Lindsay Campbell

Title: Research Social Scientist
Unit: People and Their Environments: Social Science Supporting Natural Resource Management and Policy
Previous Unit: Integrating Social and Biophysical Sciences for Natural Resource Management
Address: Northern Research Station
c/o EPA Region 2, 290 Broadway, 26th Floor
New York, NY 10007
Phone: 212-637-4175
E-mail: Contact Lindsay Campbell

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Education

Rutgers University, Department of Geography

• Doctoral student, currently enrolled
• Forest Service Scientist Recruitment Initiative selectee

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Urban Studies and Planning

• Masters of City Planning degree recipient, 2006
• Masters Thesis: "Civil Society Strategies on Urban Waterways: Stewardship, Contention and Coalition Building"

Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School of Public Policy with Environmental Studies Certificate

• AB degree recipient, 2002
• Senior Thesis: "Natural Resource Management and Tourism Policy in Namibia: A Sustainable Development Paradigm"

Civic & Professional Affiliations

• MillionTreesNYC Steering Committee and Research and Evaluation Sub-Committee
• Urban Ecology Collaborative Steering Committee and Research Committee
• Association of American Geographers, member

Current Research

My current research explores the dynamics of urban stewardship on a variety of different site types, with a particular emphasis on issues of social justice:

• The Living Memorials Project treats September 11 as a case study of a disturbance to which people respond, including through acts of stewardship.
• STEW-MAP (the Stewardship Mapping and Assessment Project) for New York City is a collaborative project with Erika Svendsen and Morgan Grove of the Northern Research Station, Dana Fisher of Columbia University, and Jarlath O`Neil-Dunne of the University of Vermont. This citywide assessment analyzes the spatial locations and network relationships of nearly 3,000 civic stewardship groups. STEW-MAP is an integral part of our ULTRA-EX project for New York City, "Understanding the Dynamic Connections Among Stewardship, Land Cover, and Ecosystem Services in New York City's Urban Forest." For more information on that project, visit: http://iserp.columbia.edu/research-initiatives/centers-and-projects/environmental-stewardship-project.
• Restorative Commons: Creating Health and Wellbeing through Urban Landscapes in an edited volume created in partnership with the nonprofit, Meristem, to share lessons learned from the fields of urban natural resource management and design with other practitioners, policymakers, and the general public.

The Forest Service Northern Research Station and the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation have jointly created the New York City Urban Field Station. The Urban Field Station develops and applies adaptive management, technology transfer, and science to improve human well-being and the environment in urban metropolitan areas. I am involved in all aspects of the development and implementation of the field station.

Why is This Important

• The Living Memorials research explores the ways in which natural resources aid human recovery not as passive design elements, but as catalysts for collective action. Stewardship allows for expression of collective values, including collective memories.
• By exploring the networks among stewards and the social, organizational, informational and funding nodes that link them, STEW-MAP examines the ways that civil society stewards connect, compete with and compliment the goals of government agencies and the private business sector in the management of the urban ecosystem. This project seeks to understand and map the ways citizens serve as stewards by conserving, managing, monitoring, advocating for, and educating the public about their local environments (including water, land, air, waste, toxics, and energy issues).
• Restorative Commons' 18 articles span theory, case studies, and practitioner interviews. The book explores the relationships of urban landscape to human health and well-being and documented some of the most compelling practices and principles currently utilized to create restorative commons either as small-scale experiments or as larger efforts to "institutionalize innovation." It was designed for a wide audience with full color illustrations and graphics, has been distributed for free to more than 3,000 users, and downloaded thousands of times.
• The NYC Urban Field Station is both a physical place to conduct research and a network of relationships among a growing number of scientists, practitioners, university cooperators and facilities focused on urban ecology. It is located at Fort Totten in Bayside Queens, NY. Since its founding, the Urban Field Station has engaged over 30 non-profit, academic, and government partners creating innovative "research in action" programs to support urban ecosystem management.

Future Research

We intend to build upon our ULTRA-EX research with longer term, integrated social-ecological urban research. I am also developing a number of other applied research projects for the New York City Urban Field Station with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation and other local partners - on issues ranging from young street tree mortality, to ecological literacy, to green jobs, to research in cooperation with the FreshKills landfill to park conversion project.

Featured Publications

Additional Online Publications