Will Toor - Fellow, Former Director

Will Toor served as the director of the University of Colorado Environmental Center from 1992 through 2004. During his tenure the center has received national recognition, including the "Outstanding School Recycling Program" award from the National Recycling Coalition; a "Way To Go" award from the US EPA and Renew America for the student bus pass program, and a Year 2000 Climate Protection Award from the US EPA for initiating the nation's largest university green power program. He is co-author of the book "Finding A New Way: Campus Transportation For The Twenty-first Century."

Will is also an instructor in the Environmental Studies Program, teaching classes on the Campus and the Biosphere, Environmental Leadership, and Transportation and Environmental Policy.

He served on the Boulder City Council from 1997 to 2004, and was Boulder Mayor from 1998 to 2004. He has had a major policy focus on open space acquisition, regional growth management, affordable housing, and regional transit. He also serves on the executive committee of the Denver Regional Council of Governments, and is vice chair of the Metro Vision Policy Committee. Will also serves on the board of the Colorado Environmental Coalition, and the selection committee for the Brower Youth Awards. Elected in November of 2004, Will now serves as Boulder County Commissioner.

Will has a PhD in physics from the University of Chicago, and a BS in physics from Carnegie-Mellon University. His research focused on soft condensed matter theory, phase transitions in electrorheological fluids, and fluctuations in low dimensional systems.

Recent lectures, articles, and interviews by Will Toor

The Road Less Traveled: Sustainable Transportation for Campuses appeared in the March-May 2003 issue of Planning for Higher Education. It explores the use of transportation demand management strategies in university communities to shift many trips from single occupant automobiles to other modes of travel.

SATYA Climate change interview - Rachel Cernansky spoke with Will Toor, who explains this legal strategy and how Boulder is being affected by global warming

Living on Earth interview on climate change - This is an audio recording of an interview on the National Public Radio "Living on Earth" show, which aired on the week of September 27, 2002. download mp3 audio

Harnessing Alternative Energy: Innovative Measures at UC Boulder - This is the transcript of a webchat hosted by National Wildlife Federation on September 17, 2002.

Presentation at Transportation and University Communities Conference, hosted by the American Public Transit Association, Amherst, MA. ,June 2002.

Finding A New Way: Campus Transportation for the 21st Century is a slideshow giving a brief overview of the emerging new approach to campus transportation based on providing mobility instead of simply providing parking. It is created by Will Toor, Dr. Spenser Havlick, and Charles Bloom. Special thanks to Leanne Sweeney and to the spring 2002 students of ENVS 4800.

Panel presentation on sustainability and cities at American Public Works Association conference on Hot Topics in Public Works, May 2002.

Keynote lecture at University of California-Santa Cruz Earth Summit, April 2002.

Keynote lecture at Missoula Transportation Demand Management Summit, March 2002.

Keynote lecture at Growing Greener Power Conference, sponsored by the US Department of Energy, February 2002.

Panel presentation at Railvolution Conference, San Francisco, December 2001.
(Some of the images in this presentation are courtesy of the City of Boulder Transportation Department.)

"Transportation Planning at the University of Colorado: Finding a New Way":This is an article by Will Toor which appeared in the winter 1998 issue of Declaration, the journal of the University Leaders for a Sustainable Future.

Paper at Ball State University Greening of the Campus Conference, 1997.

Finding a New Way: Campus Transportation for the 21st Century (Poinsatte and Toor, 1997) - This resource guide profiles success stories at campuses across the country to illustrate specific examples of what Transportation Demand Management (TDM) programs can do. The guide also addresses possible pitfalls in
starting up programs and offers suggestions about how to avoid them.

Syllabi of Recent Classes

Transportation and Environmental Policy, Spring 2002.

Environmental Leadership, Fall 2001.

Campus and the Biosphere, Spring 1998.