Greenways for America.

AR0071

In recent years decrepit cities looking for new revenue and a symbol of hope have gentrified their waterfront wharfs and warehouses with great fanfare. More important from the environmental perspective are the many new urban "greenways"-long, narrow ribbons of parkland stretched along creeks, rivers, ridges, and abandoned railroad rights-of-way. Some provide a bikeway or history walk. Others protect important floodplains and wildlife habitat. Still others serve multiple purposes-social, economic, and even political. But the most important fact is that most greenways began as grassroots efforts.

This is a book for people who want to quit complaining and do something. Most of the book is case history-Iowa's Heritage Trail; Tucson's Pima County River Parks'- Portland, Oregon's Forty Mile Loop; the BrooklynQueens Greenway. Because Little writes well about the often dramatic events and characters in the greenways story, it is also just good upbeat environmental-political reading. In this era of controversy over public funding, I should note that key support for this book came from the Conservation Fund's American Greenways Program, funds originating with the National Endowment for the Arts.