"Century of the City" Is Published -- Copies Available

From Neal Peirce (who writes a weekly column on state and local issues, a column that is distributed by the Washington Post Writers Group, but the Washington Post doesn't run his column[???????????], something I have complained about from time to time--the Baltimore Sun used to carry it as well but stopped a long time ago, the Seattle Times seems to run it still...):

This new book, just published by the Rockefeller Foundation, is available on request (see below). Written by Citistates Associates Neal Peirce, Curtis Johnson and Farley Peters, it's based on a landmark "Global Urban Summit" which the Rockefeller Foundation sponsored, and the Citistates team covered, in Bellagio, Italy, last year.

Planetizen -- the premier website on planning issues -- has just recognized the book as one of the 10 best planning books for 2009. Here's the Planetizen review:

This book is an impassioned call for action. Vibrant with images and littered with sidebars, Century of the City is magazine-readable but book-intelligent. It's the result of a month-long colloquy hosted by the Rockefeller Foundation to identify and strategize on the challenges faced by rapidly urbanizing 21st century cities. The focus is on taking multidisciplinary approaches to the issues faced by cities, from the underserved slums of India to the most bustling economic powerhouses of the new China. Readers will come away convinced that even the most inefficient cities are incredibly important to the livelihood of both local citizens and global citizens, and that making them better is truly an international imperative.

Ordering Copies

Copies of the book are available, cost-free, to interested readers: email rockefeller@forbesamg.com and include "Century of the City" in the Subject line of the email form. There is no charge for the books; however, the Rockefeller Foundation can offer only two copies per request.
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I got my copy yesterday. It looks to be a great read, judging by my skimming of the chapter on transportation which quotes Robert Puentes of Brookings a lot, and he made at least one excellent point:

...level the playing field between highway and transit projects so that local officials can make sounder investment decisions. Across the nation extraordinary high numbers of metro areas are bidding for the limited pool of transit assistance. Even when they try, they are required to run the gauntlet of New Starts funding evaluation, while highway projects are not. An even playing field would presumably make funds more fungible, allowing comparison of benefits, highways vs. transit. ANd it would fix the disparity between the 80% federal-local match for roads [versus] the 50% match for transit.

Puentes proposes a 25% solution in which the federal government would aim to help the top 50 metro areas achieve a balance in which at least 25% of workers either use transit, bike, or walk to work. Today only 9 of the top 50 metro areas meet that test. (pages 279-280)

This point, of focusing transit assistance on the top 50 metro areas, is really important, and a way to maximize the return from the investment. It gets at the point I was making yesterday about relative vs. absolute need and the proposed federal infrastructure stimulus plan. Utah might have the most requests ready, but Utah has fewer than 1% of the total U.S. population and so the return on investment is not as great by giving them everything they want (comparable to a $270 million "bridge to nowhere" in Alaska serving fewer than 500 people).

This also helps address the concerns of the anti-transit advocates, who rightly make the point that rail everywhere isn't necessarily cost efficient.