History of the Urban Environment

Total 38 results found.

City on Fire

City on Fire

Technology, Social Change, and the Hazards of Progress in Mexico City, 1860-1910

City on Fire is a chronicle of progress and danger, that integrates urban environmental history with histories of technology, science, and medicine to reveal how Mexico City changed in response to the growing threat of fire in the urban center.

Weeds

Weeds

An Environmental History of Metropolitan America

A comprehensive history of “happenstance plants” in American urban environments. Beginning in the late nineteenth century and continuing to the present, Falck examines the proliferation, perception, and treatment of weeds in metropolitan centers from Boston to Los Angeles.

Epidemics, Empire, and Environments

Epidemics, Empire, and Environments

Cholera in Madras and Quebec City, 1818–1910

Michael Zeheter offers a probing case study of the environmental changes made to fight cholera in two markedly different British colonies: Madras in India and Quebec City in Canada. He examines the complex political and economic factors that came to bear on the reshaping of each colony’s environment and the urgency placed on disease control.

Power on the Hudson

Power on the Hudson

Storm King Mountain and the Emergence of Modern American Environmentalism

Robert D. Lifset offers an original case history of a major event in environmental history—when a small group of local residents initiated a landmark case of ecology versus energy production and challenged the construction of the Storm King pumped-storage hydroelectric power plant on the Hudson River in the 1960s.

Energy Capitals

Energy Capitals

Local Impact, Global Influence

Fossil fuels propelled industries and nations into the modern age and continue to powerfully influence economies and politics today. As Energy Capitals demonstrates, the discovery and exploitation of fossil fuels has proven to be a mixed blessing in many of the cities and regions where it has occurred. With case studies from the United States, Canada, Mexico, Norway, Africa, and Australia, this volume views a range of older and more recent energy capitals, contrasts their evolutions, and explores why some capitals were able to influence global trends in energy production and distribution while others failed to control even their own destinies.

River City and Valley Life

River City and Valley Life

An Environmental History of the Sacramento Region

Often referred to as “the Big Tomato,” Sacramento is a city whose makeup is significantly more complex than its agriculture-based sobriquet implies. In River City and Valley Life, the contributors reveal the major transformations to the natural and built environment that have shaped Sacramento and its suburbs, residents, politics, and economics throughout its history. This environmental history provides a compelling case study of urban and suburban development in California and the American West.

Land of Sunshine

Land of Sunshine

An Environmental History of Metropolitan Los Angeles

Comprised of essays by geologists, ecologists, and historians, this study examines the development of Los Angeles as an example of the complex interactions between urban planning and nature.

London

London

Water and the Making of the Modern City

As people crowded into British cities in the nineteenth century, industrial and biological waste byproducts, and then epidemic followed them. Britons died by the thousands in recurring plagues. Figures like Edwin Chadwick and John Snow pleaded for measures that could save lives and preserve the social fabric. In London: Water and the Making of the Modern City, John Broich follows the politically charged and arduous task of bringing a municipal water supply to one of the world’s most complex urban environments.

The City Natural

The City Natural

Garden and Forest Magazine and the Rise of American Environmentalism

The weekly magazine Garden and Forest existed for only nine years (1888-1897). Yet, in that brief span, it brought to light many of the issues that would influence the future of American environmentalism. In The City Natural, Shen Hou presents the first “biography” of this important but largely overlooked vehicle for individuals with the common goal of preserving nature in American civilization. As Hou reveals, Garden and Forest was instrumental in redefining the fields of botany and horticulture, while also helping to shape the fledgling professions of landscape architecture and forestry.

Between Ruin and Restoration

Between Ruin and Restoration

An Environmental History of Israel

This volume assembles leading experts in policy, history, and activism to address Israel’s continuing environmental transformation from the biblical era through its future aspirations, with a particular focus on the past one hundred and fifty years.

Urban Rivers

Urban Rivers

Remaking Rivers, Cities, and Space in Europe and North America

Urban Rivers examines urban interventions on rivers through politics, economics, sanitation systems, technology, and societies; how rivers affected urbanization spatially, in infrastructure, territorial disputes, and in flood plains, and via their changing ecologies. Providing case studies from Vienna to Manitoba, the chapters assemble geographers and historians in a comparative survey of how cities and rivers interact from the seventeenth century to the present.

Seattle and the Roots of Urban Sustainability

Seattle and the Roots of Urban Sustainability

Inventing Ecotopia

Sanders examines the rise of environmental activism in Seattle amidst the “urban crisis” of the 1960s and its aftermath. Seattle’s activists came to influence everything from industry to politics, planning, and global environmental movements.

Metropolitan Natures

Metropolitan Natures

Environmental Histories of Montreal

Metropolitan Natures presents original histories of the diverse environments that constitute Montreal and its region. It explores the agricultural and industrial transformation of the metropolitan area, the interaction of city and hinterland, and the interplay of humans and nature.

Precious Commodity

Precious Commodity

Providing Water for America's Cities

Melosi examines water resources in the United States and addresses whether access to water is an inalienable right of citizens, and if government is responsible for its distribution as a public good. He provides historical background on the construction, administration, and adaptability of water supply and wastewater systems in urban America. Looking to the future, he compares the costs and benefits of public versus private water supply, examining the global movement toward privatization.

The Age of Smoke

The Age of Smoke

Environmental Policy in Germany and the United States, 1880-1970

The Age of Smoke provides an original, comparative history of environmental policy development in Germany and the United States from 1880 to 1970, and the rise of civic activism to combat air pollution.

Total 38 results found.