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

Planning implementation [Chapter 14]
Planners have traditionally assisted decision-makers in choosing among development options 
presented by special interests. They could instead help empower the community by exposing and 
trying to eliminate perverse subsidies, redirecting incentives towards Positive Development, and 
helping NGOs identify social and ecological needs. NGOs should demand that the biases in planning 
implementation that militate against good design be removed (such as green buildings penalized by 
the cost of certification). Planners can work with NGOs, for example, to:
•
Advocate the creation of incentives for solarization and/or eco-retrofitting programmes such
as performance contracting. Similarly, create systems of credits/awards for positive 
off-site

impacts in planning assessment systems.

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Positive Development
• 
Apply ‘direct action’ principles to planning. For example, invest in making public transport
and physical activity convenient, low-cost and attractive, through varied and attractive public 
environments (instead of congestion to make driving inconvenient).
• 
Encourage legislation to prohibit food and garden waste in the urban waste stream, so that 
all such waste is recycled in buildings and urban parks or sent to farms for food production.
Planning has undervalued urban soil nutrients and water storage.
• 
Implement demonstrations of Positive Development through, for example, public– 
private+community sector partnerships and/or cross-agency task forces (which, again, share 
risks, profits and benefits to the parties, and roll-over profits into future positive initiatives).
• 
Specify or negotiate contracts to prevent materials used at each stage of construction 
from being sent to landfill or incinerated, or favour construction materials that are non-toxic, 
recyclable, reusable or able to be composted in urban parklands.