The American Planning Association selected WRT to receive the first National Planning Excellence Award for a Planning Firm for its innovative, collaborative, and ethical approach to planning. The award recognizes planning firms that have produced bodies of distinguished work influencing the professional practice of planning. WRT will receive the award at a special luncheon at APA’s National Planning Conference in Boston on April 11, 2011.
“WRT has cultivated a pioneering approach to planning while fostering a renowned culture of cooperation and teamwork,” said Marie L. York, FAICP, APA Board member and 2011 National Planning Awards Jury Chair. “The extensive body of work produced by WRT is truly distinguished and continues to influence the planning profession today.”
WRT integrates planning with landscape architecture, urban design, and architecture, resulting in a broad understanding of the implications of city and regional planning on the built environment. The development of the environmental planning method, the invention and application of the “susceptibility to change” analysis in urban planning, and the development of “values-based” planning are significant examples of our firm’s influence on the planning profession.
“WRT’s work has always been grounded in two ethical stances,” said the firm’s Managing Principal, Joe Healy. “First is the belief that there are principles of planning that derive from nature. This belief is reflected in WRT’s focus on sustainable planning and design. Second is the belief in the moral role and professional planner’s responsibility as agents for the general public welfare, helping to make environments better places in which to live and work.”
In the course of nearly 50 years of practice, WRT has received more than 300 awards from national, state, and local organizations, including over 150 awards for planning. Over half of our 50 national planning awards have been won just in the past decade, including six from the American Planning Association.
In 2004, WRT received the national ASLA Firm Award, which recognizes a sustained body of distinguished work in landscape architecture that has influenced the direction of the discipline.
