Designing Small Parks: A Manual for Addressing Social & Ecological Concerns" provides guidelines for building better parks by integrating design criteria with current social & natural science research. Small parks are too often relegated to being the step-child of municipal & metropolitan open space systems because of assumptions that their small size & isolation limits their recreational capacity & makes them ecologically less valuable than large city & county parks. This manual is arranged around twelve topics that represent key questions contradictions or tensions in the design of small parks. Topics cover fundamental issues for urban parks natural systems & human aspects. Also included are useful case studies with alternative design solutions using three different approaches for integrating research findings into small urban park design."