Title:	Urbanization and Locality: Strengthening Identity and Sustainability by Site-Specific Planning and Design
Authors:	Fang Wang Martin Prominski
Keywords:	Local Development
Issue Date:	2016
Publisher:	Springer
Description:	Urbanization, an irreversible trend in the economic and social development of humankind, can be regarded as an important index of prosperity and social progress in the country and region. Processes of urbanization yield many positive effects, but especially in phases of rapid urbanization, certain qualities are in danger of being neglected or overrun by the sheer forces of the processes. Locality, which refers to the specific natural and cultural characteristics of a place, is one such endangered quality. An increasing number of contemporary urbanization projects look the same; they do not address the local character of the site, which leads to urban areas with a low identity. Residents have a difficult time identifying with their environment in these new districts, a phenomenon that decreases the quality of living. In this book, researchers from Germany and China address the topics of urbanization and locality and then determine how identity and sustainability can be strengthened by site-specific design and planning. Pairing these two countries is relevant because both represent different stages in the urbanization process, leading to different problem definitions and solutions. Germany is a developed country where the urbanization rate has stabilized at a high level, whereas China is a developing country currently in a stage of rapid urbanization. Germany, as one of the world’s most highly urbanized countries, already saw two periods of rapid urbanization (at the end of the nineteenth century and after World War II) and is currently implementing subtle strategies to achieve identity and sustainability in urban planning.
URI:	http://10.6.20.12:80/handle/123456789/28348
ISBN:	978-3-662-48494-4
Appears in Collections:	Regional and Local Development Studies

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