Jane Jacobs

Jacobs was an author, journalist, and an activist who organized an opposition to a plan to build a highway through the heart of Greenwich Village. The proposed highway was part of a larger urban renewal plan that would have destroyed large portions of the neighborhood, including historic buildings and public spaces. Together with other community activists, Jacobs helped organize protests and letter-writing campaigns, and successfully lobbied city officials to abandon the plan. In the years that followed, Jacobs became increasingly involved in community development and neighborhood planning. She criticized large-scale urban renewal projects in her book The Death and Life of Great American Cities, arguing that they were often misguided and destructive. Instead, she advocated for a more bottom-up, community-based approach to urban planning.