"This book is a study of design initiatives and policies in five US West Coast cities - Seattle (including Bellevue), Portland, San Francisco, Irvine and San Diego - all of which have had particularly interesting urban design experience of relevance to practice in Britain and other countries." "Although these cities are not a representative sample of all American design practice, they provide a rich vein of ideas about recent policy development and current initiatives which will stimulate thought about the formulation of effective design controls. The presentation of substantial extracts from key documents that underpin design controls in the five cities will be of interest, inspiration and practical use to academics and practitioners who want to know more about American practice and who want to contribute to improvements in the standards and quality of urban design policies and design control."--Jacket.