Xarissa Holdaway, one of May’s Buildings & Grounds guest bloggers, is campus e-news coordinator for the National Wildlife Federation’s campus-ecology project. She is a graduate of Brigham Young University, where she majored in English. She says that a summer she spent studying and eating pastries in Paris sparked an interest in baking, which prompted an interest in the global food-supply network and in fair-trade issues, which led to her interest in sustainability.

When I moved recently, it became blindingly clear to me that my eco-cred was on dangerous ground. I’d just taken a job at the campus-ecology department at the National Wildlife Federation that would allow me to work with sustainability at universities, and in my personal life I was pretty hardcore about turning lights off and buying pesticide-free produce. Finally, I thought, with my new job and apartment my daily life will align with the things I value.

I quickly realized, however, that when it came to finding a home, there was no easy “green” choice. My new office, in a suburb far outside of Washington, was built on the premise that a Metro line would soon be close enough for employees to use public transit, but delays and financing disputes have made that unlikely. No matter, I thought. I could live close enough to walk, saving gas and taking advantage of the miles of bike and walking trails in the area. It would be like my college days, when I lived six blocks from campus and actually had to use my legs to get places.

But while a five-minute walking commute would save me a lot of stress, time, carbon emissions, and money, it would effectively cut me off from the city infrastructure that drew me to D.C. in the first place. Most of my friends are based in the city, as are shops, museums, festivals, restaurants, and theaters. I believe strongly that living in convenient, higher-density areas (ideally with plenty of built-in green space) is good for people’s well-being, so I didn’t want to bind myself to a sprawling suburb that would make my work commute a dream but then leave me driving six miles to pick up eggs and spending an hour and a half in traffic to get to downtown D.C. On the other hand, living downtown and commuting out to my office was an option I’d already tried and rejected.

This was a choice I never had to make as a student. Our campus was big (about 30,000 students and staff members), but it was dense and plenty close to off-campus housing. I didn’t need a car for errands, work, or play. Every resource I needed was well within my reach. I could chat with a professor about a paper, go to class, visit the dentist, work a four-hour shift at our study-abroad office, attend another class, meet a friend for dinner, stop for groceries, and still get back to my apartment in time for roommate poker (using chocolate bars instead of money, since Brigham Young University didn’t exactly encourage such degenerate gambling activities). I didn’t need to invest in a car until just before graduation, and BYU earned my business by planning around my needs. Our relationship was symbiotic and mutually beneficial.

Campuses that are designed to meet student needs are not only good for business—since I’m sure I paid a premium for the convenience of on-campus shopping—but also good for students and faculty members. Because of their limited size and desire for good viewbook photos, many universities unconsciously follow smart-growth principles, offering centralized shopping and eating areas, walkability, common places for gathering, and plenty of green space. The benefits of this kind of development go far beyond media relations: It lessens traffic congestion and air pollution, reduces crime rates, and encourages socializing, strong community networks, and the combining of resources—all things I saw firsthand as an undergrad. Ultimately, residents are happier. And campus-wide planning creates opportunities for utility and building systems that piggyback on each other to conserve water and electricity. (Sadly, most campuses don’t take advantange of these opportunities as well as they could, which I’ll try to address in future posts.)

In case you’re curious about how my housing search turned out, I ended up choosing a place that was a bit of a compromise. A Metro stop about a mile’s walk away gets me to downtown D.C. in half an hour. I still have to drive to work, and so far I haven’t found anyone to carpool with. But my neighborhood is tree-lined and walkable, and almost everything I need is within a 20-minute radius, including a neighbor who lets me use a section of her patio to grow the vegetables that won’t thrive in my west-facing apartment. It’s not perfect, but until we plan our cities the way we plan our campuses, it’s a start.