While urbanization in Mexico's northern border region is long-standing, the pace of urbanization has increased significantly in recent years. Many observers acknowledge the rise in urbanization, but few have examined how it is affecting Mexico's northern border cities. This dissertation fills the void by investigating the effects of rapid urbanization in Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico. I focus on Ciudad Juarez because; (1) it is the fastest growing border city, and; (2) processes fueling growth in Ciudad Juarez are shared by many other Mexican border cities. The dissertation focuses on two principal aspects of urbanization in Ciudad Juarez: urban morphology (i.e., land use) and the changing socio-spatial complexion of the city. In the first instance, I investigate whether population growth and expansion of the maquiladora (maquila) economy "distorted" the development of residential and commercial land use during the period 1988-1993. The analysis builds on the comparison of land use change in Ciudad Juarez versus three cities located in Mexico's interior. In the second instance, I develop a socio-spatial deprivation index to investigate whether population growth and industrialization (the maquila economy) have affected social conditions in the city's neighborhoods. The deprivation index incorporates many types of data (variables) that are organized within a GIS platform. The analysis is dynamic, and uses the deprivation index to monitor socio-spatial change during the period 1990-1995. The results demonstrate how rapid urbanization has affected Ciudad Juarez. In terms of morphology, the analysis shows that residential land has developed more quickly than expected, given rates of growth in non-border cities. In contrast, the development of commercial land use lags well behind non-border cities. In effect, proximity to the border has distorted development of both residential and commercial land uses. My analysis provides specific measures of these distortions. In the second case, population growth and industrialization have changed the social complexion of the city's neighborhoods. While it is difficult to discern whether these factors improved or worsened conditions at the neighborhood scale, the deprivation index shows clearly that neighborhood change is extensive and, as such, warrants closer inspection in subsequent research.

This dissertation provides a grounded examination of an evolving geographic information systems (GIS) discourse to examine how it affects decision-making processes in the context of resource management and urban planning issues, and whether the use of GIS is empowering or marginalizing for social groups involved in these processes. By using Foucault's genealogical and critical approaches to study discourse, GIS discourse is reconstructed. From the genealogy approach four discontinuities, the role of positivism, the social construction of GIS technology, the role of GIS manufacturers and vendors, and the institutionalization of GIS are examined to show how they have shaped the discourse. The critical approach uncovers how GIS discourse limits participation in decision-making processes through three systems of exclusions: prohibition, rejection and will to truth. These systems of exclusion legitimate particular knowledge, values and views that can be readily incorporated into a GIS. Typically it is the knowledge, values and views held by more dominant social groups that are privileged by GIS discourse, since they can be expressed in terms that are readily digitizable with no distortion in meaning. Hence, decisions based on the use of GIS tend to empower these groups because outcomes are in line with their interests. Using the Riparian Habitat Protection Ordinance and the Comprehensive Plan from Pima County, Arizona as case studies, this dissertation shows that GIS discourse systematically marginalizes weaker social groups. GIS discourse establishes the boundaries of the debates by shaping the way in which these issues were framed, dictating the data to use and the criteria to evaluate the data, and legitimating the participation of certain social groups. In both case studies social groups who argued from outside these boundaries were marginalized. An examination of power relations among actors reveals which actors can exercise power through decision-making, and that GIS discourse attempts to conceal moments when conscious decisions are made regarding the use of GIS. These moments are opportunities for contestations to occur, but since GIS discourse attempts to hide them, the use of GIS appears to be natural. GIS discourse is also articulated and reinforced through its intersection with local political and economic discourses.

Traditional explanations of suburbanization in the United States focus on spatial mobility, consumer demand, federal policies, and deteriorating quality of life in central cities. Other, more recent, explanations associate suburbanization with market failures. These two paths of explanation, however, fail to acknowledge the role of growth control and management as factors fueling the outward extension of metropolitan regions. Growth control and management emerged in the 1970s as a way of tackling the costs of suburbanization, but they were not applied consistently across metropolitan regions. Instead, their use was determined locally in most cases, which led to a patch-work pattern of growth control in metropolitan regions. This pattern, in turn, fueled "spillovers," where the imposition of growth control measures in suburban communities led homebuilders and residents to seek other suburban communities with no, or less stringent, growth controls. Although several scholars acknowledge the presence of spillovers, few have studied them directly. This dissertation investigates the spillovers generated by the price effects of local growth controls, as a mechanism underlying U.S. suburbanization. Using spatial econometric modeling as well as statistical and GIS map-based analyses, the dissertation targets the State of California and, specifically, the state's major metropolitan regions--Los Angeles and San Francisco--from the mid-1970s to the early 1990s. First, the study analyzes the price effects of growth controls in California, focusing on their impacts on local housing construction. The analysis finds that restrictive residential zoning, as a control suppressing permitted residential densities, has the effect of restricting housing construction. However, in contrast to expectation, urban growth boundaries accommodate homebuilding rather than constraining it, and population growth or housing permit caps and adequate public facility ordinances have no significant effects. Second, the study develops an index of spillovers, and categorizes localities of California as spillover origins or destinations with the index values. The index is based on a quasi-experimental approach that uses a temporal control and a model of local homebuilding. Third, I discuss the outward progression of spillovers given diffusion of growth controls in the politically fragmented metropolitan regions of California. For this, my dissertation explores the spatial distribution of spillover origins and destinations and investigates the relationship to local growth controls, especially at the metropolitan scale. The discussion provides a likely picture of suburbanization: in metropolitan regions growth controls spread to produce clusters of spillover origins at core areas, and this diffusion promotes spillovers to progress beyond the clusters towards outlying areas, thereby reinforcing suburbanization.

