Bridge Builders Award
For the Initiative’s innovative approach to creating sustainable cities through the cross-disciplinary engagement of scholars, community leaders, and project partners.
Most communities would jump at the chance to become more walkable, boast more green space, and generally become a more livable place for its residents. But despite increased federal attention to livability and sustainability agendas, many communities lack the resources and know-how to implement such programs. Since 2007, cities have had a new champion to turn to: the Sustainable Cities Initiative (SCI) of the University of Oregon. Through the joint efforts of students from architecture, planning, law, journalism, and business, this cross-disciplinary program seeks to redefine higher education for the public good and catalyze community change toward sustainability.
Spearheaded by Marc Schlossberg and Robert Young, both professors of planning, and Nico Larco, a professor of architecture, SCI has already established itself as an expert convener and purveyor of livability-centered research as well as a trusted resource for on-the-ground services to city partners. Most recently, SCI aimed its arsenal of expertise and eager students at Salem, Oregon to help the city become more economically, socially and environmentally sustainable. Roughly 600 students in more than 25 courses will dedicate 80,000 hours over the coming year to help Salem explore the possibilities of nurturing green business clusters, redeveloping brownfields, connecting parks with bicycle paths and reusing industrial waste, among other efforts.
These types of changes to the built environment require extensive knowledge not only in planning and design, but in law and policy. SCI works with policy makers in all levels of government to help break down the barriers to livability. The program is currently working with the Oregon Department of Transportation and the Oregon Transportation and Growth Management program to help draft statewide model codes for sustainable urban form throughout Oregon. The program is also working with the City of Eugene on its Bicycle and Pedestrian Strategic Plan and its first ever Climate Action Plan. Beyond city, county, and state level policy, SCI has contributed white papers to federal agencies and submitted congressional testimony identifying critical sustainable transportation and livability research needs of the nation for the next decade. A major goal of the program is to make their tools available to an even wider audience through a National Livability Clearinghouse. This comprehensive source of multi-disciplinary research and information will help communities through four primary resources including a repository of best practices, the development of interdisciplinary research, livability metrics, and policy analysis.
The Sustainable Cities Initiative has aggressively broken through not only academic silos, but the barrier between academia and on-the-ground implementation. This visionary program is training the next generation of livability experts while helping cities around the nation improve their sustainability, prosperity and quality of life for all residents.