The Adaptive Reuse Handbook: Procedures to Inventory, Control, Manage and Re-employ Surplus Municipal Properties - Tapa dura

The dynamics of change in the uses and occupancy characteristics of cities has caught urban managers off guard. The abandonment of central city realty in many locations is a fact which cannot be overlooked. Yet within this reality, there are the seeds of hope, not of return to things past, but to a series of new constructive efforts. Bridging the gap between the city and/or neighborhood of yesterday and the potentials of tomorrow requires a firm grasp of all the many required tools - in terms of legal, physical and strategic planning. It is to these necessities that this handbook is dedicated.The Adaptive Reuse Handbook is a basic urban revitalization manual for city managers, zoning administrators, urban planners, architects, lay planning/zoning board members, and interested citizens. The handbook consists of procedures to gain control of, and positively reemploy, abandoned urban real estate. This is the non-architectural side of surplus property conversion - the legal and administrative procedures necessary to garner structures and land and prepare them for reuse.This book is divided into four sections: planning/inventory; property control; property management and disposition; and physical revitalization. Each section presents procedures and field experience to deal with a particular urban revitalization activity: property inventory, abandonment early warning systems, reuse planning, interim/permanent property control, tax sale/foreclosure, property management, property disposition, and physical revitalization. This is a must have reference work for anyone in the field of urban studies.

David Listokin is a professor at the Edward J. Bloustein School at Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey.