Books in the The City in the Twenty-First Century series

Comparing metropolitan planning processes in Boston, Denver, and Portland, Christina D. Rosan examines the impact that various metropolitan governance arrangements have on regional land use decisions and challenges us to think more critically about the political arrangements necessary to govern sustainable metropolitan regions.

Richard M. Freeland reviews how Northeastern University in Boston, historically an access-oriented, private urban university serving commuter students from modest backgrounds and characterized by limited academic ambitions and local reach, transformed itself into a selective, national, and residential research university.

Looking at the shrinking cities of the Midwest and Northeast as well as New Orleans, urban planning experts examine the conditions of disinvested places and lay out ways policymakers and planners can approach the future through processes and ideas that differ from those applicable to growing cities.

Like a CAT scan of an organ, urban tomography documents metropolitan life by sampling and compiling multiple slices of a city. Using photography and audio recording, urban planning expert Martin H. Krieger scans contemporary Los Angeles to illuminate different aspects of a community, from work to worship.

"A furious, blues-tinged, erudite hymn to our greatest vernacular city. Read it and weep; read it and rejoice!"-Edward Hirsch, President, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation

Slums: How Informal Real Estate Markets Work shows that unauthorized settlements in rapidly growing cities are not divorced from market forces; rather, they must be understood as complex environments where state policies and market actors play a role.

Shared Prosperity in America's Communities examines the degree to which place matters in the geography of economic opportunity; offers strategies to address the challenges of place-based inequality; and shows how communities across the nation are implementing change and building a future of shared prosperity.

In 2007, after serving almost fifteen years on the Philadelphia City Council, Michael A. Nutter became the ninety-eighth mayor of his hometown of Philadelphia. From the time he was sworn in until he left office in 2016, there were triumphs and challenges, from the mundane to the unexpected, from snow removal, trash collection, and drinkable water, to the Phillies'' World Series win, Hurricane Irene, Occupy Philadelphia, and the Papal visit. By the end of Nutter''s tenure, homicides were at an almost fifty-year low, high-school graduation and college-degree attainment rates increased significantly, and Philadelphia''s population had grown every year. Nutter also recruited businesses to open in Philadelphia, motivating them through tax reforms, improved services, and international trade missions.Mayor begins with Nutter''s early days in politics and ultimate run for mayor, when he formed a coalition from a base of support that set the stage for a successful term. Transitioning from campaigning to governing, Nutter shares his vast store of examples to depict the skills that enable a city politician to lead effectively and illustrates how problem-solving pragmatism is essential for success. With a proven track record of making things work, Nutter asserts that mayoring promises more satisfaction and more potential achievements—for not only the mayor but also the governed—than our fractious political system would have us believe.Detailing the important tasks that mayoral administrations do, Nutter tells the compelling story of a dedicated staff working together to affect positively the lives of the people of Philadelphia every day. His anecdotes, advice, and insights will excite and interest anyone with a desire to understand municipal government.

Underfunded pension liabilities are severely threatening many cities, and policymakers are increasingly turning their attention to the legacy issues surrounding the funding of pensions. Public Pensions and City Solvency addresses this complex fiscal issue and presents strategies to achieve financial sustainability.

Ed Bacon is the first biography of the innovative and controversial urban planner who transformed Philadelphia in the mid-twentieth century.

Leading economists and other housing market researchers examine key elements of the mortgage meltdown in this volume of original essays. More than a critique in hindsight, this volume offers pragmatic solutions to the problems facing American home ownership.

Global Downtowns weaves together rich cultural materials from North America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America to explore the most iconic space of modern urban imagery and identity. Essays bring diverse downtowns to life while probing deeper shared theoretical and pragmatic questions of power, division, consumption, and conflict.

This collection of essays, written by urban planners, scholars, medical practitioners, and activists, examines the impact of urban living on the well-being of women and girls in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the United States.

This book traces the intertwined histories of disaster experts-specialists in predicting the unpredictable and managing the unmanageable-revealing how their interdisciplinary research and practices over the past century have shaped modern America.

This volume examines the rebuilding of cities and their environs after a disaster and focuses on four major issues: making cities less vulnerable to disaster, reestablishing economic viability, responding to the permanent needs of the displaced, and recreating a sense of place.

Nearly a decade after the housing market's collapse triggered the Great Recession, members of both sides of the political aisle are calling for reform. Principles of Housing Finance Reform lays out a roadmap for reforms for a new housing finance system to achieve liquidity, access, and sustainability.

Street commerce is deeply intertwined with myriad contemporary urban visions and planning goals and has become an increasingly prominent issue in urban areas. In Street Commerce, Andres Sevtsuk offers a comprehensive analysis of the issues involved in implementing successful street commerce and suggests innovative solutions.

This thoroughly illustrated collection of essays, written by scholars as well as practitioners of urban policy, gives a panoramic view of sustainability and environmental issues for green-minded city planners, policy makers, researchers, and citizens.

My Storm is a firsthand account of a critical sixteen months in the post-Katrina recovery process. It tells how Blakely, as Katrina recovery czar, endeavored to transform the shell of a cherished American city into a city that could not only survive but thrive.

In Design After Decline, Brent D. Ryan chronicles the fraught and intermittently successful rebuilding of Detroit and Philadelphia in recent decades, concluding that small-scale strategies must give way to a revived combination of innovative urban design and social planning.

Edited and with an introductory chapter by sociologist Elijah Anderson, the essays in Against the Wall describe how young black men have come to be identified publicly with crime and violence.

After decades of urban crisis, American cities and suburbs have revived, thanks largely to immigration. This is the first book to explore the phenomenon, from big cities such as New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, to newer destinations such as Nashville and suburban Boston and New Jersey.

This volume surveys the current rapid growth in urban populations and begins to formulate a global urban agenda for the next half century. Drawing from a wide range of disciplines, contributors tackle issues ranging from how cities can keep up with fast-growing housing needs to the possibilities for public-private partnerships in urban governance.

Neighborhood and Life Chances brings together researchers from a range of disciplines to demonstrate that place matters in education, physical health, crime, violence, housing, family income, mental health, and discrimination-issues that determine the quality of life among low-income residents of urban areas.

Policy, Planning, and People presents original essays by leading authorities in the field of urban policy and planning. The volume includes theoretical and practice-based essays that integrate social equity considerations into state-of-the-art discussions of findings in a variety of planning issues.

Former two-term mayor of Miami Manny Diaz shares lessons learned from governing one of America's most diverse and dynamic urban communities.

From Beat Cop to Top Cop: A Tale of Three Cities documents John Timoney's rise, from his days as a tough street cop in the South Bronx right up to his role as police chief of Miami.

For many living in U.S. cities, social services come not from the government but from local churches. Based on the first census of congregations ever conducted in any American city, this book provides an authoritative account of the functioning of congregations, their involvement in social services, and their support of other organizations.

Spurred by an unprecedented crime wave in 1996, University of Pennsylvania President Judith Rodin knew that the time for urgent action had arrived, and she set a new course of proactive community engagement for her university. This book narrates the challenges, frustrations, and successes of Penn's campaign and its prospects for long-term change.

The essays in How Ideas Shape Urban Political Development argue that ideas have been the real drivers behind urban political development and offer as evidence national and international case studies.