The Smart Growth Manual is a technical text meant for planners and people concern with the way physical space is used in our cities. It essentially details the elements of smart growth (anti-urban sprawl) and what smart growth looks like when it is applied from a regional down to a street and building level. To me this text is more of a supplement to Suburban Nation (written by the same authors) than it is a stand alone text as the why we should do smart growth is discussed more in Suburban Nation than it is in The Smart Growth Manual. Despite this, the text is an important pick up as the Smart Growth perspective gains steam its important to understand it particularly in terms of the implication towards the issues of inner city revitalization. ( )

Authors Andres Duany, Jeff Speck, and Mike Lydon have created The Smart Growth Manual, a resource which not only explains the overarching ideals of smart growth, but a manual that takes the time to show smart growth principles at each geographic scale (region, neighborhood, street, building). The Smart Growth Manual bounces back and forth (in a beautifully organized manner) between steps for the implementation of smart growth and key concepts. The format of The Smart Growth Manual allows for each concept to be referenced and reviewed quickly (each concept is explained in about half a page).

I found The Smart Growth Manual to be the type of reference that you would throw in your bag before heading to your community association meeting or grab on your way to a city council hearing about a new development. The information is presented in such a simplistic, uncluttered format that you can use it almost like a dictionary. Instead of wondering whether a particular idea really is smart growth you can flip to it in the manual and understand how the concept would work and how it relates to other principles of smart growth. More importantly it can be used to better articulate community goals through providing an accessible guide to smart growth in an attainable format for charrettes, community meetings, etc.

To make The Smart Growth Manual all the more enticing, the pages are printed on 100% post-consumer recycled paper and it's pretty much pocket sized (so you don't have to lug around yet another huge manual in addition to ordinances and the like). The pages feature vivid illustrations and photographs of each concept so it's not a struggle to understand or explain a concept. I highly recommend The Smart Growth Manual as a part of any community participant's or urban planner's desktop references. ( )

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