This thesis is an examination of National Recreation Areas managed by the National Park Service, the Forest Service, and the Bureau of Land Management. It is exploratory in nature and seeks to illustrate their history, how well they are working today, and prospects for the decade of the 1990's. Included is information about the history, benefits, and trends of federal provision of outdoor recreation opportunities. Also included is a section on planning theory and conceptual frameworks--the concept of Multiple-Use, and the theory of Transactive Planning, as developed by John Friedmann. Managers of thirty-six of thirty-seven existing national recreation areas were interviewed by telephone concerning area attributes, the designation process, public support, enabling legislation, impacts of designation, and management mechanisms. A second research effort consisted of the creation of a computer database that serves as an index to the enabling legislation of all thirty-seven areas.

Recently, sustainable development has been presented as a revision to neoliberalism by emphasizing not just economic factors, but also social and environmental concerns. This revision also maintains the value of promoting negotiation with communities that stand to be affected by initiatives. Yet, given criticisms of current policy, what is the role of non-state actors such as NGOs and local communities in shaping development? This question will be addressed by discussing a current integration project in Central America and Mexico called the Plan Puebla Panama (PPP). Although based on sustainable development, the PPP is criticized on social and environmental grounds and for little public information. By applying Long's actor model to political ecology, I argue that although the development promoted by international institutions has fallen short, civil society has shaped current policy. Moreover, I assert participation and negotiation from civil society is essential in encouraging more equitable and sustainable development.

This study evaluated the success of recently revegetated roadsides in Tucson, Arizona. The primary objectives of this study were to (1) evaluate a sample of revegetated roadsides by assessing site condition and comparing existing vegetation to the original seed mix; and (2) develop recommendations for appropriate revegetation practices for use in Tucson. Density data were collected at 20 locations using belt transects to derive species information such as origin, vegetative life-form, and invasiveness. Results indicated that the study sites had greater proportions of plant material not specified in the original construction documents than specified plant material. Of the specified species, creosote bush, desert senna, and triangle-leaf bursage had the highest rates of establishment while brittlebush, globemallow, shrubby buckwheat, and fourwing saltbush provided the most vegetative cover. Several non-specified species exhibited successful establishment on many study sites, while some species rarely or never appeared in the study area despite frequent specification.

<p> As cities grew throughout the past century, the availability of locally grown food declined, mostly because urban expansion occurred at the expense of adjacent agricultural land. As a result, city dwellers turned to commercial food market systems that import food from distant production areas. Private greenspace, which is one of the largest land cover types in cities, offers the potential for substantial agricultural production. Because urban food production on private land, such as backyards, requires the willing participation of landowners, resident&rsquo;s feelings about and experience with food growing are important to understand.</p><p> This study examined the demographic differences between food growers and non-food growers with respect to their attitudes and perspectives about backyard food growing. The positive associations, the problems and barriers residents encountered, and the resources they needed to begin food gardening, were identified through questionnaires and in-depth interviews administered to study participants in Palm Beach County, Florida, U.S.A. The demographic groups that were most likely to food garden were those in long-term relationships, higher income brackets, those with college education and residents over 50 years old. Incentives and programs focused on producing more from existing gardens may be most appropriate for people in these demographic groups, while other groups will most require basic food growing information. Study participants highly valued intangible benefits of food gardening (e.g., relaxation, feelings of happiness and satisfaction), often more than the provision of food. Most barriers and problems with backyard food growing, such as a lack of space and the need for gardening information, were similar for those who food garden and those who do not.</p><p> Results from this study indicate that traditional agricultural incentives and perspectives must be rethought if they are to be applied in urban settings. The practice of backyard food gardening, which can be a significant part of sustainable urban agriculture, must be viewed and valued beyond the framework of market commodities and economics. By creating incentives and initiatives that reflect the needs and challenges faced by urban growers, urban agriculture will become an integrated part of the community, improving food quantity and quality while enriching residents&rsquo; lives.</p>

