CENTER for APPLIED TRANSECT STUDIES

The Center for Applied Transect Studies is dedicated to the integration of social and enviromental development practices across a natural and urban continuum and across the community disciplines. C.A.T.S is a non-for-profit organization.

What is a Transect 

A transect of nature, first conceived by Alexander Von Humboldt at the close of the 18th century, is a geographical cross-section

of a region intended to reveal a sequence of environments. Originally, it was used to analyze natural ecologies, showing varying

characteristics through different zones such as shores, wetlands, plains, and uplands. It helps study the many elements that

contribute to habitats where certain plants and animals thrive in symbiotic relationship to the minerals and microclimate.

Human beings also thrive in different places. There are those who could never live in an urban center; there are those who

would wither in a rural hamlet. Humans need a system that preserves and creates meaningful choices in their habitats. Near

the close of the 20th century, New Urbanist designers recognized that sprawl was eradicating the pre-war American transect

of the built environment. They began to analyze it and extract its genetic material for replication. In this way, they extended the

natural transect to include the built environment, thus establishing the basis for the SmartCode.

The rural-to-urban Transect is divided into six Transect Zones for application on zoning maps. These six habitats vary by the

level and intensity of their physical and social character, providing immersive contexts from rural to urban. SmartCode elements

are coordinated by these T-zones at all scales of planning, from the region through the community scale down to the individual

lot and building belong in certain environments. For example, an apartment building belongs in a more urban setting, a ranch house in a more rural setting. Some types of thoroughfares are urban in character, and some are rural. A deep suburban setback destroys the spatial enclosure of an urban street; it is out of context. These distinctions and rules don’t limit choices; they expand them. This is the antidote for the one-size-fi ts-all development of today.

To learn more about the Transect visit our website at www.dpz.com

DUANY PLATER-ZYBERK & COMPANY 

DPZ’s projects have received numerous awards, including two National AIA Awards, the Vincent Scully Prize, the Thomas Jefferson Medal and two Governor’s Urban Design Awards for Excellence. The firm’s early project of Seaside, Florida, was the first authentic new town to be built successfully in the United States in over fifty years. In 1989, Time Magazine selected Seaside as one of the 10 "Best of the Decade" achievements in the field of design. The firm has been featured in other national media such as NBC News and ABC News, as well as Newsweek, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the New Yorker.

The firm is led by its Principals, Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, who are co-founders of the Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU), recognized by the New York Times as "the most important collective architectural movement in the United States in the past fifty years." The movement, currently over 3,000 strong, marked a turning point from the segregated planning and architecture of post-war America; instead, they advocated and promoted the universal and time-tested principles of traditional planning and design that created the best-loved and most-enduring places throughout the world.

The firm’s method of integrating master plans with project-specific design codes and regulations is currently being applied to sites ranging from 10 to 10,000 acres throughout the United States. Abroad, DPZ projects are underway in Scotland, Spain, Canada, Germany, Belgium, Australia, the Philippines, Mexico, India and Turkey. Urban redevelopment plans for existing communities include: Baton Rouge, Louisiana; West Palm Beach, Naples, Sarasota, and Fort Myers, Florida; and Providence, Rhode Island. In addition, the firm is rewriting the entire City of Miami zoning code in the groundbreaking Miami 21 project.

A significant aspect of DPZ’s work is its innovative planning regulations which accompany each design. Tailored to the individual project, the codes address the manner in which buildings are formed and located to ensure that they create useful and distinctive public spaces. Local architectural traditions and building techniques are also codified within the regulations. In the last five years, DPZ has also been continually developing a new model, form-based zoning code called the SmartCode, which has been adopted by municipalities across the country.

DPZ has also taken a leading role in the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast after hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Working with both with the Mississippi Governor’s Commission on Recovery, Rebuilding and Renewal, and the Louisiana Recovery Authority, DPZ’s designers generated plans for rebuilding at the regional, local and neighborhood scales, as well as guidelines for individual homeowners looking to rebuild. Notably, DPZ organized and led the Mississippi Renewal Forum, which generated plans for all eleven municipalites along the Mississippi Coast, conducted the Louisiana Speaks charrette series and participated in the Unified New Orleans Plan as neighborhood planners.

Duany and Plater-Zyberk’s recent book, Suburban Nation, written with Jeff Speck, was hailed as "an essential text for our time," and "a major literary event," in the national media. In 2004, Builder Magazine recognized Duany as among the 50 most influential people in home building, the ranks of which included economists, bankers and developers, apart from architects, planners and builders. Duany was ranked after Alan Greenspan, Franklin Rainee, George W. Bush and Jerry Howard, earning Duany the distinction of being the top ranking individual from the private sector. Duany sits on the board of the National Town Builders Association, and Plater-Zyberk shepherds the Knight Program in Community Building, a program that brings an interdisciplinary approach to the revitalization of inner cities. These and other efforts have earned Duany, Plater-Zyberk, and the firm at large international recognition and dozens of local and national awards in recognition of their contributions to the American built environment.