Newsletter of the College of Architecture at Texas A&M University
A lecture highlighting the educational value of community outreach initiatives presented by Kenneth Reardon, a nationally renowned expert in community-based neighborhood planning and university-community partnerships, is set for 4 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 20 in Langford C105 on the Texas A&M campus.
The presentation is part of the Department of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning’s Fall 2010 Lecture Series.
Reardon, who is currently director of the graduate program in city and regional planning at the University of Memphis, earned the American Institute of Certified Planners President's Award for his role in establishing and directing the highly regarded East St. Louis Action Research Project (ESLARP) in 1987, while an associate professor of planning at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
ESLARP combines the knowledge, skills and resources of the community and those at the university to advance a development agenda set by local residents. Under Reardon's leadership, the faculty and students focused on large-scale initiatives such as riverfront development, street lighting, industrial and railroad redevelopment, storm water retention, and the construction of a modular housing factory.
ESLARP, he said, has played an integral role in the neighborhood’s growing revitalization movement. Aided by the university’s instructional, research and public service resources, the organization is achieving results in communities where residents are mobilizing to address current social, economic, and environmental problems.
Prior to joining the Memphis faculty, he served as associate professor and chairman of the Department of City and Regional Planning at Cornell University, where he led an urban planning student project establishing a research-based, comprehensive recovery program for New Orleans' 9th Ward after Hurricane Katrina, which came to be known as "The People's Plan."
In creating the plan, faculty and students worked with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now to establish the ACORN Housing/University Collaborative. Students in the collaborative performed field research, examined and analyzed population, housing and business trends, and interviewed families and business owners who returned to the 9th Ward after the hurricane.
Using the students' research, the collaborative worked to transform, rather than simply restore, the environmental, economic and social conditions that existed within the nine historic neighborhoods comprising the 9th Ward.
A significant section of the ward, recommended in The People’s Plan for immediate renewal, was included in a $1.1 billion capital improvement project designed to accelerate the city’s recovery.
For more information on Reardon’s Oct. 20 lecture, contact Michael Murphy, 979.458.2788, or MMurphy@archmail.tamu.edu.
- Posted: Oct. 1, 2010 -
Contact: Phillip Rollfing, prollfing@archone.tamu.edu or 979.458.0442.
Kenneth Reardon
