Bringing Buildings Back: From Abandoned Properties to Community Assets

Written by a distinguished urban planner and practitioner with three decades of experience, the original volume of Bringing Buildings Back provided both a detailed toolkit and a call to rethink the way America carries out urban redevelopment.

This second edition of Alan Mallach's now classic work contains new material that directly addresses the issues that have arisen as communities across the country try to stabilize their neighborhoods in the wake of the foreclosure crisis. It discusses both the fundamental "big picture" issues and the technical and practical questions that have emerged. Mallach explores the concept of neighborhood stability and explains how it relates to the economic forces affecting a community, city, or region. As in the prior volume, this updated edition of Bringing Buildings Back does not seek simply to provide technical guidance to practitioners; it also suggests creative ways of thinking about local policies, strategies, and actions. Ultimately, no plan for dealing with problem real estate is about just the properties themselves; it is about how to build stronger, healthier neighborhoods, towns, and cities.