Learning Resources

Abstract: This article provides a survey of innovative approaches to campus transportation in the United States. The high costs of parking expansion have propelled many institutions toward a transportation demand management strategy, using parking pricing, transit passes for students and employees, and investment in bicycle infrastructure to shift many trips from single-occupant automobiles to other modes of travel. These institutions have experienced multiple benefits, including lower transportation costs, lower environmental impacts, and improved community relations.

Abstract: Sustainable planning for academic institutions can reduce the ecological footprint and improve project performance. Structured workshops are proposed as the method to integrate green planning seamlessly into the process by establishing goals, developing preliminary green measures, and making realistic decisions based on consensus. Energy conservation, indoor environmental quality, and resource efficiency are the strategies for achieving the goals. Green rating systems, such as Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED™), offer specific ways to gauge the environmental effectiveness of green measures. Greenness is dependent on the capital cost invested but produces life-cycle costs savings. “Greening” the campus through the workshop process is the precursor to “greening” the curriculum.

Abstract: The challenge of planning a sustainable future is so great and the task so broad that moving our institutions of higher learning, let alone our society, toward sustainability requires an unprecedented coalition of leaders. Planners must use the best skills and knowledge of all members of the academy: faculty, students, staff, trustees, alumni, and administration. This article reviews and critiques the processes, circumstances, and leadership that enabled Northland College to make significant progress toward sustainability. An Environmental Council that supported strong linkages between student learning and sustainability was key to the progress. The council was an incubator of leadership from which students, faculty, and staff emerged as agents of change.

Abstract: The natural resource planning theory of Walter Firey is examined as conceptual base for planning efforts aimed at achieving sustainable policies and practices on university and college campuses. Sustainable policies and practices are those that, according to Firey’s theory, are simultaneously ecologically possible, economically gainful, and ethnologically adoptable. Successful planning for sustainability must take all three criteria fully into account in order for sustainability to be achieved. While Firey’s theory may not identify specific policies and practices that are universally applicable in pursuing sustainability, it does provide robust and flexible general principles useful for planners.

Abstract: A four-step process that has awakened The Pennsylvania State University to its ecological impact and is moving it toward sustainable resource-use policies is presented as a general model for ecological reform in universities. The first step was to frame the problem by conducting a high-profile ecological assessment of the institution using sustainability indicators. This created both the justification and the momentum necessary to persuade the university to adopt an ecological mission (step 2). Next, a detailed ecological and economic analysis of a university facility was made (step 3) to establish concrete socio-techno solutions that could then be extrapolated (step 4) to form specific sustainable policies for the entire university.

Abstract: Colleges and universities are expanding at unprecedented rates, creating new hazards for our increasingly fragile natural environments. Higher education administrators and planners are finding that campus development, like suburban sprawl, can disrupt functioning natural systems and destroy the natural, historical, and cultural fabric of the place. To address environmental issues and new regulations, proactive institutions of higher education are taking the lead as stewards of the land by including an environmental component in their campus master plans. An environmental approach to planning incorporates ecological information into campus master plans to ensure a sustainable campus landscape that is beautiful, durable, and distinctive. These Environmental Master Plans are best developed using a democratic process, considering each site’s unique essential environmental resources, the constraints of the regulatory environment, and a continuing education and outreach program. A case study of an Environmental Master Plan at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill illustrates how such a plan was created at one of the nation’s oldest and largest college campuses.

Abstract: This list of print and electronic resources is designed to act as a springboard to assist practitioners in finding information to start implementing sustainability efforts on their campuses.

Abstract: Campus energy consumption causes the largest environmental impacts. College and university planners, architects, and facilities managers are uniquely positioned to play a critical role promoting campus environmental responsibility by addressing the need for campus energy sustainability. Both demand- and supply-side strategies are required. On the demand side, an aggressive campus energy conservation program can reduce campus energy consumption by 30 percent or more. Addressing the supply side of the energy equation means shifting to clean, renewable, non-carbon-based energy resources and technologies. Developing campus energy policies, coping with the computer explosion, avoiding the pitfalls of electric deregulation, buying green power, and implementing green building design are all parts of the solution.