general

I primarily work as a structural-architectural engineer and am becoming more and more involved in civil-site work. This handbook is exactly what I was looking for in terms of something that would quickly get me "up to speed" in the fundamentals of civil-site design.
Of course, no single book could (or should) be thought of as a substitute for the experience and mentoring received from seasoned professionals in a design office, but this one has enough technical explanation and details to get you going with confidence.
I choose this one over the Colley book (reviewed both before making purchase) as Land Development Handbook has more of the technical info that engineers would seek.

I am in a class at Community College of Baltimore County and we are using this book at this time. Our whole class along with the Professor find this book to be very difficult to follow. The book constantly repeats itself making it extremely boring to read and is not fluent at all. They have examples that reference charts that are 3-5 pages apart from the problem being discussed the formulas you almost have to figure out for yourself how they are used and there are alot of typos.
I recomend burning this book!!!!!!!

Ever since I purchased this publication I can't stop using it. Every civil engineer should have this as part of their reference library, regardless of your area of specialty. It provides macro to micro scale explanations of general processes, design applications, etc in a very readable format. More times than I can remember I have looked to this book for an answer or at least for some guidance and was throuroughly satisfied. No it is not a definitive reference for civil engineers but its' breadth and usability overshadows any technical shortcomings. If I had to have just one reference book for my area of practice (general civil), this would be it. Yeah, yeah, the "Standard Handbook for Civil Engineers" is a more definitive reference, but I usually find out what I need in this pub.

ps - Almost everyone of my fellow employees that has used the book has purchased their own, find someone you know who has a copy and check it out for yourself.