Benjamin Grant is an independent city planning and urban design consultant in the San
Francisco Bay Area. His areas of emphasis include conceptual urban design, transportation
and land use integration, and targeted client and stakeholder communications.
He has contributed to a range of planning and urban design projects, both public and private,
including a conceptual design for Fordham Plaza in the Bronx, and, as a consultant to
Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, a Vision Plan for a major portion of central Beijing, China.
Other consulting clients include the San Jose Redevelopment Agency, the Metropolitan
Transportation Commission, and the County of Alameda.
With the San Francisco design firm SMWM, Mr. Grant contributed to a series of planning and
design efforts in Downtown San Jose, California, most importantly the Greater Downtown San
Jose Strategy for Development, the city’s ten-to-twenty year vision plan. He was also a
principal author of the VTA Manual of Best Practices for Integrating Transportation and Land
Use.
He received national recognition in the competition to design New York City’s High Line,
which drew over seven hundred submissions. He is co-founder and director of city|space, a
nonprofit cultural institution exploring cities and urbanism through fine art, film, design, and
cultural landscape research. Since 2006, he has been a lecturer and studio instructor in the
graduate program in Urban and Regional Planning at San Jose State University.
Francisco Bay Area. His areas of emphasis include conceptual urban design, transportation
and land use integration, and targeted client and stakeholder communications.
He has contributed to a range of planning and urban design projects, both public and private,
including a conceptual design for Fordham Plaza in the Bronx, and, as a consultant to
Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, a Vision Plan for a major portion of central Beijing, China.
Other consulting clients include the San Jose Redevelopment Agency, the Metropolitan
Transportation Commission, and the County of Alameda.
With the San Francisco design firm SMWM, Mr. Grant contributed to a series of planning and
design efforts in Downtown San Jose, California, most importantly the Greater Downtown San
Jose Strategy for Development, the city’s ten-to-twenty year vision plan. He was also a
principal author of the VTA Manual of Best Practices for Integrating Transportation and Land
Use.
He received national recognition in the competition to design New York City’s High Line,
which drew over seven hundred submissions. He is co-founder and director of city|space, a
nonprofit cultural institution exploring cities and urbanism through fine art, film, design, and
cultural landscape research. Since 2006, he has been a lecturer and studio instructor in the
graduate program in Urban and Regional Planning at San Jose State University.