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Large turnout for first-ever conferenceon promoting livable communities By Karen L. Trimbath
Al Zelinka, principal planner with RBF Consulting/Urban Design Studio in Urbine, Calif., discusses the use of thoughtful design methods to reduce crime during the Redefining Community conference, held in San Diego. A planner of the conference, he is co-author of the book Safescape: Creating Safer, More Livable Communities Through Planning and Design. Photos by Pamela Logan Michael Rios, director of the Hamer Center for Community Design Assistance at Penn State, talks about strategies for strengthening communities and existing neighborhoods during the Redefining Community conference, held in San Diego. Penn State’s College of Arts and Architecture sponsored the conference. Judy Corbett, executive director of the Local Government Commission (LGC), welcomes participants at the Redefining Community conference. LGC partnered with Penn State to organize the conference. A follow-up conference will be held in January 2002 in San Diego. During his closing remarks at the Redefining Community conference, Rick Cole, former mayor of Pasadena, asks participants to share how they will use information presented at the conference after they return to their communities.	Providing practical, holistic, community-based strategies for rehumanizing the places where we live and work was the subject of a national multidisciplinary conference organized by Penn State and the Local Government Commission, a nonprofit organization in California. More than 550 participants from across the nation attended this first-ever conference, “Redefining Community: A Smart Growth Approach to Street and Neighborhood Design, Crime Prevention and Public Health and Safety,” held at the historic U.S. Grant Hotel in San Diego, Calif.   The forum examined the connections that sustain smart growth practices, an emphasis that reflects the complexity of sustaining livable communities, said Donald Leslie, associate dean for undergraduate studies and outreach in the College of Arts and Architecture and past president of the American Society of Landscape Architects. Leslie developed the conference with Conferences and Institutes, Penn State Division of Continuing Education.   “This conference provided an opportunity to explore new ideas, concepts and practical design and planning applications to make our cities, towns and communities safer places in which to live and work,” Leslie said.   According to Leslie, a community must be livable in positive ways. For example, most families want their neighborhoods to provide safety, convenience, shopping and recreation — all without magnifying traffic congestion or harming the environment. Sustaining such a livable community takes well-thought-out planning between residents, government officials, health and safety professionals, architects and landscape architects.   “Different elements are woven into community design, and all of them came together at the conference in a meaningful way,” he said. “Smart growth isn’t just a design issue — it also involves safety, health and ecological issues.”   While safety and health problems are exacerbated in urban areas, they are not confined to them, he said. Good planning and design practices are also a must for rural communities, particularly when faced with unprecedented growth. Leslie cites the town of State College, Pa., as an example. With a growing population of more than 100,000, the town is pushing its fringes into the surrounding rural landscape, which impacts local tax bases and prime grazing land and increases the costs associated with police and fire safety services.   “As we push the urban fringe to rural communities, we need to create safe, healthy environments,” Leslie added. “In the case of State College, the town’s transportation system was constructed more than 50 years ago, yet it now handles 200 to 300 percent more cars. We are now being strangled by our out-of-date infrastructure. We’ve all got to work together for change.”   During the conference, a broad range of practitioners examined how to work together to redesign existing neighborhoods and improve the design of new neighborhoods to create safer, healthier, pedestrian-friendly communities. Participants represented a wide variety of professions, including government officials, planners, public health professionals, landscape architects, law enforcement/crime prevention professionals, urban designers and architects.   The conference also drew an impressive and diverse range of speakers, including health care, crime prevention, urban planning and civic leaders from across the country.   Leslie, who spoke at the conference, was not the only Penn State faculty member to share his experiences at the conference. Another presenter was Michael Rios, director of the Hamer Center for Community Design Assistance, which joins design faculty and students from the departments of Architecture and Landscape Architecture in outreach programs to solve community design needs.   Rios spoke on strategies for strengthening communities and existing neighborhoods, and he also described his involvement with the Bart Project in San Francisco, which reenhanced the city’s 16th Street Mission District.   Other conference speakers were Bill Lockyer, California attorney general; Richard J. Jackson, director, National Center for Environmental Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Harvey Gantt, former mayor of Charlotte, N.C., and architect with Gantt, Huberman Architects; Michael Freedman, urban designer with Freedman, Tung & Bottomley; Alan Jacobs, professor with the University of California at Berkeley and author of Great Streets; and David Rice, executive director, Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority.   Speakers shared their own experiences with turning around troubled communities and implementing good planning from the beginning of the design process. Their insights included: Revitalize inner-city neighborhoods, as well as downtowns. Gantt told participants that simply bringing entertainment to a city center doesn’t do the job. “People make cameo appearances downtown, and then they leave,” he said. “A lively, walkable, safe downtown needs people on the street all the time. To accomplish that, people must live downtown and in adjacent neighborhoods.” Reduce crime by building a sense of community. Clare Cooper Marcus, a researcher from the University of California at Berkeley, shared her studies of how affordable housing can be designed to offer safety and opportunities for children to play outside. She advocates housing patterns that site a limited number of houses around a central courtyard and plant trees closer to buildings. “Research shows that more trees help develop a stronger sense of community. People spend more time outside,” she said. “Stronger social networks are developed, leading to lower levels of crime.” Involve residents in the design process. “Just letting future residents help plan and personalize their own housing complex can stimulate a sense of ownership and community,” said architect Michael Pyatok, author of Good Neighbors: Affordable Family Housing. He also spoke about his success in creating places for people to both live and work in lower-income neighborhoods.   In addition to the main conference, the program also included a special preconference session and reception sponsored by the California Center for Health Improvement, during which the center released its latest poll results on public perceptions on health, crime prevention and smart growth. Participants also had an opportunity to tour local model projects following the conference.   Penn State teamed up with the Local Government Commission to plan the conference. Other co-sponsors included a number of organizations with ties to community planning, safety and the environment.   Major conference funders included the California Department of Transportation and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Other significant supporters of this event include the American Society of Landscape Architects, California Center for Health Improvement, Alliance Healthcare Foundation, Southern California Gas Company, RBF Consulting/Urban Design Studio, Project Design Consultants, Center City Development Corporation, San Diego Metropolitan Transportation Development Board, StateNet/California Journal and the U.S. Department of Transportation – One DOT Initiative. In addition, the League of California Cities, the American Planning Association and more than 80 organizations and government agencies signed on as co-sponsors of the conference.   Leslie said he is pleased by the unexpectedly large turnout of attendees. Not only does he plan to work with Penn State Conferences and Institutes and the Local Government Commission on a follow-up conference in January 2002 in San Diego, but he also wants to partner with other colleges within the University to develop related conferences. Work has already begun on forums with the College of Arts and Architecture and the College of Health and Human Development.   The College of Arts and Architecture has two centers involved with community design and growth issues: the Hamer Center for Community Design Assistance and the Center for Watershed Stewardship, directed by Lysle Sherwin. The College of Health and Human Development has faculty specializing in quality-of-life issues that affect community residents.   “There was a real energy that came out of the first conference,” Leslie said. “Many people learned about other disciplines and the cumulative impact on livable communities. Sustaining a community’s livable quality takes good planning. All of these practicing professionals are contributing to established developed communities and sustaining healthy environments.” An outreach program of the College of Arts and Architecture