NYU's Open House
The first two Open Houses were intended to provide information about NYU and introduce you to NYU's planning process. Eleven kiosks displayed information about what NYU is doing currently, where NYU is going, and what it will be studying during the planning process. The content of the open house can be accessed by the link below.
Feedback from both the NYU community and our neighbors will help shape each stage of planning. We hope to be able to learn from your observations and thoughts.
As a result of a conscious choice made by the University's leaders in the late 1970s, NYU has transformed itself from a good regional university into a prominent and selective national research university. That transformation, which has been widely recognized and lauded, can be seen in the quality of NYU's faculty and their scholarship, in the academic talent of its students and the selectivity of its admissions process, and in the faith and generosity of the donors who believe in its mission and ideas. Moreover, the timing of transformation could not have been more opportune: not only is New York perceived far more positively than it was 15 years ago, increasingly public officials are recognizing that the city's economy is going to depend to an ever greater degree on the vitality of its intellectual, cultural, and educational (ICE) sector.
NYU is dedicated to accelerating the momentum of those accomplishments and securing a place for itself among the world's greatest institutions of higher learning. An important element of achieving those goals is to take the opportunity to reflect upon what NYU has done over the past two decades -- the University's advancement was so rapid it was not accompanied by a great deal of strategic self-examination -- in order to plan better for the future.
NYU's transformation has necessarily been accompanied by growth: in student housing, in faculty housing, and in academic facilities. Each new project prompted NYU's neighbors and local elected officials to ask to see a "master plan" to better understand NYU's needs and intentions. The lack of such a plan was greeted with some frustration.
We are now beginning an initiative to plan for and guide the next 25 years of the University's physical development. Along with the Partners Initiative (to strengthen and expand the arts and science faculty), student community-building, and the $2.5 billion "Campaign for NYU," this undertaking will be one of the University's hallmark efforts in the first part of the 21st century. It will provide a roadmap for addressing the physical aspects of the University's academic needs between now and NYU's bicentennial (2031) while respecting our local community and bringing predictability and clarity to NYU's development efforts.
Developing an office dedicated to planning was an early commitment of John Sexton's. The objectives of the planning office are threefold: 1) to bring critical thinking, research, and analysis to the process of planning the built environment at NYU; 2) to engage the NYU community and the neighborhood in the process of planning; and 3) to bring design excellence to NYU's buildings and urban design. Lori Pavese Mazor, the Associate Vice President for Planning and Design, has hired a team; formed NYU's first Office of Strategic Assessment, Planning, and Design (SAPD); and led the competitive process to select a consultant to work with the University on the plan.
We are in the early stages of the planning efforts following an intensive period of data collection and analysis. We have already begun sharing that information about NYU's historic growth, projections, and the planning process with our NYU community and neighborhood. Internally, we have an Advisory Planning Council with representation from the student, faculty, and staff. Externally, we have met regularly with community representatives, including elected officials, brought together by Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer. With this task force, we have developed a set of planning principles that will guide the development of NYU's first strategic plan.
The next phase involves intensive outreach to solicit input and ideas from the NYU community and our neighbors over the next few months in order to devise a long-term, predictable, and clear strategic plan that can ultimately be brought forth to our internal community, local community representatives and members, and city officials.
The June 28th and September 17th Open Houses were an early opportunity to bring the NYU community and the neighborhood up to date on our planning efforts; to give them a chance to meet the SAPD and the consultant team (SMWM, in association with Grimshaw Architects, Toshiko Mori Architect, and the Olin Partnership); to enable them to see some of the baseline, historic data about NYU's growth that SAPD has accumulated; and to engage the community in the planning process. The pages that follow are the information that was shared with the public at the Open House.