As our southwestern cities continue to grow in essentially uncontrolled and sprawling patterns it becomes increasingly apparent that new planning approaches and design guidelines must be generated to rectify past and combat future problems. Today, many community developments focus decision making principles on purely economic gain at the expense of addressing the socio-cultural, aesthetic, functional, economic, and environmental issues. In an attempt to address these issues, we employed both qualitative and quantitative methods of research. The qualitative methods included: a case study analysis of past, present and future communities; a literature review of past communities and new theoretical movements; structured interviews with real estate developers in the southwest; and participant observation encompassing peer dialogue and design reviews. The quantitative methods included statistical analysis of questionnaires given to designers and developers practicing in the southwest. A series of design and planning guidelines were distilled from this research. They were then tested by applying them to the design of a new community in the southwestern United States.

Prior to the Iraqi invasion and occupation, there was limited landscaping in Kuwait. Public gardens, highways, streets, governmental and private buildings had been planted to some extent. In the post invasion days the Amir of Kuwait has set a goal to beautify Kuwait by intensified landscaping. Responsibility for this Plan was given to the Public Authority for Agriculture and Fisheries (PAAF) which in turn, commissioned the Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR) to develop the Plan, in collaboration with PAAF staff. Currently, a Strategic and Master Plan for "Greenery" Development (1995-2010) is being prepared. The plan will consist of guidelines for the gradual landscaping of Kuwait focusing on the urban areas. The objectives of this thesis is to ensure the development of guidelines into a comprehensive body of knowledge which takes these categories into consideration: sociocultural factors, functional factors, environmental/ecological factors and aesthetic factors. It is hoped that this information could be synthesized into a thoughtful, utilitarian landscape design guideline for Kuwait.

The role of urban public space in the form of a contemporary downtown city park is the focus of this thesis. The subject of study was El Presidio Park located in Tucson, Arizona. The objective was to examine the use of this public space, past and present, as well as compare it to the use of other public places in the city today. Also looked at was the contribution of an urban plaza to this city, the effects of decentralization and the downtown context. A literature review was conducted to show the evolution of the town square or urban plaza throughout history. Data were collected through a survey and statistical analysis revealed relationships in use within and among each place. Results indicated that a small percentage of the sample population (27%) used the park, usually for special events, but not for everyday use and that it was the most demographically diverse of all places surveyed.

This paper describes some of the effects of urbanization on the environment and the benefits and liabilities of environmentally oriented land use regulation, and in detail, the use of the Xeriscape Landscape and Screening ordinance as one tool to effect the goal of environmental health of the Tucson community.

No description available.

The socio-economic problems created by apartheid in South Africa are a huge challenge to the current government. In order to alleviate the above, Integrated Development Planning was seen as the most appropriate strategy the country could apply. There was need to introduce a new approach to planning which was integrated, democratic and environmentally sensitive. For the first time, planning became 'people focused' by introducing participatory processes. As a backup to the above strategy, government introduced a variety of measures to bring total transformation to local government to facilitate service delivery. The key actions taken were; restructuring of local authorities, provision of new legislative framework and various capacity support programmes. Ironically, ten years after democracy was achieved, the situation has hardly changed. Access to basic services is still poor, poverty is worsening and unemployment is on the increase. This fact has been confirmed by the 2001 census data, which generally reflect deteriorating standard of living. This has been the cause of the current widespread violent demonstrations by communities in the country. It is ironical that despite all the effort being put by the provincial and national governments, the desired goals are not being achieved. This raises the big question, 'What is going wrong?' Are there shortcomings within the structures and processes or programmes being undertaken? The above question can be answered by conducting a research to try and find the root cause of the problem. This would be carried out by way of scrutinizing the roles and responsibilities of major stakeholders in development namely, municipalities, sector departments and communities. Focus would be made on issues like cooperative governance, weakness within support initiatives, availability of funding, compliance with prescribed processes and procedures etc. The research aims to interrogate the causes of poor service delivery and possible practical solutions. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2007.

A framework capable of escaping the bipolarities inherent in traditional urban/suburban classifications is designed not only for the analysis of historical form, but also as a means of identifying more affective modes of operation for the architectural and urban planning professions in an increasingly complex environment. The boundaries that have been established through settlement patterns are then traversed in order to gain a better comprehension of their nature, although not for the purpose of reassuring their stasis, but rather to reveal their movements in an effort to project future transformations. Ultimately, the tactical method of visualization is employed in the dual attempt to represent the future and to prepare for entry into it.