Beyond the Urban Fringe was first published in 1983. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions. The non-metropolitan hinterland of the United States is no longer the placid and bucolic countryside celebrated by Currier and Ives. As urban America imposes ever-increasing demands upon the nation's resources, energy, water, food, recreation and scenery, peace and quiet are all sought in the land beyond the urban fringe. Certain dramatic changes in non-metropolitan America are already apparent. Census figures from 1980 documented that the population of rural areas and small towns was increasing more rapidly than that of metropolitan areas or the nation as a whole. The interstate highway network affords unprecedented access to small cities and towns, broadening commuting patterns and enabling industries to relocate outside of cities. During the 1960s and 1970s millions of acres were carved yo for second homes and recreational developments, a practice which often inflated the price of rural land. Beyond the Urban Fringe deals with problems arising from this transformation of nonmetropolitan America. It is based on reports given at a 1980 conference sponsored by the Association of American Geographers and funded by the National Science Foundation, with the participation of the U.S. Geological Survey and the Office of Water Research and Technology. The authors represent a wide range of disciplines--geography, resource economics, rural sociology, planning, law, and physics--and deal with topics not often found in a single volume: the character of land-use change in non-metropolitan areas, rural economic growth and decline, the rural land market, the growth and decline of small towns, farmland policy, remote sensing in rural areas, the impact of energy development on land use, hazardous waste disposal, and nuclear plant siting in nonurban areas. Geographers, planners, resource economists, and others concerned with environmental and resource management will find Beyond the Urban Fringe a valuable source of current research on a subject of central importance at all levels of government.

A Times Political Book of the Year A Daily Mail Political Book of the Year A Guardian Political Book of the Year An Independent Political Book of the Year Veering from the hilarious to the tragic, Andrew Mitchell's tales from the parliamentary jungle make for one of the most entertaining political memoirs in years. From his prep school years, straight out of Evelyn Waugh, through the Army to Cambridge, the City of London and the Palace of Westminster, Mitchell has passed through a series of British institutions at a time of furious social change – in the process becoming rather more cynical about the Establishment. Here, he brilliantly lifts the lid on its inner workings, from the punctilio of high finance to the dark arts of the government Whips' Office, and reveals how he accidentally started Boris Johnson's political career – an act which rebounded on him spectacularly. Engagingly honest about his ups and downs in politics, Beyond a Fringe is crammed with riotous political anecdotes and irresistible insider gossip from the heart of Westminster.

Urban Ecology is a rapidly growing field of academic and practical significance. Urban ecologists have published several conference proceedings and regularly contribute to the ecological, architectural, planning, and geography literature. However, important papers in the field that set the foundation for the discipline and illustrate modern approaches from a variety of perspectives and regions of the world have not been collected in a single, accessible book. Foundations of Urban Ecology does this by reprinting important European and American publications, filling gaps in the published literature with a few, targeted original works, and translating key works originally published in German. This edited volume will provide students and professionals with a rich background in all facets of urban ecology. The editors emphasize the drivers, patterns, processes and effects of human settlement. The papers they synthesize provide readers with a broad understanding of the local and global aspects of settlement through traditional natural and social science lenses. This interdisciplinary vision gives the reader a comprehensive view of the urban ecosystem by introducing drivers, patterns, processes and effects of human settlements and the relationships between humans and other animals, plants, ecosystem processes, and abiotic conditions. The reader learns how human institutions, health, and preferences influence, and are influenced by, the others members of their shared urban ecosystem.

This volume offers a new perspective to debates on local food and urban sustainability presenting the long silenced voices of the small-scale farmers from the productive green fringe of Sydney’s sprawling urban jungle. Providing fresh food for the city and local employment, these culturally and linguistically diverse farmers contribute not only to Sydney’s globalizing demographic and cultural fabric, but also play a critical role in the city’s environmental sustainability. In the battle for urban space housing development threatens to turn these farmlands into sprawling suburbia. In thinking from and with the urban ‘fringe’, this book moves beyond the housing versus farming debate to present a vision for urban growth that is dynamic and alive to the needs of the 21st century city. In a unique bringing together of the twin forces shaping contemporary urbanism - environmental change and global population flows - the voices from the fringe demand to be heard in the debate on future urban food sustainability.