This research considers the likelihood of adoption of and the effectiveness of growth management policy. First, I consider the likelihood that states adopt growth management policies. To conduct this research, I employ the policy diffusion model and add to the economic competition component of this model. I argue that the relative severity of a policy problem influences policy adoption among competing governments. In other words, states remain competitive with other states by adopting a policy when its policy problems are worse or similar to competitor states. This expectation is supported. I find that the higher the relative policy severity the higher the likelihood of policy adoption. Secondly. I examine how institutional structure influences policy outcomes. Here I consider the role of two institutional components: decision-making autonomy and policy-making costs of metropolitan governments. First, I expect that more autonomy at the metropolitan level will result in more effective policy outcomes. Second! I expect that metropolitan areas that receive more state aid will have more effective policy outcomes. Finally, I suggest that a conditional relationship exists between autonomy and transaction costs. More specifically, I contend that transaction costs increase, as a result of increasing autonomy. Metropolitan areas with more autonomy will likely receive less financial assistance, thereby increasing the metropolitan area's cost of implementing a policy. I find that, separately, state aid and autonomy have a significant affect on growth management outcomes. Metropolitan areas that receive state aid have more effective policy outcomes and less autonomous metropolitan areas have less effective policy outcomes. I do not find a conditional relationship between transaction costs and autonomy.

Throughout the history of New Orleans the paradigms of mechanical and fluid were projected as opposing modes of thought in the attempts to render the inhospitable dynamic site suitable for urbanization. The city's devastation in hurricane Katrina is a reminder that the top-down infrastructural practices have failed to freeze the unstable ground and may have increased the city's vulnerability by encouraging unlimited growth. A reconstruction strategy that perpetuates a mode of occupation irreverent of the fragile geographical reality will inevitably lay the groundwork for future disasters. This thesis seeks to develop an alternative vision by surrendering a high-risk area in the city to the fluvial landscape. As a system of passive water management controls interspersed with islands of resilient program, the new territory will be a catalyst for the city's recovery between major catastrophic events by alleviating seasonal flooding and operating as a bio-remediation filter for toxic runoff.

The image of our metropolis is the product of our economy. Commercial vernacular architecture in the United States since 1950 has become increasingly generic and anonymous. This is the direct result of a shift in proprietorship from individual to joint ventures in ownership of built form. Joint ventures in ownership, in turn, allow for an increase in the scale of built form, or 'bigness,' which dislodges or shifts the fundamental architectural volume or unit. This new unit appears on frontage roads across the nation, and Houston's own 'feeder' roads are a prime example of this changing space of American cities.

Hard Core Urbanism is the tendency to produce corporate enclaves within the fluid city. The garrison mentality denies the complex and interwoven processes exemplified by the history of Potsdamer Platz. Breaking the completeness of the corporate plan, the project initiates the process of diversification; enabling a reoccupation by the city.

When U. S. Highway 59 was constructed through Houston, Texas in the 1950's a trench was dug. One neighborhood became two, as a third community of automobile commuters filled the gap. The proposition of the design thesis is to heal this "wound" by physically and conceptually expanding an existing public park currently sited on the north side of Highway 59 into the right-of-way on both sides of it and onto the bridges that cross it. The new "park" facilitates the development of different relationships between people on the highway and people off it, and between people on one side of the highway and those on the other. The thesis is an exploration of issues of scale, speed, "place-ness" and of architecture's role in the facilitation of human interaction. I come to the project as one who participates in the place both as a highway driver and a neighbor-hood resident, as a traveler and a dweller. I also come to the project as an outsider trying to observe the energy that makes up the system (the machinic assemblage, if you will) so that I might effect it with minimal means. My objective is to engage architecture and the process used to create it to facilitate the development of community among people.

This thesis proposes an alternative development for the Odaiba reclamation site. This alternative consists of terrain manipulation and modified infrastructure, as well as procedural guidelines. By forgrounding the artificiality of the landfill site, and providing spaces for occupation outside those typical for consumption, these alterations will allow the citizens of Tokyo to experience the site as a unique territory outside of the traditional systems of Tokyo. It is a new system, that will continue to exist---and be transformed---as the site is inexorably assimilated into Tokyo itself.