metro » o n the cover

‘True
Advocate’

Longtime Metroparks commissioner
believes nature and recreation
improve quality of life.

“Without
those parks,
we would
have ongoing

sprawl.”

Photos by Brandon Schwartz

Robert Marans

Robert Marans in the Environmental Discovery Center at Indian Springs Metropark
in White Lake

Julie Edgar | Contributing Writer

T

hroughout a long and rich career,
retired University of Michigan
professor Robert Marans has
championed the importance of environ-
ment — the natural and the built — on
quality of life.
A hybrid social scientist-architect-urban
planner, Marans has worked on planned
communities in Israel and regional trans-
portation in Southeast Michigan. He has
conducted and analyzed countless surveys,
most recently on sustainability initiatives
at U-M. He has authored eight books
on his own and many more papers and
reports on better living through better
planning.
Marans, 82, was just appointed to a sixth
term as the Washtenaw County represen-
tative on the Huron-Clinton Metroparks
Authority (HCMA), making him the
longest-serving member of the commis-

sion and its only Jewish member (county
representatives serve six-year terms). He is
a calm but effective voice, guiding policies
that enhance the usability of the 13 parks
in the Metroparks stable.
Since Marans was first appointed to the
HCMA Commission 30 years ago — not
long after he earned a doctorate in urban
planning — he has seen the Metroparks
system grow to encompass some 25,000
acres, eight golf courses and 55 miles of
paved hiking/biking trails. The commis-
sion oversees an operating budget of $55
million, most of which comes from a mill-
age paid by residents in the five counties,
with the rest from user fees and grants.
The parks — from Kensington to Hudson
Mills to Indian Springs to Stoney Creek —
attract some 9 million visitors a year.
“Without those parks, we would have
ongoing sprawl,” says Marans of Ann
Arbor. “If you didn’t have park land,
there’d be more subdivisions. There’s a lot

of data to show that being close to a park,
using recreational facilities, is important
to the quality of people’s lives, in terms of
psychological and physical well-being.’’
George Phifer, HCMA director, calls
Marans a “true advocate” for the parks.
“He has an ability to connect the
Metroparks with the people we serve,” he
says. “Bob is passionate about quality of
life,” noting that Marans brings back work-
able ideas from his world travels. “And he’s
the only actual planner who sits on the
board.”

ISRAEL AND BACK
After earning a degree in architecture from
U-M and a master’s degree in urban plan-
ning from Wayne State, Marans, a 1952
Central High graduate, moved his family
— wife, Judy, and his first child, Gayle, to
Israel. He wanted to work with renowned
architect-planner Artur Glikson on an
experimental community called Kiryat

Gat, a town midway between Beersheva
and Tel Aviv.
“It was going to integrate new immi-
grants from North Africa and Eastern
Europe and mix them with native Israelis,”
Marans says. The experience led him to
focus his academic research on how the
built environment influences behavior and
social connectedness.
Marans has been back to Kiryat Gat
many times — once at the request of the
United Nations, which was interested in
social integration strategies.
“My conclusion was that it was moder-
ately successful in integrating these differ-
ent groups,” he says. That early project has
come full circle: Marans is working with a
student at the Technion who is interview-
ing Kiryat Gat residents about growing up
in a planned neighborhood with differ-
ent housing types and different types of
people.
Upon their return, the family — now

continued on page 14

12 September 15 • 2016

