Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk talks about the impact of New Urbanism

In the latest episode of the Official CNU Podcast, founder Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk looks back at the influence new urbanism has had on the culture, and talks about her current work. 

CNU: You were in the news recently for stepping down from your position as Dean of the Architecture Dept. at the University of Miami. What’s next for you? What prompted that decision?

Plater-Zyberk: After 18 years, it was the right time to go. We had a great run with a great faculty and a supportive administration. There are great things going on at the University of Miami. I’d like to think that we made some contribution to the New Urbanism through our faculty and our students. Many graduates are working in the field. But change is good, and knowledge spans time. It’s better for people to come and go, and this was just a good time for a transition.

CNU: What are some of the landmark accomplishments of CNU that you’ve seen since the organization was founded? 

Plater-Zyberk:  In terms of sheer numbers, within the first decade of the organization you might not have pointed to very much. A lot of the sprawling metropolis that we were proposing alternatives to continued to be built. But just in the last couple of days, an op-ed piece in the New York Times by Paul Krugman (“Stranded by Sprawl”, July 28, 2013) attempted to deal with sprawl in Atlanta. I thought he was reaching in some cases, but clearly the focus has been brought to (the issues New Urbanism deals with) to a group of people who otherwise wouldn’t be thinking about it. But the real impact has been in cities that have changed their codes, regional plans that have been completed, and I don’t know how many beautiful communities and revivals of cities and towns that have resulted in the last 25-30 years. 

So I think we’ve been very important contributors. Not the only ones, certainly, but along with other organizations and a cultural shift to the point where we now have economists saying that cities are important, young people saying that they’re not interested in owning a car, and a myriad of cultural changes occurring across the United States and having an influence abroad. I actually think that without the CNU this might not have happened in the same way, because other organizations are not as focused on the built environment as we are. We’re a very important knuckle, or hinge, among things like smart growth on one hand and maybe traditional architecture on the other. It’s probably hard to put metrics to it – we are in the age of metrics, right? – but I think you can point to an awful lot of things that we’ve played a very important role in. 

CNU: Absolutely. And what are you working on today? What are some of the exciting projects that you and DPZ are involved in right now?

Plater-Zyberk: We’re part of a team for a sustainable communities project in Southeast Florida as part of a HUD/EPA/DOT partnership grant. Dover, Kohl and Partners is leading that team, and we’re working on a fifty-year plan for 7 counties. It’s called seven50 and our colleagues are doing a great job leading the project. Part of that is of course looking at climate change and how that might affect South Florida. As part of leaving the deanship, I’ve said I’m going to try to address that very specifically. We have risks that other parts of the country do not, and they are directly related to the built environment. What the public sector does and what the private sector does relatively independently in our country – you know, the public sector does the roads and the private sector does the buildings – there has to be much more integration between those groups to deal with climate change. So that’s the kind of challenge I’m going to try to take on locally.

SUBSCRIBE to the Official CNU Podcast to hear more from Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk and get the latest news on our work. In the next episode, Leigh Gallagher talks with CNU President John Norquist about her book The End of the Suburbs. Go to cnu.org/podcast.

This article was printed in Better! Cities & Towns, September-October 2013, courtesy of the Congress for the New Urbanism, The Marquette Building, 140 S. Dearborn, Ste. 404, Chicago, IL 60603.  312/551-7300; fax: 312/346-3323.  www.cnu.org, cnuinfo@cnu.org