“Rio+10”, sustainability science and Landscape Ecology

The ‘sustainability debate’ has had a profound influence on contemporary Landscape Ecology. This paper explores the implications of the second global summit for the research agendas that developed after the Rio Summit (1992), and argues that although the Declaration from Johannesburg 2002 restates the earlier summit concerns, the messages it sends to the research community are subtly different to those a decade earlier. The growing body of literature, which identifies the need for a new kind of sustainability science, is reviewed, and its relevance to Landscape Ecology is discussed. Although recent commentators have argued for a more transdisciplinary approach to Landscape Ecology that appears to meet the requirements of this new science we still lack ways of taking this forward. The paper concludes by proposing a new paradigm for Landscape Ecology based on the concept of ecosystem goods and services, or natural capital. It is argued that in the decade since the Rio Summit, a key focus of the future research agenda for the discipline should be an exploration of the ‘sustainability choice space’ defined by the interaction of biophysical limits and social and economic values at the landscape-scale. The paper provides a conceptual model (the tongue model) that describes how biophysical and socio-economic constraints can be combined in sustainability planning.     

Environmental aesthetic design Identifying and achieving desired environmental effects, particularly “image” and “atmosphere”

Environmental aesthetic design is the process of determining aesthetic aspects of an environment still to be built. Aesthetic matters weigh heavily in the world of design and in the decisions of building designers, particularly architects. Yet, apart from its use within the specialized literature, the word aesthetic may mean whatever the user chooses it to mean. For the purposes of this paper an aesthetic effect of an environment is assumed to be a particular subjective quality that a designer may wish to give to, and a subjective response experienced by those who use, that environment. The paper proposes a simple procedure by which designers may establish aesthetic programmes (or briefs) for the “atmospheres” of environments and achieve their desired effects. The same procedure may be used to create a desired “image”.     

The Houston Growth Coalition In “Boom” and “Bust”

ABSTRACT: Although growth machine theory emphasizes the coalition's tactics and organization, it neglects adjustment to changing economic conditions. This article explores the changes in the strategy and organization of Houston's growth coalition during the peak growth of the 1970s and the decline of the 1980s. During the boom, the coalition focused not on additional growth but on easing the city's infrastructure problems. The coalition underwent several major changes during decline as it struggled to compete aggressively with other cities for various enterprises and to devise strategies for diversifying the economy. A growth coalition has the opportunity to establish the economic basis for future growth when the city's dominant industries reach maturity and decline.