‘This is a wonderful book that should be on the desk of every architect and planner. It shows how

Economic frameworks 
transfer wealth by treating externalities (where the private costs of 
development are shifted to the general public) and internalities (inordinate benefits received 
by special interests at the expense of the general public). Environmental impacts are 
exacerbated by economic conventions such as ‘discounting’ [Box 43]. While assessing
internalities and externalities could assist our understanding, the economic concepts
themselves make environmental damage seem ‘collateral’. Currently, internalities and
externalities are intrinsic to the design of the economic system. The past use of the term
‘market failure’ itself implies that we are not responsible for the inability of the 
economic system to meet the growing demand for environmental protection and public
health.
• 
Planning and design precepts
are ‘redistributive’ and can therefore have negative 
or
positive 
outcomes. Planning decisions have tended to create inequities, as land and development
approvals have been allocated on a first come, first served basis. Ecologically insensitive

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Positive Development
planning and design can also re-distribute environmental amenities indirectly, such as where
a view is gained by blocking others’ views, or access to sunlight is removed by a tall building. 
While planning systems try to balance rights, this has been done in an unbalanced 
framework that ignores unjust enrichment and only determines if public 
costs
are too
excessive (addressed to some extent by the concept of ‘betterment’ or capital gains tax). A
‘balance’ between conservation and development should mean ecological restoration, not 
reserving bits of the remaining public estate each time the rest of it is allocated to
development.