Scenic Hudson Board Member
Owen Gutfreund is Associate Professor of Urban Policy and Planning at Hunter College and formerly was the Director of the Barnard-Columbia Urban Studies Program. Before earning his doctorate in history at Columbia University, he was a Vice President at Lazard Freres & Co., where he worked in public finance, assisting states, cities, and government agencies in raising capital for a wide range of purposes.
Owen is the author of Twentieth Century Sprawl: Highways and the Reshaping of the American Landscape (2004), and was one of the authors of Robert Moses and the Modern City (2007). His areas of specialization include transportation policy, suburbanization, sustainable development, infrastructure, and public finance. He was an Associate Editor of the Encyclopedia of New York City, and on the editorial board of the Journal of Urban History. Owen is currently working on Cities Take Flight, a book about the impact of airports and air travel on American cities and towns.
Owen is a trustee and former chair of Blythedale Children’s Hospital; Director, volunteer, and former river guide for the Keewaydin Foundation in Vermont, providing camps and outdoor education programs for kids. He is on the on the board and Treasurer of The Skyscraper Museum, was chair of the New York Council for the Humanities, and is on the Executive Council of the New York Academy of History.
Owen’s lives with his wife, Victoria Rhodes Gutfreund, in Chappaqua and they have two daughters, both of whom live in New York City.
Education: B.A. from Vassar College (1985); M.A. and Ph.D. from Columbia University (1998).
