Designing Sustainable Communities: Learning from Village Homes

Designing Sustainable Communities examines the history of the sustainable community movement and how Village Homes fits into that context. It offers an inside, start-to-finish look at the project’s development. LGC no longer sells this publication. Copies can be purchased at the Island Press Bookstore.

The movement toward creating more sustainable communities has been growing for decades, and in recent years has gained new prominence with the increasing visibility of planning approaches such as the New Urbanism. Yet, there are few examples of successful and time-tested sustainable communities. This book is about one such development — and the lessons other communities can learn from it.

Village Homes, located on an infill site in Davis, California, was built between 1975 and 1981 on 60 acres. It offers common areas and green space; community gardens, orchards and vineyards; pedestrian and bike paths; solar homes; and an innovative ecological drainage system.

Authors Michael and Judy Corbett were intimately involved in the design, development and building of Village Homes, and have lived there since 1977. In Designing Sustainable Communities, they examine the history of the sustainable community movement and how Village Homes fits into that context. They offer an inside, start-to-finish look at the project’s development – the obstacles, the problem-solving, and the changes that have occurred over the years.

An invaluable guide for planners, architects, landscape architects, and policymakers, this book also compares Village Homes with other communities and developments across the country, and examines the prospects for continued growth of the sustainable community movement.

Author: Judy Corbett and Michael Corbett, with a foreword by Robert L. Thayer
Published: 1999, Island Press
Pages: 235
ISBN: 9781559636865