The Studio Team

The Hunter College East Shore Studio team with clients Zone A New York and SImagines

Team Bios:

Sara Allen is an enthusiastic transplant from Minneapolis, MN where she earned her bachelor's degree in Urban Studies at the University of Minnesota, and cultivated a deep and abiding love for all types of transit. She worked for Project for Public Spaces as both a Transportation Intern and a Consultant, and is looking forward to completing her final semester in Hunter College's Master of Urban Planning program.

Julia Borredon is is 21 years old and comes from France, where she studies at the Urbanism Institute of Paris. She has a double degree in History and Geography from Lyon 2 University. She is studying urban planning at Hunter thanks to an exchange program. Julia wanted to come to New York to have a different point of view on urban planning and because living in this city is an incomparable experience.

Anthony Fabre is currently in his last semester as a graduate student in the Hunter College urban planning program. With concentrations in housing and transportation, he has interests in local and federal urban policy and its effects on the way people live. Although a New York City native, Anthony lived in Florida for almost eight years and completed bachelors degrees in economics and international affairs with a minor in urban planning at The Florida State University. He returned to New York City for graduate school at Hunter because he has an appreciation for the cultural diversity of New York City and the variety of neighborhoods throughout the five boroughs.

Joseph DeAngelis is a lifelong Staten Islander and in his second to last semester as a Hunter College graduate student. He currently works for the Gateway National Recreation Area and was a Planning and Logistics Intern for the SImagines Planning for Recovery Program. Most of Joseph's research has been focused on Staten Island-specific issues, including: transportation, housing, waterfront resiliency, and economic development. Joseph hopes to pursue a career in resilient waterfront planning upon graduation in Spring 2014. 

Benjamin Fink is a graduate student in Urban Planning at Hunter College, with a concentration on economic development and currently works in finance. He was born in Iowa and moved to Baltimore when he was 13. During his graduate studies he interned with the Church Avenue Business Improvement District in Flatbush, Brooklyn. Prior to Hunter, Benjamin worked as a consulted and in the non-profit sector. He majored in religious studies and minored in dance at Franklin and Marshall College for his undergraduate degree. Benjamin has lived in Lower Manhattan for the past six years.

Aleda Gagarin earned her Master of Urban Planning degree with departmental honors in December 2013 at Hunter College, with a specialization in Community Planning & Advocacy.  She is currently a Development Associate the The Foundation Center, the leading source of information about philanthropy worldwide.  Prior to her role at The Foundation Center, she was contracted to do a program evaluation of the Ford Foundation's Building Economic Security Over a Lifetime Initiative (BESOL) as a Research Associate, and has extensive experience with qualitative data analysis.  Before entering the graduate program at Hunter she spent four years managing heavy workloads as a coordinator at Institutional Investor, and prior to that was the program assistant for the General Federation of Women's Clubs, a large women's volunteer non-profit, in Washington DC.  She received her BA in International Relations with a focus on development at The American University in Washington, DC.   Aleda lives in Queens with her husband and three children, and in her free time practices Shaolin Kung Fu in Chinatown at the USA Shaolin Temple.  

Having grown up in Washington Heights, David Leyzerovsky has called New York home for most of his life. David completed his bachelor’s degree in History at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor. At Michigan, David first became interested in cities, development patterns, and urban growth in the United States after taking a course on the History of American Suburbanization. At Hunter College, David has focused his Master’s degree on Transportation Planning, and is currently working as a Transportation Planning intern at Project for Public Spaces (PPS). Prior to his position at PPS, David was an intern at NYC Department of Planning Staten Island Office, where he performed site review, and studied land use patterns in Staten Island’s environmentally protected districts. At DCP, David became more familiar with the borough, its culture, and the important issues related to Superstorm Sandy.

 

Julio Palleiro was born in Queens and is a current Brooklyn resident. Julio is a life long New Yorker that is passionate about his city's urban design and infrastructure. He is in his final semester as an Urban Planning Graduate student with four years planning experience as a civil servant. As a Bay Ridge resident, Staten Island is like a second home.

Julie Schipper is currently finishing her last semester of the master of urban planning program at Hunter College. Her main focus throughout this program has been environmental planning. She is most interested in planning for natural disasters and hopes to work within this field when she graduates. She completed her undergraduate degree in Environmental Design, Policy, and Planning at Stony Brook University in Stony Brook, NY. While completing this degree, Julie found a passion for learning about suburbs and the differences between planning for suburban versus urban areas. Julie grew up in Brooklyn Heights and still lives there today. In her free time she loves to travel and explore new neighborhoods in New York City. 

The Hunter College East Shore Studio Professor

Pablo E. Vengoechea, is a registered architect, planner and urban designer with over 30 years experience in land use planning, housing development, zoning, architecture, education and environmental assessment in New York City and abroad. He is a principal of Zone Architecture, a multi-disciplinary firm offering design and urban planning services to civic and community organizations, not-for-profit institutions, government agencies, the development community and individual clients. He is also founding partner of a related firm Vengoechea + Boyland Architects.

Mr. Vengoechea serves as Vice Chair of the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission and is responsible for designating and safeguarding New York City’s landmarks and districts. He also serves on the Mayor’s Staten Island Growth Management Task Force, focused on identifying planning and zoning solutions to overbuilding and better manage growth in that borough.

Previously, he was an Adjunct Professor of Planning in the School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, Columbia University. There, he taught workshops on planning skills, a seminar on legislating aesthetics & development, and an international planning studio. He is a member of Aedificatio, an international research group based in Spain examining development, construction, management, and planning of historic city centers and cultural heritage preservation.