Jane Jacobs: New Urbanist Who Transformed City Planning

The writer Jane Jacobs has always taken a high interest in urban planning, emphasizing the necessity to take into account community's needs.

She was particularly involved in redevelopment projects such as the ones concerning the Greenwich Village and Toronto, where she participated in demonstrations against changes that did not focus on community, but on individual interests of the 'master builders'.

Jane Jacobs was a writer and activist who published seven books throughout her lifetime and many more articles on urban planning in different magazines. In her most famous book, she presents new principles of city building and rebuilding. The focus is on great cities rather than on towns or suburbs. Furthermore, conventional urban is blamed for not having taken into consideration community's needs and natural ecosystems.

From the writer's point of view, diversity is the key principle and it can be reached by making sure of the following elements: mixing uses and functions within the neighborhoods as well as older buildings with newer ones, short blocks and denser neighborhoods.