everyone wants to live in a princeton urban planner uncovers yearning for sense of place and birds by kathleen mcginn spring princeton packet business editor monday march anton nelessen knows exactly where citizens of the st century want to live because tens of thousands of them in durban south africa orlando milwaukee atlanta metuchen and hundreds of other spots around the globe have told him and where they want to live is downtown princeton well perhaps not in princeton per se but in a place that looks and works very much like it mr nelessen is a professor of urban planning at rutgers the founder of ana vision planning a princeton urban planning firm a reluctant jerseyite and a man who even in the midst of central jersey sprawl has not lost hope for a more user friendly landscape computer enhanced photos of parking lots and downtowns and residential streets decorate the walls of his office though they represent locales on both sides of the equator their common elements are markedly alike but not always obvious each photo is softened by trees and shrubs so people want greenery but not just that mr nelessen said people have told us again and again that they want birds they like the sound so the urban environment needs trees birds like translating residents priorities their vision of what their town should look like and how it should work is vision planning s job we are the spokesperson for the average guy mr nelessen said and what does the average guy want the common denominators mr nelessen said are open space parks water tree lined streets sidewalks that go someplace some place to go great streetscapes jobs close by good schools buildings which never go higher than six stories a way to get around that is cheap and easy a sense of place parties and festivals he knows this because he asks and the way he asks is by showing pictures to residents of each town for which he prepares a design using photography combined with computer wizardry is something mr nelessen has been doing since the early s when he spent two years traveling the world taking degree photos of all the major public spaces on earth now he layers elements onto photos of existing elements of a town one series of photos in mr nelessen s extensive files starts with what looks like an irredeemably ugly residential street in photo number two some trees soften the space between the sidewalk and the curb on the curving street it looks better as the series goes on a row of shrubs goes up behind the houses on the left hand side of the sidewalk and ornamental streetlights sprout between the trees on the right hand side a few benches later the street is a knock out a wholly inviting visual treat in another example that has been executed by a shore town a downtown corner featured cracked curbs and a crab shack restaurant with a large sign not attractive surprisingly some trees and other plantings placed around the corner attractive lighting and a place to sit made a huge difference in that site even though the tall sign remained mr nelessen has residents in towns he is designing rate a streetscape and has found that small changes can raise approval ratings significantly one stretch of street for example had no trees it rated a he said after a few trees and fences were added it jumped to in what he calls design by democracy mr nelessen and his associates have taken photo series like these to town residents gathered in public meetings all around the world the residents then indicate which elements are most important to them in a current project the design of a new downtown for milwaukee mr nelessen took the consensus gathering one step further putting the drawings onto the internet some residents took the time to evaluate and give opinions on the plans these respondents want what mr nelessen has found most people want the sense of place the attractive surroundings the convenient ways of getting around the vital downtowns this being the case why do so few of us get this why instead do we have impersonal developments treeless big box shopping centers strip malls and hourlong stop and go commutes instead depression thinking mr nelessen said they just sprawled it the they to which he refers are mayors and members of planning boards who in his view granted and still are granting building permits thinking of their own town s tax base but caring nothing about the regional effects of their decisions in towns ringing princeton for example mr nelessen said old guys on boards have figured out that a square foot ranchburger will bring in enough taxes to pay school costs while a house will not this type of thinking gives rise to more and more spread out developments and less open space on the retail front west windsor does not care about princeton mr nelessen declared citing the harm shopping centers in west windsor have done to retail and quality of life in surrounding towns i have no choice mr nelessen a downtown princeton resident said i have to go to home depot i have to get into my car the owner of a year old mercedes that he likes to keep in its garage space mr nelessen walks or takes buses whenever possible and even where a desire for more planned regional growth may exist he said it is often frustrated because developers permits never expire so for example a developer who won approval years ago for a housing development office complex or strip mall and then sat on the permits waiting for better economic times a common occurrence can go ahead and build now even though residents might not want the growth in addition there are zoning ordinances that frustrate more inviting landscapes mr nelessen said for example many towns will now allow trees to be planted between the sidewalk and the curb because that space needs to remain clear for sewer lines where will all of this lead if sprawl remains unchecked and towns ignore regional needs in years we will all be stranded in our ranchburgers mr nelessen predicted gas by then will be prohibitively expensive and lacking a system of public transportation aging boomers will rattle around in their four bedroom colonials whose three car garages with entrances leading directly to the media center gourmet kitchen acted as shields against their neighbors the to year old boomer population will have closets but no neighborhood social system and no easy way of getting around but it doesn t have to be this way and mr nelessen doesn t think it will be boomers want to leave a legacy he said and that legacy will be the environment he sees today s fiftysomethings taking the reins on planning boards pushing for regional plans livable downtowns and sane transportation but if boomers lack the will to stop it mr nelessen sees necessity becoming the mother of more human friendly environments a strong advocate of public transportation on demand mr nelessen said a system of satellite directed vans taking development residents to downtown princeton or to a friend s house or the train station could have positive social effects there could be a central pickup point in each development he said perhaps benches would be added and a public bulletin board mr nelessen suggested friendships would develop as development residents waited together for a van this would be preferable to endless faceless sprawl but we can do a whole lot better mr nelessen is convinced and he thinks we will because of one photograph when we saw the first shot of the earth from the moon it changed everything he said we realized that this really is one place