This thesis explores the relationship between urban tree canopy and physical health measures between different Springfield, Massachusetts neighborhoods. The study hypothesis was that there would be a correlation between urban tree canopy and human health. Statistical analysis was used to examine the correlation between available health data and urban trees. The existing neighborhood health data that was available comprised of asthma rate, infant mortality, and low birth weight. It also examined other data such as median household income, demographic percentages, home ownership, and green space. The research questions guiding this study were: Are there any correlations between urban trees canopy and the asthma rates, infant mortality rates, and low birth weight in Springfield neighborhoods? Do local residents have equal access to resources such as urban tree canopy and green space? Previous research reviewed in the literature shows that urban tree canopy provides social, environmental, physical benefits to their surroundings and to the residents of urban neighborhoods, such as those in Springfield. The literature review also discussed some challenges with regard to unequal access to urban trees in other cities, such as Boston that show environmental justice issue may be an influence. The current study used data on health, demographic, and urban tree canopy data that was primarily collected by the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission, the US Forest Service and ReGreen Springfield. The major findings showed correlations between urban tree canopy and median household income, low birth weight, and demographics percentages. Those correlations indicated that there are signs of environmental justice issues in the City of Springfield. This correlation results verifies prior that was reviewed in the literature. One recommendation to offset the issues of environmental justice would be to invest in organization such as ReGreen Springfield and other organizations that promote planting trees by neighborhood groups.

Zoning map for the city of Johnson City and the outlying areas. Original map was drawn January 11, 1972 and was originally adopted by the city April 20, 1972. This revised map is a duplicate of the original and was produced September 27, 1983. This was likely when the hand drawn lines were added to update the zoning districts. Most main streets are also labeled with arterial streets notated by dotted lines. While not included in the legend, it is likely that R stands for residential and I for industrial. East Tennessee State University can be found in zone R-6 located next to Greenwood Drive. The left portion of the map has been cut as you can see by the title Johnson City partially missing. No accompanying maps are found in the collection. Physical copy resides in the Government Information, Law and Maps Department of East Tennessee State University’s Sherrod Library. / https://dc.etsu.edu/rare-maps/1002/thumbnail.jpg

City map of Bristol, Virginia. While date is not printed on map, "1962" is written in pencil on the back. This is the assumed publication date. Sullins College, which closed in July 1976, being included confirms that publication at least predates the mid 1970s. The legend includes the scale - 1"=500'. Road, railways, and large cemeteries are labeled. A few streets such as Midway Street and Memorial Drive are written by hand in blue ink. These additions were made at an indeterminate time post publication. Physical copy resides in the Government Information, Law and Maps Department of East Tennessee State University’s Sherrod Library. / https://dc.etsu.edu/rare-maps/1008/thumbnail.jpg

Produced by the Johnson City GIS Division on May 8, 2006, this map denotes the annexations of Johnson City and the surrounding area from 1960 to 2006. The map scale indicates a ratio of 1:24,000. In the text box on the left side, the ID, date, and annexation names are listed. As part of the legend, each 5 year annexation period is color coded. Physical copy resides with Johnson City, Geographic Information Systems Division. 1 in= 2000’ / https://dc.etsu.edu/rare-maps/1057/thumbnail.jpg

Zoning Map for Erwin, Tennessee published in 1967 by the Tennessee State Planning Commission. Base map prepared in September 1965 from subdivision plats and soil conservation Aerial Photographs. Includes downtown Erwin and some surrounding areas. Some numbers were added by hand to individual properties in black ink at an indeterminate time post publication. Physical copy resides in the Government Information, Law and Maps Department of East Tennessee State University’s Sherrod Library. / https://dc.etsu.edu/rare-maps/1000/thumbnail.jpg

This thesis examines the relationship between architecture and planning in Detroit. The relationship between these two disciplines has reinforced gross inequality in socioeconomic status over many decades. It has been compounded by racism which planning policy and Architecture exploited during the 20th Century for private interests. This impacts the built environment at all scales. Today division is reinforced through small details such as how handrails are placed on benches, but it extends to planning metropolitan areas, and how they are divided up into city and suburb. At the scales between, both architecture and planning reinforce the segregation within their own disciplines, but the stage is set at this intersection. The scale of 1”=100’ has a history of being a scale at which both architectural form, and planning, can be expressed simultaneously. This is famously seen in the scale model of San Francisco which was commissioned by the City during the Great Depression. Architecturally, the prevalence of skywalks between major buildings in urban areas has greatly increased. These networks grow organically, responding to a market demand for division, a city within a city. In Detroit, neighborhoods have edges, and within a few blocks, there is emptiness and abandonment. It is one of these edges that is explored in the intervention. The edges are oftentimes reinforced by the built environment with walls, traffic regulations, and pedestrian access carefully controlled at the scale of the neighborhood. Therefore, the thesis proposes a new form of development and is interested in this scale where architecture and planning are supposed to meet. Through this interdisciplinary approach, more problems are addressed simultaneously. The intervention identifies an educational district just outside of downtown Detroit and greatly expands it over several decades. 3 focus buildings were developed in more detail to sketch possible formal outcomes of the exercise in the built environment. The intervention proposes greater community input which informs this reimagining of neighborhood. The idea also draws on the concept of a “15-minute neighborhood,” which has been proposed by the mayor of Detroit as a solution to urban blight in Detroit.

