Dan Cary, New Urbanism champion

Before a the market grew for urban places and the housing crash cut conventional sprawl down to size, the New Urbanism was propelled forward mostly by “champions.” Such visionaries, usually with guts, were and are rare.

Dan Cary epitomized that kind of person. He was doubly rare because of his career as a publicly employed planner — a bureaucrat. People in those positions have incentives not to stick their necks out.

Cary, 64, who died March 6 after a long bout with leukemia, was always sticking his neck out.

A big man with an oversized personality, Cary relentlessly promoted better urban design and smart growth in South Florida — where sprawl was king. He served as the executive director of the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council from 1985 to 1994, then as the planning director of the South Florida Water Management District, and finally as head planner for West Palm Beach under former Mayor Nancy Graham.

He is credited with helping spur the revival of urban and town centers along the Treasure Coast, including West Palm Beach, Delray Beach, and Lake Worth, according to the Palm Beach Post.

“I remember his telling us that he thought he could be ambitious and get some things done because he had 30 bosses – a board made of the representatives of the many municipalities of the Treasure Coast — and he figured that many people would never be able to agree to fire him!” recounted Congress for the New Urbanism cofounder Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk at Cary’s funeral service. Plater-Zyberk sent the remarks to Better! Cities & Towns.

Under Cary and his successor, Michael Busha, Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council sponsored scores of new urban planning charrettes and has been among the nation’s leading municipal planning organizations in pursuit of smart growth. Cary was instrumental in Graham’s groundbreaking work in West Palm that established a new urban code and remarkable infill development.

“Dan was an embodiment of two seemingly contradictory characteristics: idealism and effectiveness,” says Plater-Zyberk. “I suppose these together define leadership.”

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