You are here:
PLACES: A Tool For Sustainable Land Use
Citation:
HANSEN, V. E. PLACES: A Tool For Sustainable Land Use. Presented at TASK/USEPA Workshop, Denver, CO, November 12, 2009.
Impact/Purpose:
To introduce and discuss a proposed voluntary program (PLACES) that would enable land uses without compromising environmental, social, and economic systems.
Description:
Rapid development of the human made environment to meet human needs and expand the economy is largely responsible for environmental losses. Because all land uses will incrementally and cumulatively degrade ecosystems that sustain human life, site-level land use decisions must account for effects on the local and broader environments. This is not now possible because the systems context has not been identified, and land owners have no authority off-site. Land uses should be the product of the environmental, social, and economic systems that must function to sustain human life. Because we are fairly certain of the environmental qualities that must be maintained to sustain the environment and human life, it is possible for communities to use these qualities to identify contexts of land use and programs for improving them. PLACES (Planning Land And Communities to be Environmentally Sustainable) is a proposed voluntary program that would enable land uses without compromising environmental, social, and economic systems. If approved, it would provide "EPA Certificate of Sustainable Community" to communities that establish (a) land use policies that meet sustainable environmental qualities, and (b) public programs to restore systems within which individual land users can participate. These two program attributes will: (1) help to assure that site-level land use decisions do not compromise the systems that sustain human life; (2) place responsibility for the external effects of land uses on those who initiate change; and (3) provide land users with the ability to counteract off-site effects of their land uses.