Environmental Justice is an issue that has been relevant in the mind of the federal government for the past 18 years. Within society, the goal of Environmental Justice looks to prevent the exploitation of vulnerable populations through the siting of environmentally hazardous sites. Instead of over burdening specific vulnerable populations, fair distribution of hazards throughout the population is desired. Although there is a large body of research that study the location and impact of hazardous sites on the surrounding communities, there are few existing models which look to locate vulnerable populations through the use of quantitative data. Of the existing models none implement an intensity scaling method based upon the percent of the population that exist within certain study area dependent thresholds. The purpose of this study is to develop a multi level index that examines a study area based upon intensity scaling of census data as well as hazard siting proximity analysis. A gap in the current literature is filled by the creation of the index and introduction of intensity scaling. The final output of the index presents a method that is modular allowing for the application of each level of the index to be applied individual of the other level. The index can be used to support and facilitate decision making performed by local, state, or federal agencies, to prevent the over burdening of a community. A second use is as a predictive model, providing a base upon which a better understanding of the local impacts of future siting and/or removal of a hazardous site can be evaluated. A final use of this index is as a foundation upon which future research can be conducted, providing an environmental justice understanding of a region, allowing for targeted research to be performed.

One of the most urgent long-term issues is the impact of climate change and learning how to mitigate and adapt to its effects through adopting new development approaches over time. Learning more about sustainability and green buildings will hopefully help cities and towns address these future challenges of achieving local developments while decreasing global warming rates. Because there is at present relatively little data in Massachusetts about use of more sustainable practices in particular communities and regions, this thesis looks at the MetroWest Corridor region in Massachusetts as a case study to learn more about its new development methods: in what ways and to what extent do MetroWest towns include sustainable building practices in their planning codes? The MetroWest Corridor is discussed through basic review of its history and current projects within the region. This study included distribution of surveys to thirty municipalities in the region, and the information collected helped to clarify what and how much has been done to promote green building practices. The limited findings from this study indicate that a simple survey by itself will not provide a complete understanding about sustainable projects in terms of what is known or done by local planners. However, with more thorough research methods, there are ways to better identify current local sustainable building projects, policies and programs in Massachusetts, even if they were only partly understood from these limited prelminary survey results.

Wind energy is a means of energy production without carbon emissions, facilitating regional and national energy security. While there are currently no offshore wind farms in the United States, there has been growing success in building land-based wind capacity. Within the wind industry, there is a call for a streamlined permitting process, as well as an objective evaluation of current stakeholder processes. Within city and regional planning, the stakeholder process and public participation in general have long been subject to research and discourse, as scholars and practitioners alike seek to identify and typify what exactly makes public participation robust or rigorous. In Europe, researchers have found that a stakeholder process characterized by early inclusion and local decision-making increases community acceptance of large-scale wind projects, and that a ‘soft-path’, decentralized approach to infrastructure development, as seen in Germany, leads to greater community acceptance as well, versus the ‘hard-path’, centralized approach to infrastructure development as typified in early Dutch wind development. While the public process should not supplant the formal permitting process, or detract from technical expertise, a better understanding of what type of siting and decision-making process are construed by participants as positive or negative could help to formulate stakeholder involvement more effectively in future projects. It could also help to decrease the length of permitting times by promoting consensus-building rather than inadvertently creating an adversarial decision-making climate. This thesis uses a case study methodology to compare three land-based wind farms in Massachusetts and Vermont. It also compares the wind development policies between the two states. From each site, stakeholders are identified and interviewed concerning their experiences and perspectives of the stakeholder or public process. Interviews are analyzed using a matrix composed of success criteria pulled from the fields of regional planning and public participation theory, collaborative planning, and adaptive resource management. Findings include evidence as to what degree there was a stakeholder process, and to what degree participants found it positive or negative. The research found that the characteristics and practices of ore robust or rigorous stakeholder engagement are largely lacking in New England land-based wind development. These characteristics or practices included third-party data collection and reporting; early and broad stakeholder inclusion; collaborative ground rule setting; and no third-party mediation or facilitation. Stakeholder process perspectives are easily divided by wind-energy attitudes: anti-wind stakeholders reported greater antipathy toward the process, whereas proponents of both specific projects and the technology in general reported greater favorability toward the process and outcome. Vermont and Massachusetts have distinct wind development processes and distinct mechanisms for public participation and stakeholder engagement in a renewable energy technology context. In many ways, the siting of renewable infrastructure still follows the ‘decide, announce, defend’ character of conventional infrastructure and facility siting. Wind proponents, and proponents of other renewable energy technologies and sustainability measures in general, should pause and consider how to craft meaningful, robust and rigorous stakeholder processes prior to site selection and development. This will lend legitimacy to both the process and technology, lending political and social sustainability to a technology that is well needed for social, economic and environmental well-being. Continued avoidance of early and robust stakeholder engagement may contribute to ongoing conflict and confusion regarding renewable energy siting, permitting and development. Stakeholder experiences and perspectives also demonstrated that there are many factors contributing to public and social perceptions of wind technology and specific projects, including the financial gain or reward to communities and stakeholders; the size of individual turbines; project ownership and management; and project scale. There is opportunity for enhancing the public process and allowing rigorous and robust stakeholder process in wind energy development.

In economics, new growth theory suggests that knowledge creation and innovation are key drivers of growth. As a result, the ‘new economy’ is increasingly reliant upon the knowledge, skills, and abilities embodied in its workforce, also known as human capital, that facilitate the stimulation and generation of new ideas (Romer 1986, 1990 and Lucas 1988). This research contributes to the understanding of the relationship between stocks of human capital and economic output. I construct metrics to measure concentrations of basic worker skills using the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Information Network (O*NET) and employment estimates for 353 US metropolitan areas. In general, I find that basic skills are positively correlated with higher productivity. Specifically, I find that higher levels of the skills math and critical thinking partially explain higher levels of regional productivity. Science, though not statistically significant, has a negative correlation between higher levels of skill and regional output.