By Tom McClimon
February 23, 2009

The American Architectural Foundation presented its 2009 Keystone Award to Conference of Mayors President Miami Mayor Manny Diaz at its 20th Annual Accent on Architectural Gala held in Washington (DC) February 6.

The Keystone Award is presented annually to an organization or individual outside of the architectural profession for their leadership in demonstrating the power of architecture and design to improve lives and transform communities. It is the highest award that can be presented to a non'architect by the architectural community. Only two other mayors and Conference Past Presidents have been so honored – Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley and Charleston (SC) Mayor Joseph P. Riley, Jr.

Diaz was honored for his vision for Miami and the nation on the importance of sustainable urban design. Three years ago, Diaz launched Miami 21, a comprehensive master plan for Miami, based on new urbanism and smart growth principles, which includes economic development, park and public places, transportation, historic preservation, and arts and culture. He created the city’s first Office of Sustainable Initiatives which coordinates Miami’s environmental programs, retrofitted city hall that now sports solar panels, and launched the city’s first Tree Master Plan, which aims at enhancing and restoring the city’s tree canopy.

Diaz was also cited for his work on the national scene. “Mayor Diaz was our leader on getting the mayors to adopt a resolution in supporting of a Cabinet'level Secretary of the Arts,” stated Conference of Mayor CEO and Executive Director Tom Cochran, one of the award’s presenters. “His leadership will guide mayors for years to come.”

Diaz is a member of the National Advisory Council of the Mayors’ Institute on City Design, a partnership program of the American Architectural Foundation, U.S. Conference of Mayors and the National Endowment for the Arts.

In addition to the presentation of the Keystone Award, other awards presented at the annual gala included the Gold Medal Award, the American Institute of Architects highest award to an architect'this year’s recipient was Glenn Marcus Murcutt; the Architecture Firm Award presented to the firm of Olson, Sundburg, Kundig, and Allen; and the Twenty'five Year Award to the Faneuil Hall Marketplace.

Our Role is to Make Cities Sustainable

The following are Diaz' remarks accepting the American Architectural Foundation’s 2009 Keystone Award.

"It is truly a personal honor for me to receive the 2009 keystone award, and that the American Architectural Foundation has chosen to regard our work in Miami as a model.

I am humbled by the fact that I follow in the footsteps of two of the greatest mayors in American history, Richard M. Daley and Joe Riley. They have been my friends, my mentors and my inspiration.

As mayors, we face significant challenges daily, eradicating poverty, ensuring the safety of our residents, and providing a quality education for our children, creating opportunity for all. We deal with the suffering of people losing their jobs, their homes, and their businesses. Our role to make cities sustainable, to make them work, to be the architects of their future, is more important today than perhaps at any other time in history.

Every generation faces a great collective challenge – a challenge that defines that generation by its response.

For our parents and our grandparents, the ones we now call the greatest generation, the challenge was a battle between opposing ideas. They faced two world wars and a cold war – because of their response, democracy survives, continuing to represent hope and freedom.

Our generation also faces a great challenge—but it is a challenge of a different sort. Ours is not a battle between nations–a battle to preserve the fundamentals of democracy, ours is a battle to sustain our cities, sustain our planet, and sustain our quality of life.

During the last few decades, the world has changed at a pace never before imagined, a world very different from the one our parents expected for us. And yet, this much we know: that our children and grandchildren will live in a world of exponential change, a level of competitiveness and diversity few of us have experienced, and much less understand.

For the first time in history, over half the world’s population lives in cities and metro areas. In the US, it is 85 percent. And this trend will continue. Metro areas drive the world’s economies. In the US, they are responsible for 90 percent of all jobs, income, and our gross domestic product. And this trend will continue.

Traditional American cities were developed as high density, compact, walkable, mixed'use neighborhoods – think of Washington (DC), Chicago, Boston, and New York – where neighborhoods connect to form great cities.

But all that changed. We abandoned our cities for the failed promise of the suburbs. We paved our land, destroyed our natural areas, wasted our water resources, spent billions to connect distant neighborhoods, strained municipal budgets, and we glorified the automobile.

And you know the results: longer commutes, traffic congestion, more asphalt, pollution, and isolation — disconnected neighborhoods diminishing human contact, separating us from our neighbors, and increasing human impact on climate change.

This is why the single most critical response to help save our planet is to embrace smart growth ' to design cities that make sense.

We must live up to the legacy of the greatest generation by letting our legacy be ‘the greenest generation.’

This distinction will not be achieved without proper and sustainable planning. Because if you fail to plan, plan to fail.

I could not let Miami fail.

Miami 21 incorporates six elements; a new form based code; economic development; transportation and transit; parks and the public realm; arts and culture and historic preservation. Miami is a city graced with unrivaled natural beauty. It should also be graced with great civic and green spaces, with public parks and promenades within a half mile of every resident; where we will not need a car, where we can walk, use a bike safely, or ride a streetcar; where we preserve our historic buildings so we can appreciate our past; where we honor the arts; and where economic opportunity and the American dream continue to be available for those willing to work for them.

In 1906, David Burnham produced a plan for Chicago. Speaking of his plan, he inspired us with these words, “Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing.”

In Miami, we are not afraid to dream big dreams; to aim high in work and in hope; to take a step back for the sake of our future; to control our destiny, and in so doing set a course to guarantee our sustainability.

We welcome our obligation to honor our debt to the past, and fulfill our duty to the future. It is a moral obligation that rings with a sense of urgency, that we may leave our children a city, greater, better, more beautiful and more sustainable than was left to us."