Alex Marshall (born May 7, 1959) is an American journalist who writes and speaks about urban planning, transportation, and political economy. He is a former Senior Fellow of the Regional Plan Association and contributes to publications concerned with urban design, municipal government, architecture, and related matters — including Metropolis and Governing. He has also contributed to The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, and other newspapers and magazines.
Marshall has authored the books How Cities Work: Suburbs, Sprawl and the Roads Not Taken, Beneath the Metropolis: The Secret Lives of Cities, and The Surprising Design of Market Economies (Texas 2012).
Background Marshall was born in Norfolk, Virginia, to John Francis Marshall Jr. and Eleanor Jackson Marshall.Obituary of John Francis Marshall, Jr., Norfolk, Va., The Virginian-Pilot, July 16, 1995 Marshall's great-grandfather, Albert H. Grandy, founded The Virginian-Pilot newspaper in Norfolk in 1898, and was its first publisher and editor-in-chief.
After attending Woodberry Forest School in the class year of 1978,Woodberry Forest Magazine and Journal, “Book Report: Recent Publications by Woodberry Alumni”, Fall 2012, p. 63, http://my.texterity.com/woodberryforestmj/fall2012?pg=65. Retrieved August 10, 2013. Marshall received a dual Bachelor of Science degree in political economy and Spanish from Carnegie Mellon University in 1983 and a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1988. He studied at the Harvard Graduate School of Design during the 1999–2000 academic year as a Loeb fellow.
Marshall lived from 2003 to 2022 with his wife Kristi Barlow in Brooklyn, New York, where the couple were noted for their attempt between 2008 and 2010 to organize a cohousing community in Brooklyn.; related slide show, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/11/28/realestate/1130cov_audiov3/index.html; (printed as "Cockeyed Optimists and Steely-Eyed Lenders");
Career From 1988 to 1997, Marshall worked as a staff writer and columnist for the Virginian-Pilot, where he came to focus on State and local politics and urban development.See, e.g., Alex Marshall, "Libraries' Use Speaks Volumes", Virginian-Pilot [Norfolk, Va.]: September 30, 1995, p. A1. Print; "Sound Investment or Shaky Gamble? The City Council Will Decide Soon If Norfolk Will Pay Most of the $60 Million to Fund the East Ocean View Project", Virginian-Pilot [Norfolk, Va.]: January 14, 1996: p. B1. Print; "Fraim Optimistic About Rebirth of Urban Cores of Center Cities Mayor Says Norfolk Would Again Be a Hub of 'Creativity and Collaboration'", Virginian-Pilot [Norfolk, Va.]: April 12, 1996, p. B3. Print. In 1998 and '99, Marshall wrote a bi-weekly opinion column as a correspondent for the Virginian-Pilot.See, e.g., Alex Marshall, "Urban Renewal Paves Over Norfolk's Past: Many Historic Structures, Along With Slums, Were Bulldozed in the Name of Progress." Virginian-Pilot [Norfolk, Va.]: Aug 29, 1999, p. M9. Print. Archived by Infotrac Newsstand, http://go.galegroup.com.dbgateway.nysed.gov/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA68429179&v=2.1&u=nysl_ca_nyempire&it=r&p=STND&sw=w. Retrieved August 13, 2013.
Marshall left the paper in 1999 for a Loeb Fellowship at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He moved to New York City shortly thereafter, where he continued his freelance journalism.
Markets and democracy
Controversy over New Urbanism In the 1990s, Marshall became involved in controversy over his criticism of New Urbanism, a school of suburban design he called a marketing scheme to repackage conventional suburban sprawl behind nostalgic imagery and aspirational sloganism.See, e.g., Alex Marshall, "Building New Urbanism: Less Filling, But Not So Tasty", Builder Magazine, November 30, 1999; republished on Marshall's website, August 2, 2006.
In a 1995 article in Metropolis magazine, Marshall denounced New Urbanism as "a grand fraud".Alex Marshall, "Suburbs in Disguise", Metropolis Magazine, July 1996, p. 70, republished as "New Urbanism" in Busch, Akiko, ed., Design is ... Words, Things, People, Buildings and Places (New York:Metropolis Books/Princeton Architectural Press, 2002), p. 272; and as "Suburbs in Disguise" on Marshall's website. Retrieved October 2, 2013. Marshall continued the theme in numerous articles, including an opinion column in the Washington Post in September of the same year,Alex Marshall, "Putting Some 'City' Back In the Suburbs", The Washington Post, September 1, 1996, p. C1. Retrieved October 2, 2013. and in Marshall's first book, How Cities Work: Suburbs, Sprawl, and the Roads Not Taken (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2000).
Andrés Duany, the architect whose Duany Plater Zyberk & Company is among the leading promoters of New Urbanism, and some of whose projects had come under Marshall's strongest criticism, dismissed Marshall's criticisms in an interview for the Daily Princetonian, saying that Marshall, ". . . cannot stand the fact that we're working with the middle class. He wants us to spend all our time with the poor."Jessica Gross, "Alums lead New Urbanism movement", Daily Princetonian, March 10, 2005. Retrieved June 1, 2024. Metropolis Magazine published a "round-table debate" between Marshall and Duany in May of the same year, which is archived on Marshall's website.
New Urbanism advocate James Howard Kunstler gave Marshall negative reviews of How Cities Work, in Metropolis Magazine.James Howard Kunstler, "One Track Mind", Metropolis Magazine, January 2001, p. ___. Print. Kunstler wrote,
He concluded
Architectural Record called How Cities Work an "important new work," saying
Books The Surprising Design of Market Economies (University of Texas Press, 2012), Beneath The Metropolis: the Secret Lives of Cities (Carroll and Graf, 2006), How Cities Work: Suburbs, Sprawl and The Roads Not Taken (University of Texas Press, 2001),
References
External links Alex Marshall's website Laura Granieri, "12 Years Later, How Cities Work is Still a Must-Read", web log entry, The Grid, November 26, 2013. Tom Weber, interview with Alex Marshall, The Daily Circuit, Minnesota Public Radio, October 23, 2013. , interview with Alex Marshall, , WHRV, Norfolk, Va., September 17, 2013. Mary Manning Cleveland (Adjunct Professor of Environmental Economics, Columbia University), review of The Surprising Design of Market Economies, Huffington Post, June 14, 2013. Sam Roberts, review of The Surprising Design of Market Economies, "Bookshelf", The New York Times, February 22, 2013. Steve Scher, interview with Alex Marshall, KUOW, Seattle, Wash., January 29, 2013. Interview begins at 20:30. Allison Arieff, "What Jane Jacobs Got Wrong About Urban Economies", The Atlantic Cities , December 5, 2012. Interview with Alex Marshall. Serena Dai, Five Best Friday Columns, The Atlantic Wire , September 14, 2012. The Surprising Design of Market Economies at University of Texas Press How Cities Work at University of Texas Press NewUrbanism.org , a website advocating New Urbanism, passenger rail, and related causes.