Jim Rouse secretly bought 14,000 acres of farmland in segregated Howard County, Maryland, promising to transform them into a city of 100,000 that was "economically diverse, poly-cultural, multi-faith and interracial." A veteran journalist tells the fascinating story of how this new town of Columbia grew and prospered, succeeded and failed.

The rapid conversion of land to urban and suburban areas has profoundly altered how water flows during and following storm events, putting higher volumes of water and more pollutants into the nation's rivers, lakes, and estuaries. These changes have degraded water quality and habitat in virtually every urban stream system. The Clean Water Act regulatory framework for addressing sewage and industrial wastes is not well suited to the more difficult problem of stormwater discharges. This book calls for an entirely new permitting structure that would put authority and accountability for stormwater discharges at the municipal level. A number of additional actions, such as conserving natural areas, reducing hard surface cover (e.g., roads and parking lots), and retrofitting urban areas with features that hold and treat stormwater, are recommended.