About the Book: Land use climate bubbles are popping up throughout the nation at an alarming rate, creating an economic crisis that will be more damaging than that of the housing bubble of 2008. The costs to ecosystems and low- and moderate-income households are equally severe. These bubbles, where land and building values are declining, provide extensive, objective evidence that climate change is real and must be dealt with on the ground. And it sidelines the ideological battles over the political response and instead requires us to focus on the practical question: what can we do to respond? Climate action seeks to avoid the harm we can't manage and to manage the harm we can't avoid. Local leaders understand the urgency of the crisis and are highly motivated to learn how to prevent and mitigate its consequences. This book describes how the local land use legal system can leverage state and local assistance to reduce per capita carbon emissions as an important and now recognized component of global efforts to manage climate change. The tools and techniques presented in the book are available to the nation's 40,000 local governments, if led by courageous leaders choosing to succeed in this epic battle. About the Author: John R. Nolon is Distinguished Professor of Law at the Elisabeth Haub School of Law at Pace University where he teaches property, land use, dispute resolution, and sustainable development law courses and is Counsel to the Law School's Land Use Law Center which he founded in 1993. He served as Adjunct Professor of land use law and policy at the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies from 2001-2016.

"Zoning has for a century enabled cities to chart their own course. It is a useful and popular institution, enabling homeowners to protect their main investment and provide safe neighborhoods. As home values have soared in recent years, however, this protection has accelerated to the degree that new housing development has become unreasonably difficult and costly. The widespread Not In My Backyard (NIMBY) syndrome is driven by voters’ excessive concern about their home values and creates barriers to growth that reach beyond individual communities. The barriers contribute to suburban sprawl, entrench income and racial segregation, retard regional immigration to the most productive cities, add to national wealth inequality, and slow the growth of the American economy. Some state, federal, and judicial interventions to control local zoning have done more harm than good. More effective approaches would moderate voters’ demand for local-land use regulation—by, for example, curtailing federal tax subsidies to owner-occupied housing"--Publisher's description.

- Foreword and acknowledgements - Executive summary - Spatial and land-use planning systems across the OECD - Australia - Austria - Belgium - Canada - Chile - Czech Republic - Denmark - Estonia - Finland - France - Germany - Greece - Hungary - Ireland - Israel - Italy - Japan - Korea - Mexico - Netherlands - New Zealand - Norway - Poland - Portugal - Slovak Republic - Slovenia - Spain - Sweden - Switzerland - Turkey - United Kingdom - United States - Bibliography

This report discusses the findings from a mail survey of local government economic development activities that was sent to all 540 municipalities and 100 counties in North Carolina. An important part of the analysis examines whether cities and counties differ significantly in their economic development efforts and whether smaller jurisdictions employ different types of development strategies and tools than larger ones. The survey findings also highlight the barriers that local governments face in promoting economic development and identify important technical assistance needs and gaps in local capacity.

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1984.

Land use controls can affect the quality of the environment, the provision of public services, the distribution of income and wealth, the development of natural resources, and the growth of the national economy. The Economics of Zoning Laws is the first book to apply the modern economic theory of property rights to all major aspects of zoning. Zoning laws are neither irrational constrints on otherwise efficient markets nor disinterested attempts to correct market failure. Rather, zoning must be viewed as a collective property right, vested in local governments and administered by politicians who rationally repsond to their constituents and to developers as markets for development rights arise. The Economics of Zoning Laws develops the economic theories of property rights and public choice and applies them to three zoning controversies: the siting of a large industrial plant, the exclusionary zoning of the suburbs, and the constitutional protection of propery owners from excessive regulation. Economic and legal theory, William Fischel contends, suggest that payment of damages under the taking clause of the Constitution may provide the most effective remedy for excessive zoning regulations.

Why are American cities, suburbs, and towns so distinct? Compared to European cities, those in the United States are characterized by lower densities and greater distances; neat, geometric layouts; an abundance of green space; a greater level of social segregation reflected in space; and—perhaps most noticeably—a greater share of individual, single-family detached housing. In Zoned in the USA, Sonia A. Hirt argues that zoning laws are among the important but understudied reasons for the cross-continental differences.Hirt shows that rather than being imported from Europe, U.S. municipal zoning law was in fact an institution that quickly developed its own, distinctly American profile. A distinct spatial culture of individualism—founded on an ideal of separate, single-family residences apart from the dirt and turmoil of industrial and agricultural production—has driven much of municipal regulation, defined land-use, and, ultimately, shaped American life. Hirt explores municipal zoning from a comparative and international perspective, drawing on archival resources and contemporary land-use laws from England, Germany, France, Australia, Russia, Canada, and Japan to challenge assumptions about American cities and the laws that guide them.

Land Use Law in Florida presents an in-depth analysis of land use law common to many states across the United States, using Florida cases and statutes as examples. Florida case law is an important course of study for planners, as the state has its own legal framework that governs how people may use land, with regulation that has evolved to include state-directed urban and regional planning. The book addresses issues in a case format, including planning, land development regulation, property rights, real estate development and land use, transportation, and environmental regulation. Each chapter summarizes the rules that a reader should draw from the cases, making it useful as a reference for practicing professionals and as a teaching tool for planning students who do not have experience in reading law. This text is invaluable for attorneys; professional planners; environmental, property rights, and neighborhood activists; and local government employees who need to understand the rules that govern how property owners may use land in Florida and around the country.