Envi Planning Overview/Foundations

A comprehensive collection of vocabulary flashcards covering the core concepts, legal frameworks, policy tools, planning procedures, and foundational principles from GEOG/ENVI 239.

Environmental Planning

The process by which societies spatially organize better futures by diagnosing current conditions, setting goals, coordinating actors, and revising plans over time.

Environmental Policy

The set of authoritative tools and institutional choices used to implement, constrain, incentivize, or finance environmental planning goals.

Social Learning

The process through which society and decision-makers incorporate new information and experience to adjust their understanding and actions over time.

Agenda Setting

The political process that determines which environmental problems receive governmental attention and action while others do not.

Edmund S. Muskie

U.S. Senator known as 'Mr. Clean' who authored and championed landmark American environmental legislation, including the Clean Air Act of 1970 and the Clean Water Act of 1972.

Performance Standard

A regulatory instrument specifying what environmental result must be achieved while providing flexibility in how the regulated party complies.

Technology Standard

A regulatory instrument specifying the exact design, equipment, or practice that a regulated party must use to comply.

33/50 Program

A voluntary pollution prevention initiative launched by the EPA in 1991 aiming for a 50% reduction in industrial releases of 17 high-priority toxic chemicals by 1995.

Spatial Scale

The geographic level or extent (parcel, neighborhood, city, or region) at which an environmental process, problem, decision, or analysis is considered.

Interconnection

The geographical reality that environmental systems such as watersheds, airsheds, and habitats cross political boundaries.

Spatial Inequality

The uneven geographic distribution of environmental quality, natural resources, and hazard exposure across different communities.

Central Arizona Project (CAP)

A 336-mile canal delivering Colorado River water to Phoenix and Tucson, created after Arizona accepted junior water rights in 1968 to secure federal funding.

Multilevel Environmental Governance

The system of overlapping environmental authority divided among federal, state, and local levels of government.

National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA)

A 1970 federal law requiring federal agencies to assess the environmental impacts of their proposed actions prior to making decisions.

NEPA Decision Process

The federal administrative procedure evaluating proposed actions for environmental impact to determine whether an Environmental Assessment (EA) or Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) is required.

Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ)

A body within the Executive Office of the President established after NEPA to coordinate federal environmental policy and environmental reviews.

State Environmental Quality Review (SEQR)

New York State's environmental review law requiring state and local agencies to analyze environmental impacts and avoid or minimize them to the maximum extent practicable.

Comprehensive Plan

A state-mandated long-range document describing municipal policies and goals related to land use, transportation, housing, infrastructure, and the environment.

Functional Plan

A strategic local plan focused on a specific issue or infrastructure system across a municipality, such as a stormwater or climate action plan.

Area Plan

A strategic local plan focused on a specific geographic location within a municipality, such as a downtown, neighborhood, or watershed plan.

Zoning

A local legal regulatory tool consisting of text rules and a map that controls land use, building dimensions, and development density.

Overlay Zone

A zoning district placed on top of an existing base zone that subjects property owners to the standards of both zones.

Form-Based Code

A land development regulation that prioritizes the physical form and design appearance of buildings over the strict separation of land uses.

Performance Zoning

A land-use control system that regulates the measurable physical impacts of land uses (such as noise, light, or runoff) rather than prohibiting use types.

Subdivision Regulations

Local ordinances establishing design rules for dividing land parcels, laying out roads, installing utilities, and managing stormwater.

Capital Improvements Program (CIP)

A 5- to 10-year municipal financial schedule planning the location, timing, and funding for constructing, repairing, or replacing public infrastructure.

Green Infrastructure

An interconnected network of natural assets (wetlands, forests), enhanced assets (rain gardens, bioswales), and engineered assets (permeable pavement) designed to manage stormwater and preserve ecosystem functions.

Concurrency Policy

A local policy requiring necessary public infrastructure to be in place before new public or private development can begin.

Urban Service Boundary

A designated geographic boundary restricting public infrastructure extensions to promote compact development and prevent urban sprawl.

Natural Resources Inventory

A detailed catalog documenting natural environmental features such as air, water, soils, wetlands, forests, farmland, and wildlife species.

Built Environment Inventory

A catalog documenting physical human-made structures such as buildings, roads, sewers, public facilities, land development patterns, and population.

Geographic Information System (GIS)

A digital framework linking spatial geographic features with descriptive attribute data to visualize, query, and analyze multiple map layers.

Orthophoto

An aerial or satellite image geometrically corrected for terrain elevation, sensor tilt, and Earth curvature to create a uniform scale.

Land and Water Suitability Analysis

A systematic evaluation rating environmental factors to identify locations where specific land uses or conservation are most appropriate.

Current Trends Analysis

The tracking of environmental conditions over time to evaluate whether a problem is improving, worsening, or remaining stable.

Environmental Goal

A broad policy statement expressing a community's long-term values and desires regarding environmental quality.

Environmental Objective

A specific, measurable target designed to achieve a broader environmental goal within a defined timeframe.

Environmental Action Plan

An implementation document specifying concrete actions, responsible parties, timelines, funding sources, and metrics to reach environmental goals.

Legal Pecking Order

The hierarchy of legal authority structuring environmental regulation, descending from Constitutional law to Statutory law, Administrative regulations, and Local ordinances.

Fifth Amendment Takings Clause

A constitutional provision specifying that private property shall not be taken for public use without just compensation.

Tenth Amendment Police Power

The constitutional power reserved to states to enact regulations protecting public health, safety, general welfare, and natural resources.

Fourteenth Amendment Equal Protection

A constitutional requirement mandating that government decision-making not discriminate, serving as a legal foundation for Environmental Justice.

Environmental Justice

The principle that all people receive fair treatment and meaningful involvement in environmental decision-making regardless of race, income, or ethnicity.

Administrative Law

The body of rules, regulations, and procedures created and enforced by government agencies to execute statutory laws.

External Cost

A cost generated by an economic activity that is borne by third parties or society and is excluded from the market price.

Social Cost

The total cost of an activity borne by society, calculated as the private cost plus the external cost.

Contingent Valuation

A survey method estimating the monetary value of nonmarket environmental goods by asking people their willingness to pay or accept compensation.

Cost-Benefit Analysis

An economic evaluation method comparing the total monetary value of all social benefits and costs of a proposed policy or project.

Fiscal Impact Study

An analysis evaluating how a proposed development or policy will directly affect local government revenues and service provision costs.

Green Gross National Product (Green GNP)

An economic accounting metric that adjusts traditional Gross National Product by subtracting natural resource depletion and environmental degradation.

Anthropocentric Ethic

An environmental ethic holding that nature primarily possesses value through its contribution to human welfare.

Deep Ecology

An environmental philosophy asserting that nature has intrinsic value independent of its usefulness to human beings.

Preservationist View

An environmental perspective holding that selected natural areas deserve strict protection from development regardless of immediate economic usefulness.

Utilitarian View

An environmental perspective holding that natural resources should be harvested and used sustainably to generate broad societal benefits.

Cornucopian View

The core belief that human innovation and technological advancement can continuously overcome natural resource limits.

Carrying Capacity

The maximum level of population, development, or disturbance that a natural system can sustain without degrading its essential functions.