urban planner - designer - public space enthusiast
Interests
-Community Development
-Urban Design
-Social Equity
-Placemaking
-Parks and Public Spaces
I am most interested in creating positive change in communities through thoughtful policies, innovative planning, and strong urban design efforts.
Volunteer Experience
University District Organization
-January 2024- May 2024
- Helped facilitate design research for a pocket park in the city of Columbus. Freestore Food Bank
-March 2023-Present
-Helping stock the Freestore Food Bank grocery store in Over-the-Rhine, Cincinnati
Yetunde Rodriguez Design
-July 2021- August 2021
- Worked with artist Yetunde Rodriguez in small business operations and youth art workshops located in Dayton.
Skills
-Adobe Suite
-ArcGIS Collection
-Rhino 3D
-Microsoft Office
- Copy Editing
- Plan and Memo Writing
Experience
Designing Local Columbus, Ohio
Urban Planner
Part Time/ Hybrid
January 2024- December 2024
-Assisted in plan drafting through contribution of ideas, graphic design, writing, and editing content.
-Researched metropolitan areas in various metrics including socio-demographic and economic data, cultural amenities, tourism, history, and city planning efforts.
-Helped staff community engagement events by volunteering, actively participating, and notetaking.
Pho Lang Thang Cincinnati, Ohio
Server
August 2023- Present
-Serviced orders in a consistently polite and professional manner.
-Hosted and served tables, keeping wait times minimal while attending to customers requests.
Education
University of Cincinnati Cincinnati, Ohio
College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning
This image shows a master plan to transform the Cincinnati riverfront into a connection focused and invigorating area primed for more tourism and regional events.
Left: I contributed the green streetcar loop, pedestrian amenity zones, and highway cap design as well as this entire illustration.
1-71 Highway Cap
This image shows what 4th and 5th street downtown could look like if 1-71 were capped, which has been proposed and rejected many times.
Right: Satellite highlighting the existing structure of I-71, being sunken between 2nd and 3rd street.
Top: 3D model of the 3rd street block.
Bottom: Collage imagining the view of a pedestrian from 3rd street.
Industrial Corridor
Cincinnati’s industrial corridor includes the neighborhoods of Queensgate, Camp Washington, the West End, and Lower Price Hill.
This Summer 2024 studio challenged my group to consider the past of this area, which has faced industrialization and displacement, and to imagine a future that blends all four neighborhoods.
Left: Satellite view with border of area.
Right: Amenities in and within a half mile distance.
Transect 3:
Work-Build-Create Large scale buildings with combined industry, makerspaces, studios, but less push for housing.
Transect 2:
Live-Work-Create Mixed-use, with the more modern addition of makerspaces and light, near industrial creating.
Transect 3:
Live-Shop-Work
Inspired by traditional mixed-use neighborhoods, with a combination of housing and small business.
Urban Transects
I imagined the development of Cincinnati’s industrial corridor to be guided by transects inspired by the Center for Applied Transects and form-based code.
Right: Model of the interaction of all three transects.
Building the urban form of this corrifor with a series of transects that can help guide development of the built area without directly instructing it.
Utilizing Cincinnati’s existing formbased code guidelines to overlay onto the area to transition the development well into the rest of the city.
Incorporating beautifully designed and publicly accessible shared spaces, such as plazas and parks, for the community to enjoy
Prioritizing middle housing,such as row homes or 2-10 unit apartments for the majority of new housing development in the area.
Filling in the empty and paved over spaces in the corridor by maximizing lot coverage, and encouraging development investment, and placing dense pockets of trees between built development.
Applied Strategies
Here are the strategies I felt could realistically achieve the massive transformation of Cincinnati’s industrial core.
Left: Diagram showing the transformation of the current urban fabric.
Right: Highlighted areas showing how strategies are a part of the model.
Urban Infill
Social Spaces
Middle Housing
Racial Makeup of Brockton (ACS 2022)
Black or African American alone
White alone
Black, one other race
One other race, alone
2+ races, other than Black and one other race
Draft Ideal Arts Ecosystem in Brockton
Brockton, Massachusetts
I was able to work on the draft Downtown Brockton Publicly Accessible Art Plan in my time at Designing Local. This plan truly expanded my knowledge of public art processes and the relationship between arts and community.
Left: Graphics I created for this plan.
Foreign Born by World Region (ACS 2022)
Europe
Asia
Africa
Latin America
Language Spoken at Home (ACS 2022)
North America
Speak English less than “very well”
English Only
Language other than English
Plan Graphics
I created all of these graphics for the demographic analysis of Brockton and the collection of online survey responses.
Bottom Left: Answers to survey question“What are some locations in Downtown Brockton that would be idea for public art?”
Right: Answers to survey question- “What types of public art would you like to see?”
Reimagining Columbus
I worked on this ongoing discussion of Columbus’ environment changing with the times, both in feelings of equality and in the actual planning of a new site for the controversial Christopher Columbus statue formerly located at the statehouse. My team at Designing Local are the engagement coordinators for this project and allowed me to play a role in large, hands on events and discussions.
Left: Me (Right) speaking to Jan Tifrea of Indigenous Design Studio + Architecture after her firms lecture titled “What is Indigenous Design and History” on 4/4/24.
UDO Pocket Park
I was able to be a part of the volunteer staff with the University District Organization, which represent 13 neighborhoods around the Ohio State University. We worked as a team doing design research with different community audiences for a work-in-progress pocket park at Indianola Presbyterian Church.
Left: Collection of Images from community engagement events hosted around the University District.
