New Releases by Dianne Perrier

A road trip through history and the heart of the first frontier "Perrier is a consummate tour guide, making the readers know they are directed by an authority. Above all she engages the reader in the landscape's many dimensions--historical, geographic, and environmental. One is well advised to travel I-81 with Perrier's book in hand."--Keith Schulle, author of Motoring: The Highway Experience in America From its northernmost point just south of the U.S.-Canadian border, in Wellesley Island, New York, through the Appalachians to its southernmost point in Dandridge, Tennessee, Interstate 81 links the Northeast with the non-Atlantic South. One of the major routes of the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, the I-81 corridor was a much-traveled route, known as the "Great Warriors Trace," for centuries even before the invention of the automobile. Part of I-81 drifts through the magnificent Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. Robert E. Lee returned to this area after the war and spent countless hours in the saddle roaming the hillsides, finding solace as he followed the woods and streams. Hiawatha lived and hunted along its northern reaches. Thomas Jefferson regularly rode from Monticello to homes he maintained at Natural Bridge and Poplar Camp. Andrew Jackson visited one small town along the way so often that the townsfolk renamed their community in his honor. George Washington surveyed it. Daniel Boone explored it, and thousands of pioneers of Scottish, Irish, and German descent settled it. Today, the Great Warriors Trace has become a concrete ribbon of grey. A journey that took days now can be completed in about fourteen hours. Dianne Perrier's fascinating cultural history of the famous route reveals how grasslands and forests that once nourished buffalo now feed the demand for unimpeded travel. The result is a glimpse into both the heart and heartland of America.

A road trip through time down the eastern seaboard "From horseback to stagecoach, and into the front seat of the family station wagon, Dianne Perrier takes readers on a wonderful journey along the trails, plank roads, and macadamized routes of yesteryear--laying the historical foundation for the I-95 super slab of present day."--Michael Karl Witzel, author of Barbecue Road Trip: Recipes, Restaurants, & Pitmasters from America's Great Barbecue Regions Stretching from Maine's Canadian border almost all the way to the Florida Keys, Interstate 95 traverses fifteen states, plus the District of Columbia, and links the cities of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Richmond, Fayetteville, Savannah, Jacksonville, and Miami--to name but a few. At more than 1,900 miles, it's one of the longest and most heavily travelled (11 million vehicles per year) roads in the country. For both snowbirds and spring-breakers, I-95 is an escape route to sand and sunshine. Travelers may complain about heavy traffic, poor road conditions, and delays, but as Dianne Perrier points out in this fascinating cultural history of the I-95 corridor, such has always been the case. The pace of travel--and life--is faster now, so it's hard to imagine that Longfellow was inspired to write his famous poem about Paul Revere by an evening spent at a tavern along the road that would eventually be served by I-95. Perrier reminds us of the profound and mundane events that took place along the

Designed as a defense and commercial network to link Washington, D.C., with state capitals, the interstate highway system carries more traffic than anyone could have imagined fifty years ago. Lost today in the rush to get from point A to point B--with restaurants, hotels, and gas stations along the way more or less interchangeable from exit to exit--is the fact that these roads were laid down along ancient routes. These routes mirror the ancient footpaths and traces used by Native Americans and early settlers with route numbers replacing colorful descriptors, such that the Oregon Trail is now I-80, and travelers tracing portions of the Santa Fe Trail do so along I-25. The author tells stories of Davey Crockett, Horace Greely, and Charles Dickens, of women in hoop skirts, the search for eighteenth-century fast food, and nineteenth-century "truckers."

The Southeast False Creek (SEFC) sustainable neighbourhood planning project is an initiative to redevelop approximately 32 hectares (79 acres) of industrial land on the False Creek waterfront, in the downtown of Vancouver, as a residential neighbourhood for between 8,000 and 10,000 people. SEFC is being designed to embody the principles of sustainable development in a manner appropriate to the scale, location, context, opportunities and constraints of the site. This report summarizes the results of a design charrette partially funded by CMHC, in partnership with the City of Vancouver, held in October 1998, to explore the implications of sustainable guidelines and separate policies proposed for the SEFC, particularly about 19 hectares (47 acres) of city-owned land within the 32 hectare study area. A core principle in the planning of the SEFC is that it should be a transferable model of high-density sustainable urban development. This report includes a brief history of the guideline development, the reasons for holding a charrette, a synopsis of CMHC research that was used, a critique of the effectiveness and value of the charrette. The report also includes drawings done at the charrette itself.