Friday Evening Plenary with Robert Caro and the Athena Award Presentation for Allan Jacobs
Gigantism: Threat to Urbanism
There are few better to speak on counterproductive interventions in the American City than Robert Caro. As Lyndon Johnson’s preeminent biographer he is no stranger to Austin or urbanism. His Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Robert Moses, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York, has a favored spot on many new urbanists’ bookshelves. It documents in vivid and painstaking detail the brutal impact of Moses’ legacy of excessive road building and neighborhood-clearing urban renewal on the city form and city life that Jane Jacobs so valiantly defended. More recently, Caro has turned his attention to a pivotal historical figure who happened to be born and raised in the Texas Hill Country, just 40 miles west of Austin. The Path to Power, Means of Ascent and Master of the Senate—the first three volumes of his four-part biography of Lyndon B. Johnson—won numerous literary and biography awards, including the Pulitzer, the H.L. Mencken Award, and multiple National Book Critics Circle Awards.
Before the keynote Address, Richard Hall, leading new urbanist transportation engineer, presented Allan Jacobs with an Athena Award for Lifetime Achievement. Allan Jacobs is best known for his street design legacy, particularly his work on multi-way boulevards. His contribution will increase the value of urban fabric for years to come.
Robert A. Caro, pulitzer-prize winning author and urban historian
Richard Hall, PE, President, Hall Planning & Engineering Inc.
Allan Jacobs, Professor Emeritus of City & Regional Planning and Urban Design, University of California Berkeley College of Environmental Design; Principal, Cityworks
John O. Norquist, President and CEO, Congress for the New Urbanism
Allan Jacobs Athena Award Presentation
Robert Caro, intoduced by John Norquist
Attachment | Size |
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CaroIntro.pdf | 3.14 MB |
AllanJacobsWaterColor.pdf | 2.03 MB |
AllanJacobsTribute.pdf | 2.94 MB |