Skip to main content Skip to search Skip to search

Political Science City Planning & Urban Development

Perverse Cities

Hidden Subsidies, Wonky Policy, and Urban Sprawl

by (author) Pamela Blais

Publisher
UBC Press
Initial publish date
Mar 2011
Category
City Planning & Urban Development, Urban, Regional Planning, Urban & Land Use Planning
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9780774818964
    Publish Date
    Mar 2011
    List Price
    $39.95
  • Hardback

    ISBN
    9780774818957
    Publish Date
    Nov 2010
    List Price
    $95.00
  • eBook

    ISBN
    9780774818971
    Publish Date
    Jan 2011
    List Price
    $125.00

Add it to your shelf

Where to buy it

Description

Urban sprawl – low-density subdivisions and business parks, big box stores and mega-malls – has increasingly come to define city growth despite decades of planning and policy. In Perverse Cities, Pamela Blais argues that flawed public policies and mis-pricing create hidden, “perverse” subsidies and incentives that promote sprawl while discouraging more efficient and sustainable urban forms – clearly not what most planners and environmentalists have in mind. She makes the case for accurate pricing and better policy to curb sprawl and shows how this can be achieved in practice through a range of market-oriented tools that promote efficient, sustainable cities.

About the author

Awards

  • Short-listed, Donner Prize for best book in Canadian public policy, The Donner Foundation

Contributor Notes

Pamela Blais is a city planner and principal of Toronto-based Metropole Consultants.

Editorial Reviews

Analytical and detailed in its approach and consistently daring in challenging accepted views of the causes of and solutions for urban sprawl.

Donner Prize Jury