Over the past few years, publishers have put out enough books on urban sustainability to make Al Gore blush. Unfortunately, making a city sustainable takes a lot longer than does writing a book about making cities sustainable. So while green fatigue may have crept in, 2011 brought an eclectic array of books about urbanism and, in particular, about California. CP&DR has received some captivating titles this year, and somehow, California (or at least Los Angeles) continues to fascinate authors and photographers alike. 

Just in case you thought that suburbanization of the 20th century was a joint venture between God, the invisible hand, and a pot of gold delivered by the Freedom Fairy, Earl Swift's Big Roads might make you think again. 

As much as some planners might not like to admit it, sometimes it seems that the only thing worse than a choked with cars is a street devoid of cars.

Downtown Los Angeles' residential population nearly tripled between 2000 and 2008.  There are now about 45,000 people who call Downtown home, including my wife and I, who recently celebrated the anniversary of our move to Downtown (or DTLA as it's become known among locals).  We are, in many ways, exactly what planners had in mind when they began to promote downtowns as residential neighborhoods. In Los Angeles, the Adaptive Reuse Ordinance, enabling developers to convert older commercial buildings into apartments and lofts, is credited with sparking this movement. 

LOS ANGELES—For as long as I can remember, civic leaders in Southern California have been touting "regionalism." They insist that an area as interconnected as Los Angeles and its satellites really ought to coordinate how it grows and what it invests in. This sort of rhetoric usually goes no further than sparsely attended final panel discussions at a conferences about leadership or land use or some such. It's hard to "be regional" when everything from county boundaries to uncooperative public officials keep everything in its respective silos. 

In a few years, if the funding lines up and environmental clearances are issued, California may welcome the nation's very first high-speed rail system, a high-tech wonder that promises to alleviate traffic, reduce pollution, and get Californians to the blackjack tables as quickly as humanly possible.  

For a lot of planners, the idea of an "infill exemption" to the California Environmental Quality Act has been a kind of holy grail over the past few years. CEQA is a fact of life in California and unlikely to go away. But having to run though the entire CEQA process for a project a quarter-acre infill site – just as you might for a project on 5,000 acres of raw land – has been more than a little frustrating for developers and planners alike. Sure, an infill project has an impact. But if getting environmental clearance is a hassle, then what's the point?

The past few years have been great for not building things. The Great Recession has particularly devastated developers building on the urban fringe, who found themselves saddled with entitlements for homes that no one would ever buy. 

But for a distinct group of non-developers, the so-called Great Recession has been great for business. 

The outreach process that developers and planners often undergo has always struck me as less a negotiation and more like a perverse game of Marco Polo. Planners and stakeholders chase each other blindly, never quite knowing where each other are and rarely knowing what to do if one actually catches up with the other. It goes something like this: 

"Setbacks?"  "10 feet!"

"FAR?" "2.5!"

"Height limit?"  "40 feet!"

"Parking...?" Don't get me started. 

How many mitigated negative declarations are required for a lead agency to avoid preparing an EIR? In Sonoma County the answer is five. While the portion of Schenck v. County of Sonoma devoted to the "fair argument" analysis remains unpublished, the court's published ruling that certain procedural errors are not prejudicial is helpful, as well as the appellate court's affirmation that the trial court can fashion a tailored remedy to cure a California Environmental Quality Act error and is not compelled to set aside the approval.

As the state's public disclosure statute, the California Environmental Quality Act directs lead agencies to disclose the likely impacts associated with agency approval of projects. And while legal caution dictates that more disclosure is preferable to less disclosure, lead agencies have to recognize that there are two notable exceptions to this practice: information relating to cultural resources, as outlined in Government Code section 6254, CEQA Guidelines section 15120(d), and trade secrets, per CEQA Guidelines section 15120(d).

Tulare County is a diverse 4,800 square miles, with extensive, mountainous public lands in the east, and some of the country's most fertile farmland in the west. It encompasses the Sequoia Park, parts of the Giant Sequoia National Monument and Sequoia National Forest, and every year hosts the World Ag Expo. How all of these diverse elements fit into a single general plan is the question that has vexed planners and stakeholders alike for the better part of the past decade.