Smart Growth Illustrated

In 1996, the Smart Growth Network identified a set of development practices that communities across the nation were using to build healthy, vibrant, and economically competitive places. The resulting 10 principles are intended to be broad enough to apply to communities of all sizes and contexts.

Smart Growth Illustrated provides visual examples of smart growth techniques being used in real places. These examples were created in 2006, and, in some cases, updated in 2011 and 2012. They offer early examples of smart growth implementation, which helped serve as a foundation and reference point for future development efforts. 

While every example illustrates several smart growth principles, each one was chosen to highlight one specific principle. Together, these case studies show how the 10 smart growth principles have helped 20 communities around the country build and support healthy, prosperous neighborhoods with a high quality of life for people of all income levels.

Find more examples of smart growth projects.