PLACES JOURNAL GUEST EDITED BY UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE FACULTY MEMBERS

AUGUST 21, 2006 -- Two faculty members from the University of Miami School of Architecture – Knight Program in Community Building Director Charles Bohl and School of Architecture Dean Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk – guest edited volume 18 of the journal PLACES: Forum of Design for the Public Realm, published in summer 2006.

The theme of the issue is “Building Community Across the Transect.” The notion of a physical transect has become increasingly central to efforts by New Urbanist planners to combat sprawl development. Arising from the study of ecology, the idea of a transect originally provided a way to depict and understand the interrelationship of biological systems across geographical terrain. Applied to the design of towns and cities, and in combination with the day-to-day tool of a form-based zoning code, New Urbanists believe a transect approach can help refocus attention on the public realm and restore a coherent ordering of place that extends out from the neighborhood to the city and the region.

The journal gathers 12 essays by academics and practitioners. PLACES is a peer-reviewed journal published three times a year – information and a list of articles is available on the website, www.places-journal.org. 

About the Knight Program in Community Building
The mission of the Knight Program in Community Building is to advance the knowledge and practice of effective community building through an innovative series of interdisciplinary initiatives including fellowships, conferences, charrettes, courses, and publications.The Knight Program is based at the University of Miami School of Architecture and is funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which promotes excellence in journalism worldwide and invests in the vitality of twenty-six U.S. communities.

###