Good continuing recognition for one of our great urban thinkers.
The Jane Jacobs Medal Created by Rockefeller
Architecture
BY KATE TAYLOR - Staff Reporter of the Sun
February 9, 2007
The Rockefeller Foundation will announce today the creation of a $200,000 award, called the Jane Jacobs Medal, to recognize individuals who have made a significant contribution to thinking about urban design, specifically in New York City. The medal will be given annually to two people: one who has made a lifetime contribution and another who is at the start of a promising career.
Jacobs was herself a young unknown in 1958 when she received a $10,000 grant from the foundation to write what would become "The Death and Life of Great American Cities." Published in 1961, the book, which described the intricate network of relationships in neighborhoods like Greenwich Village and deplored the "urban renewal" projects of the 1950s, has continued to influence thinking about how cities work through the present.
