Smart Growth Can Improve Quality of Life in Communities
By Susan Braunstein, Reference Services Library Associate
How do you create a livable place where planned development can co-exist alongside open space, a thriving downtown, safe neighborhoods with playgrounds and parks, while providing an environment for affordable decent housing and alternative transportation? This is a challenge that was recently addressed to the Rapid City community during a two-day workshop presented through the Smart Grown Leadership Institute. Consultants were here to discuss ideas and strategies to improve growth and development in the city.
Rapid City leaders are taking the time to evaluate and explore all the best possibilities in order to avoid the pitfalls of urban sprawl. Over the years, cities all over the country have moved from the small neighborhood concept into the giant suburbs where you can’t tell where one city ends and another begins.
The consultants who were here are part of a larger group, Smart Growth America. On their website, www.smartgrowthamerica.org, they describe themselves as “A coalition of national, state and local organizations working to improve the ways we plan and build towns, cities and metropolitan areas. Members attempt to assist people who want to preserve the built and natural heritage, promote fairness for people of all backgrounds, fight for high-quality neighborhoods, expand choices in housing and transportation and improve poorly conceived development projects.”
This has been a hot topic for many years. It has become painfully obvious that it needs to be addressed as people seek out and populate the best places to live, and the Black Hills has become one of those destinations. Fortunately, the library has several resources that can enhance your understanding of the complex issues involved.
For those who want to pick up a book from the library, readers will find ”The Company We Keep: Reinventing Small Business for People, Community and Place,” by John Abrams; “Limits to Growth: the 30-year Update,” by Donella Meadows, Jorgen Randers and Dennis Meadows; “Little Town Blues: Voices from the Changing West,” by Raye C. Ringholz; “Building Suburbia: Green Fields and Urban Growth, 1820-2000,” by Dolores Hayden and “The Liveable City: Revitalizing Urban Communities,” by Partners for Liveable Communities.
Two other authors of books relating to this subject, are Douglas Morris, who wrote, “It’s a Sprawl World After All: the Human Cost of Unplanned Growth – and Visions of a Better Future” Morris states in his book that, “Suburbia has substituted cars for conversation, malls for main streets and the artificial community of television for authentic social interaction.” He believes we need to reverse the post World War II mentality of any growth is good growth and look hard at how we really want to live and work together.
As interested people look towards the future of Rapid City, they might consider the seven key points that the author, Suzanne Morse, points out in her book, “Smart Communities: How Citizens and Local Leaders Can Use Strategic Thinking to Build a Brighter Future” She believes the decision making process needs to emphasize the following: investing right the first time, working together, building on community strengths, practicing democracy, preserving the past, growing leaders and inventing a brighter future. Morse also appeared on a CSPAN panel discussion recently. There is a streaming video link to this discussion on: rtsp://video.c-span.org/archive/arc_btvo40206_4c.rm.
Other places to study this subject can be found on the websites, Project for Public Spaces, www.pps,org, whose goal is to help towns, cities and regions find answers on how to balance the needs of everyone in the community; Wisconsin’s DNR on Smart Growth, http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/es/science/landuse; the American Planning Association, http://www.planning.org/smartgrowthcodes includes a page on model smart growth codes, and Scenic America http://www.scenic.org/planning.
There are also several electronic books on this topic that readers can view online through NetLibrary, which is an electronic book resource that can be found on the library’s catalog. You can register your library card to use this resource by contacting the reference desk staff by phone or filling out a request through Ask a Librarian on the library‘s website.
Some examples of the works found there are “Cooperating with Nature: Confronting Natural Hazards with Land Use Planning for Sustainable Communities,” by Raymond Burby and “The Organization of Hope: Communities Planning Themselves SUNY Series on Urban Public Policy,” by Howell S. Baum.
Magazine articles are also an excellent place to catch up on some of the latest ideas. In the April 1 issue of Bicycle Retailer & Industry News, there is an article about a developer in Haymount, Virginia who is creating a 1,808 acre town as a bicycle friendly community. With every home sold, the family gets two brand new bikes from the retail company, Giant. There will be 1,400 acres of land that will be permanently undeveloped and pegged for use as mountain bike trails. There will also be retail and commercial space within the neighborhoods so everything will be within walking or biking distance. You will find other interesting articles in the library’s magazine and newspaper databases and they are available under resources on the website, www.rapidcitylibrary.org.