New site offers information on creating sustainable communities

To help move toward these goals, MARC created a Sustainable Land Use Resource website that describes sustainability principles and concepts and explores the interrelatedness between those ideas.

Sustainability principles are simple, broad concepts that describe characteristics of a sustainable community. Each principle corresponds to several sustainability concepts, which represent more specific means of achieving the principles.

The seven sustainability principles are:

• Corridors and Activity Centers — Vibrant corridors and activity centers with housing, employment, and commercial development, improve development opportunities, increase lifestyle choices and allow for efficient public and private investments.
• Design for Healthier Lifestyles — Places designed for active lifestyles with access to healthy foods can improve the health of residents, reduce health care costs, and contribute to vibrant neighborhoods.
• Housing Choice — Housing choices for all ages, lifestyles and income levels help support diverse communities and a healthy housing industry.
• Reinvestment — Reinvesting in existing communities and neighborhoods ensures they remain or become vibrant, connected, green places.
• Resource Conservation and Energy Efficiency — Sustainable places conserve resources for future generations while simultaneously reducing costs and increasing economic and fiscal efficiency.
• Transportation Choices — Varied transportation options help reduce family travel costs, reduce air pollution, and connect families to jobs and services.
• Unique Community Characteristics — Distinctive communities and historical, cultural and natural assets increase the vibrancy of a region and contribute to its overall economic health.

This site revives some content from a previous MARC website, the Sustainable Code Framework. While the new site currently only includes principles and concepts, MARC plans to expand the content into a more expansive land use resource that offers practical applications of the principles and concepts.