Panel: Jane Jacobs and the Future of New York: When the Big Get Bigger: New York Universities and Their Neighbors

7:45 PM EDT on September 13, 2007

More than 40 years ago, Jane Jacobs opposed the construction of New York University’s monolithic Bobst Library on Washington Square South. The world has changed since then, but institutional expansion remains a major force in cities. Plans by Columbia University, New York University, Cooper Union and the United Nations have all met with considerable controversy. This panel will address the specific cases but also the larger issues of urban investment, preservation and regeneration.

James Traub — moderator
Hilary Ballon, New York University
Kent Barwick, Municipal Art Society
Lee Bollinger, Columbia University
Judith Rodin, Rockefeller Foundation

Aaron Donovan

Before he began blogging about land use and transportation, Aaron Donovan wrote The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund's annual fundraising appeal for three years and earned a master's degree in urban planning from Columbia. Since then, he has worked for nonprofit organizations devoted to New York City economic development. He lives and works in the Financial District, and sees New York's pre-automobile built form as an asset that makes New York unique in the United States, and as a strategic advantage that should be capitalized upon.

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