO of The Nature Conservancy and former investment banker, and science writer Jonathan Adams argue that nature is not only the foundation of human well-being, but also the smartest commercial investment any business or government can make. The forests, floodplains, and oyster reefs often seen simply as raw materials or as obstacles to be cleared are, in fact, as important to our future prosperity as technology, law, or business innovation. With stories from the South Pacific to the California coast, the Andes to the Gulf of Mexico, Nature’s Fortune shows how viewing nature as green infrastructure allows for breakthroughs not only in conservation, but in economic progress as well. Organizations obviously depend on the environment for key resources—water, trees, and land. But they can also reap substantial commercial benefits in the form of risk mitigation, cost reduction, new investment opportunities, and the protection of assets. Once leaders learn how to account for nature in financial terms, they can incorporate that value into the organization’s decisions and activities, just as habitually as they consider cost, revenue, and ROI.
A must-read for business leaders, CEOs, investors, and environmentalists alike, Nature’s Fortune offers an essential guide to the world’s economic—and environmental—well-being.
A must-read for business leaders, CEOs, investors, and environmentalists alike, Nature’s Fortune offers an essential guide to the world’s economic—and environmental—well-being.
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