Donald L. Elliott, FAICP

August 19, 2015

High Energy Urban Planner, Lawyer, and Solver of Complex Governance Challenges

Don is a Senior Consultant with Clarion Associates, LLC, based in the Denver office, and has been a member of the firm since 1995. He has assisted over 80 U.S. communities to update zoning and development regulations, with a particular focus on fair and affordable housing strategies. Key projects have included first-in-a-generation zoning code rewrites for Philadelphia, Indianapolis, and Albuquerque. Don has also advised governments in Russia, Mongolia, and India on land use issues and served as the Democracy and Governance Advisor to the United States Agency for International Development in Uganda for two years. He has managed planning and zoning projects that have been state level award recipients from the American Planning Association in Colorado, Arizona, Indiana, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, and Virginia He is the author of An Even Better Way to Zone (Island Press 2025), A Better Way to Zone (Island Press 2008), co-author of The Rules that Shape Urban Form (APA 2012) and The Citizen’s Guide to Planning (APA 2009) and served as the editor of Colorado Land Planning and Development Law for 30 years. Don teaches a graduate-level course on Land Use Regulation at the University of Colorado at Denver School of Architecture and Planning and is a former member of the Denver Planning Board. He has a bachelor’s degree in Urban Planning and Policy Analysis from Yale University, a law degree from Harvard Law School, and a master’s degree in City and Regional Planning from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. Contact Don at delliott@clarionassociates.com.

  • How has your understanding of critical planning issues affected one of your lifestyle choices?: I walk to work! It keeps one more car off the street, keeps me healthy, and gives me time to think about long-term solutions to complex problems. Over the years, I’ve also picked up and recycled over 7,000 cans and bottles along the way.
  • Recent read: Building the Black City, by Joe Trotter: The largely overlooked history of how Black neighborhoods and political and social capital developed within and as an integral part of the growth of major U.S. cities, and how that evolution varied in different regions of the country.
  • Favorite city for a longer visit: Beth and I loved the month we spent working remotely from Rio de Janeiro. What a visually dramatic setting and what diverse people and neighborhoods. Despite repeated warnings, we found it no less safe than other large cities.
  • Weekend Activity: Hiking the mountains and walking and riding the neighborhoods, which is always an education about the type of city you really live in.

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