All files classified under: Land Use

The National Park Service invited Patrick Field, Managing Director of CBI, Robert Fisher, Senior Mediator at Fisher Collaborative Services, and Ona Ferguson of CBI to conduct an assessment to determine the feasibility of using a negotiated rulemaking process to manage the use of motorized vehicles on the Cape Hattera National Seashore, North Carolina.

This paper will consider psychological barriers—a term that we use to encompass both cognitive barriers and construal biases—in participatory land-use planning processes. We define cognitive barriers generally as psychological structures, attributes, processes, and predispositions that inhibit the full, rational, creative consideration of information. Construal biases involve the undue or excessive personalization of issues or situations, the failure to properly consider the alternative perceptions or cognitions of others, or the inability to disassociate other parties’ personal views from situational positions or professional roles (if you are a planner or other public servant, you may recognize yourself as a frequent victim of this bias). Both phenomena affect the productive, “rational” consideration of plans and proposals in land use decision-making.

During the spring of 1991, residents of the Hyde Park Estates neighborhood noticed the construction of a massive water tank and large-scale water supply lines. Following their concern about the implications of this infrastructure for new development, residents and members from other interested parties formed the Hyde Park Planning Group. This process resulted in an improved development for the Summit Project, a comprehensive neighborhood plan to shape future development and benefits for the existing neighborhood residents.

CBI, in partnership with Kearns & West and Jonathan Raab of Raab Associates, Ltd., have delivered training to over two-hundred agency and stakeholder participants engaged in the relicensing of hydroelectric dams.

Despite the best of intentions and the availability of considerable resources, the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Program (AMP) has failed to bring stakeholders together to jointly increase their understanding of the Colorado River and make useful, broadly supported resource management recommendations. In this article, the authors argue that the Glen Canyon Dam AMP has implemented CAM ineffectively, largely due to Congress and the DOI’s deficient initial design.

Landowners proposed a 5 lot residential subdivision on 30 acres in the town of Morrisville, Vermont. The parcel of land was located in a "Rural Residential with Agriculture" zoning district and also included in the overlay zoning district for the Public Community Ground Water Source Protection Area (WSPA). A municipal water department opposed the subdivision because of potential impacts to the groundwater.

CBI and Justice and Sustainability Associates have sought to prepare trainings and case studies that can benefit those seeking environmental justice across the U.S.

CBI is working on a holistic approach to community planning and development with residents, local businesses, non-profit organizations, and municipal and state agencies in three Rhode Island communities. Initiated by Rhode Island Housing, a quasi-public agency that focuses on critical housing issues in the state, KeepSpace is a new approach to planning for and directing investment that supports communities where neighbors meet, people work, and children play.