Book excerpt: "Designing Planned Communities is a clear statement of the design issues that are critical to creating livable and well-designed planned communities. Professor Mandelker draws on his long experience with planned community and land use regulation to explain the meaning of good design for planned communities. He shows how design concepts for planned communities can be translated into effective design guidance by local governments. Examples of design standards are provided from comprehensive plans, design guidelines, design manuals, and planned community regulations. Throughout Designing Planned Communities, the reader is taken through the complex problems of design regulation to an effective design program that can create planned communities in which we want to live. Planners and lawyers will be interested in what Mandelker has to say about the design issues facing a growing number of planned communities throughout the country. Planning and local government attorneys will find the information about the legality of innovative design plans most interesting and helpful. Mandelker provides examples of localities that have experimented with a variety of design approaches and explores case law that will have an impact on these innovations." -Michael Allan Wolf, Professor & Richard E. Nelson Chair in Local Government Law, University of Florida, Fredric G. Levin College of Law