The concentration in land use and planning is for students interested in the interface of environmental issues with land use, growth, planning, and development. F&ES offers four land use courses and a clinic designed to be completed in the course of a two-year degree, building upon each other and giving students a comprehensive study of the multi-faceted environmental problems and solutions in regards to land use. They are part of the MEM
Specialization in Sustainable Land Management.
F ALL
FES 835:
L
AND
U
SE PLANNING
S EMINAR
Faculty: John Nolon
FES 817:
L AND U SE
P LANNING AT THE
L OCAL AND
R EGIONAL L EVEL
Faculty: David Kooris
S PRING
FES 820:
L AND U SE L AW
AND
E NVIRONMENTAL
P LANNING
Faculty:
Marjorie Shansky
FES 775:
S USTAINABLE
S ITES
Faculty:
Andy Tung
N EW IN 2014:
L AND U SE
C LINIC
Faculty:
Jessica Bacher
Land Use Curriculum Director: Professor John Nolon jnolon@law.pace.edu
FES Land Use Student Liaison: Sarah Barbo, FES ‘14 sarah.barbo@yale.edu
Join the Student Interest Group: Land Use Coalition at Yale (LUCY) http://environment.yale.edu/sigs/lucy-studs/

FES 835: L AND U SE PLANNING S EMINAR
Faculty: John Nolon, 1 credit
• Land use studies encompass the interactions among land ecological functions, community building and site design, economic development, and community decision-making. Planning for land use and the techniques used to implement these plans determine where development occurs on the American landscape. They play a key role in meeting the needs of the nation’s growing population for housing and non-residential development and in protecting natural resources and environmental functions from the adverse impacts of land development.
• Land use planning and practices also bear a close relationship to climate change. Land use plans and regulations shape human settlements and can increase energy consumption and vehicle miles travelled, worsening climate change, or create neighborhoods and communities that mitigate and adapt to climate change. The course will concentrate on identifying and defining mitigation and adaptation strategies including transit oriented development, building and neighborhood energy conservation, distressed building remediation, jobs and housing balance, coastal resiliency, and biological carbon sequestration.
• The seminar exposes students to the essential components of land use planning in the U.S. and introduces them to the F&ES curriculum concentration in land use. Guest speakers are professionals involved in sustainable development, land conservation, smart growth, and local governance. Classes will focus on current issues in domestic land use and include discussion on the trajectory for professions and career paths in this sector.
FES 817: L AND U SE P LANNING AT THE L OCAL AND R EGIONAL L EVEL
Faculty: David Kooris, 3 credits
• This course explores land use planning practice, regional planning, and the tools planners use to gain consensus amongst diverse constituencies. Land use plans and the techniques that implement them determine where development occurs on the American landscape. Planners play a key role in determining how the needs of nation’s growing population for housing and non-residential development are accommodated and how the landscape is protected from the adverse impacts of additional land development.
• Planning, zoning, and other land use regulations are the principal techniques employed to achieve safe and livable communities and to conserve critical landscapes. In most of the 50 states, land use planning and regulation is conducted principally at the local level, while regional planning is encouraged, but seldom required. For regional landscapes to be planned effectively, the competitive tensions among local governments--and their land use plans--must be mediated

FES 820: L AND U SE L AW AND E NVIRONMENTAL P LANNING
Faculty: Marjorie Shansky, 3 credits
• This course introduces students to laws and programs that affect watershed protection and to the laws that delegate to local governments primary responsibility for decision making in the land use field. It helps students understand how the environment can be protected through effective regulation at the local level.
Theories of federalism, regionalism, states’ rights, and localism are studied. The history of the delegation of planning and land use authority to local governments is traced, leading to an examination of local land use practices particularly as they relate to watershed areas and to encouraging sustainable development.
• Course participants engage in empirical research to identify, catalogue, and evaluate innovative local laws that successfully protect environmental functions and natural resources, and the manner in which towns, particularly on the coast, incorporate climate change into their planning and regulations. The course includes examination of the state and local response to climate change, sea-level rise, growth management, alternatives to Euclidean zoning, low-impact development, and brownfields redevelopment
FES 775: S USTAINABLE S ITES
Faculty: Andrew Tung, 3 credits
• This course provides students with an overview of the different processes and players involved in planning, creating and managing sustainable sites. The class will utilize the principles and points-based rating system of the Sustainable Sites Initiative as a guide to examine means to lessen the impacts and optimize the benefits of environmentally-conscious site design and development.
• The course includes core lectures by the principal instructor, a landscape architect and attorney who is a partner in a multidisciplinary planning firm. Guest lecturers - including ecologists, planners, architects, landscape architects, site contractors, and resource managers - will share the real-world challenges and successes experienced in working towards sustainability on their sites and projects.
• In-class workshops will explore site analysis techniques, the site design process, and the identification and assessment of sustainability options. Field trips will provide an opportunity to see and experience the results of good, not-so-good and poor site planning and management practices. A group term project will allow students to develop collaborative strategies to improve the sustainability of a local site.
L AND U SE C LINIC
Faculty: Jessica Bacher, 1-3 credits
• The Land Use Clinic explores specific land use, environmental, and sustainable development law topics of current concern and relevance to the field. Each semester, professors teaching the course will lecture on specific topics related to the Land Use Law Center’s current work, and students enrolled in the Clinic will work with Center attorneys on Center projects. The Center at Pace Law School is dedicated to fostering the development of sustainable communities through the promotion of innovative land use strategies and collaborative decision-making techniques, as well as leadership training, research, education, and technical assistance.
• The Clinic will meet once a week for lectures, project meetings, or fieldtrips. Clinic students can register for between one and six academic credits and will be expected to devote approximately 50 hours of actual work per credit. Clinic professors will assign papers, publications, and/or research memoranda to students based on assigned project topics and number of academic credits.