Elizabeth Humstone ’66

Elizabeth Humstone graduated from Abbot Academy in 1966 and went on to become an urban planner focusing on smart growth and sustainable development. She is currently an advisor to the National Trust for Historic Preservation, a Board member at Project Harmony-International, and a volunteer in numerous local organizations in Vermont. Formerly, she was the Chair of the Board of Directors of the Vermont Natural Resources Council and the Vermont Housing and Conservation Trust Fund, the co-founder and Executive Director of the Vermont Forum on Sprawl, Director of U.S. Programs for the Institute for Sustainable Communities, and President of the national Growth Management Leadership Alliance. She has been a Visiting Professor at the University of Southern Maine in the City Planning Program and an instructor at Boston Architectural College.

Ms. Humstone has worked extensively with communities, states and regions on land planning and development issues and has lectured on smart growth both within the US and overseas. She has participated in professional exchanges in England, Wales, Japan, Cuba, the Dominican Republic and the Altai Republic in Russia. She is also a recipient of numerous awards including the Rome Prize at the American Academy in Rome, Patricia Walton Award (VT) for Public Service, and Professional Planner of the Year Northern New England Chapter of the American Planning Association. In addition to numerous articles in magazines and journals, Ms. Humstone authored with Julie Campoli and Alex MacLean, Above and Beyond, Visualizing Change in Small Towns and Rural Areas (Planners Press, 2002). Ms. Humstone is a cum laude graduate of Wheaton College and received her Masters in City Planning from Harvard Graduate School of Design. She divides her time between Vermont and Massachusetts where she lives with her partner, Stanly Black. She has one son, Christopher Gignoux, an architectural designer, with whom she supports a fund to promote small-scale smart growth projects in Vermont.