:UT Arlington Student Planning Association

The Women’s Transportation Seminar

11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. Tuesday, February 20, 2007
at The ITC, in the John B Board Room, 2nd Floor
1001 Jones Street
Fort Worth, TX 76102

WTS Luncheon, 20 February 2007

Phillip Russell, P.E., Texas Turnpike Authority’s Director, will be our distinguished
speaker. Mr. Russell is the director of the Texas Turnpike Authority Division of the
Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT). As division director since 1998, he is
currently developing two high-priority elements of the Trans-Texas Corridor. For
Russell, this involves overseeing the environmental studies, financing options,
contracting agreements and public-private partnerships.

Under his direction, the division is also responsible for expanding the state highway
system through the development of toll roads, working with districts and local officials
on the formation of regional mobility authorities and state toll projects, and overseeing
the preparation of all comprehensive development agreements for TxDOT.
Mr. Russell will be sharing his Trans-Texas Corridor presentation.

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Tomorrow, Tuesday, 20 February, hundreds of campuses, cities, and businesses will be participating in the Global Emergency Teach-In on climate change. University Hall room 532 will be set up for the live web-cast, and an auditorium is being set up in the Architecture Building as well (room 204). A pdf flyer is attached.

Climate Change Teach-In — 12-2.30pm, Tuesday, 20 February 2007

For more information, see http://www.2010imperative.org/. But if you want to watch the web-cast, please come to one of the UTA locations (or, for that matter, other locations in the Metroplex; see “Who’s Tuning In” on the web page). In order to avoid overloading the servers, the organizers are asking people to participate in organized sessions rather than logging on individually.

Why?
Because time is running out.

What?
The 2010 Imperative Global Emergency Teach-In addressing global warming and climate change is an interactive web-cast broadcast live from New York, reaching more than 500,000 students, faculty, deans and practicing professionals in the architecture, planning and design communities in both North and South America.

Who?
Dr. James Hansen, NASA GISS
Edward Mazria, AIA, Architecture 2030
Chris Luebkeman, Arup
Susan Szenasy, Metropolis Magazine

How?
All design schools, professional design firms and governmental entities (planning departments, city officials, etc.) are being asked to substitute the Teach-in for classes/work on February 20th, 2007, from Noon to 3:30pm EST. Many schools and offices are planning day-long activities around the event.

Jeff Howard, Asst. Professor
School of Urban & Public Affairs
University of Texas at Arlington
Box 19588, University Hall 519
Arlington, TX 76019-0588
Phone 817-272-5119 Fax 817-272-5008

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The 2007 IPCC Working Group report confirms that mankind’s role in driving climate change is a significant, if unintended, consequence of technological advancement. Unfortunately, our socioeconomic fabric is knit from technologies the waste products of which include high concentrations of greenhouse gases that drive the warming of our climate. Not only is this relationship ultimately unsustainable, but it also raises the specter of unforeseeable, nonlinear climate catastrophe.

The icon of our social, technological, political, and developmental advancement – the modern city – is a crucible in which planners struggle to balance environmental sustainability, individual preference, and the public good. Urban planning-as-usual appears to present an insufficient response to a post-industrial, environmental threat that derives from the very source of our prosperity . However, migrating planning to a more sustainable footing may be more easily said than done.

At least in the short-term, numerous structural impediments militate against the capacity of contemporary urban planning theory and practice to constructively respond to these environmental risks: the global dominance of a growth-obsessed political economy, tradition-bound city and regional planning institutions, the increasing influence of property rights advocates in the national and local dialogs, and the continued decay of social capital. In order to realize a future in which American urban planning is an essential contributor to developing a truly sustainable urban future, it is critical that we confront these challenges and seek a new path.

Kent Hurst

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Sponsor: Texas Council for the Humanities

Title: Community Projects Grants

E-mail: elupfer@humanitiestexas.org

Web Site: http://www.humanitiestexas.org/grants.htm

Program URL: http://www.humanitiestexas.org/grants/downloads/HTxcommunitygrant.pdf

SYNOPSIS: The sponsor provides support for public humanities projects developed by local sponsors on topics from the disciplines of the humanities.

Deadline(s): 08/15/2007

DEADLINE NOTE: Letters of intent are due August 15 for the September 15 application deadline.

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Sponsor: Center for Latin American Studies

Title: Summer Visiting Scholar Grant

E-mail: clas@uchicago.edu

Program URL: http://clas.uchicago.edu/svsrg.shtml

SYNOPSIS: The sponsor announces its annual Summer Visiting Scholars Competition for faculty from non-research U.S. universities and colleges. Recipients research and write on a Latin American topic for one month during the summer of 2007 at either or both campus(es) of the University of Chicago or University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and enjoy access to university libraries and resources.

Deadline(s): 02/28/2007

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Sponsor: Library of Congress

Title: Kluge Center Fellowships

E-mail: scholarly@loc.gov

Program URL: http://www.loc.gov/loc/kluge/fellowships/kluge.html

SYNOPSIS: The sponsor seeks qualified scholars to conduct research in the John W. Kluge Center using the Library of Congress collections and resources for a period of up to eleven months. Up to twelve fellowships will be awarded annually. The Kluge Center especially encourages humanistic and social science research that makes use of the Library’s large and varied collections. Interdisciplinary, cross-cultural, or multi-lingual research is particularly welcome. Among the collections available to researchers are the world’s largest law library and outstanding multi-lingual collections of books and periodicals. Deep special collections of manuscripts, maps, music, films, recorded sound, prints and photographs are also available. Further information about the Library’s collections can be found on the Library’s website: http://www.loc.gov/rr/.

Deadline(s): 08/15/2007

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Well, I’ve been claiming that it would be nice to have an instrument with which we could hold a conversation with our members and the larger citizen planning community. While this is an admittedly imperfect start (I’m still trying to decipher the available functionality in this blog service) and the form and function of this space are likely to evolve over time, I’m looking forward to providing the opportunity for planning, PA, and urban affairs students as well as others interested in related issues to engage in extended conversations on various topics of mutual interest.

While I don’t see technology as a panacea to decaying social capital, it stands to reason that it can at least play a role in mitigating the individual isolation that often derives from an academic programs designed to serve a non-traditional student body. SPA is also working on developing a sanctioned Web site that will provide other capabilities and meet other needs (e.g., posting of student project work and résumés), but I hope that this blog will give us the opportunity to talk to one another on-the-fly.

At the very least, SPAsm will provide visitors with an information hub from which they can access a variety of planning and related information. With your input, this content will be updated regularly with links and material that you indicate useful to you in your studies and work. If you have any suggestions for improved content and/or usability, please send them to me at klhurst AT uta DOT edu.

And don’t miss our first poll (”SPAsm Polls” under “Categories” to the right)!

/K

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