Awards & Honors

Case Studies in Retrofitting Suburbia: Urban Design Strategies for Urgent Challenges, the recent publication co-authored by June Williamson, Spitzer School chair, is the 2021 winner of the Great Places Award for books.

Presented by the Environmental Design Research Association (EDRA), in partnership with Project for Public Spaces, the Great Places Awards uniquely recognize work that combines expertise in design, research, and practice, and contributes to the creation of dynamic, humane places that capture the public imagination. These projects reflect an interdisciplinary approach that is enduring, human-centered, sustainable, and concerned with the experiential relationship between people and their environment (built and natural) over time.

In selecting Case Studies in Retrofitting Suburbia, co-written by Williamson and Georgia Tech urban design program director Ellen Dunham-Jones, the book award jury cited the impressive range of problem identification and geographic distribution within the extensive list of relevant case studies. “This research is a solid follower of the authors’ first book, ‘Retrofitting Suburbia: Urban Design Solutions for Redesigning Suburbs,’ and offers indispensable approaches for an interdisciplinary design audience,” said the jurors.

Based on decades of tracking changes to suburban form in a unique database, Case Studies in Retrofitting Suburbia spells out newly emergent challenges and what urban designers can do to address them: disrupt automobile dependence, improve public health, support an aging population, leverage social capital for equity, compete for jobs, and add water and energy resilience.

The book features dozens of newly documented case studies describing how suburban places and suburban placemaking strategies are being retrofitted to address the most urgent challenges of today. Click here to read more about the book.