Heads up, smart growth advocates: I recently received a press release about an interesting-looking conference called Makeover Montgomery: Innovative Strategies for Rethinking America’s Suburbs. Hosted by the Mongomery Country (Md.) Planning Department, the National Center for Smart Growth Research and Education at the University of Maryland, and UMd.’s Urban Studies and Planning Program, the event will take place April 14-16 in College Park and Silver Spring, Md.
A few architects are sprinkled into the speakers list, including Tom Low, AIA, LEED AP (a partner at Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co.); Ralph Bennett, AIA, LEED AP (president of Bennett Frank McCarthy Architects); and Neal Payton, AIA, LEED AP (a principal at Torti Gallas & Partners). Galina Tachieva, LEED AP, another DPZ partner and the author of the Sprawl Repair Manual, will be speaking too. And the keynoter will be Dowell Myers, a demographer at the University of Southern California. For more information, visit the Makeover Montgomery website.
