Cambridge Assistant City Manager to Lead Harvard’s Campus Planning

Harvard hired Cambridge Assistant City Manager Iram Farooq to serve as the University’s managing director of campus planning, the city announced Wednesday, ending her 25-year tenure overseeing urban planning in City Hall.

Farooq, who leads the Community Development Department, has become a formidable figure in Cambridge, overseeing high-profile development projects across the city and coordinating major changes to the zoning code. In 2022, she was named a finalist to become Cambridge’s city manager, ultimately losing the job to Yi-An Huang ’05.

“Iram’s extensive experience in planning, design, and community development will make her a remarkable addition to Harvard. We are thrilled to have her join the team,” Chief of University Planning and Design Purnima Kapur wrote in a statement to The Crimson.

As one of Harvard’s top planning officials, Farooq will oversee major campus projects including the Undergraduate House Renewal program, which will begin work on Eliot House at the end of the academic year, a new building for the Economics Department, and construction projects on Harvard’s athletic facilities in Allston.

Farooq also has extensive experience overseeing the development of neighborhoods shaped by the region’s vibrant biotechnology sector, particularly Kendall Square. The city in recent years has moved to make the sleek tech hub into a more liveable and mixed-use neighborhood.

That experience may prove especially helpful for the University’s planning in Allston, which has been guided by similar principles. But Farooq will not oversee the heart of Harvard’s neighborhood-building across the river — its Enterprise Research Campus and Beacon Park Yard projects — which are private enterprises. The ERC is overseen by the Harvard Allston Land Company.

In Cambridge, Farooq’s fingerprints lie all over an array of major policy initiatives of the past several years, including the city’s Net Zero Action Plan to achieve carbon neutrality in Cambridge buildings by 2050, the Building Energy Use Disclosure Ordinance, which limits emissions from large commercial buildings, and the Affordable Housing Overlay — a zoning overhaul to incentivize affordable development.

She is currently leading the city’s effort to eliminate single-family zoning across Cambridge.

Farooq helped bring mixed-use developments to Kendall Square, Cambridge Crossing, and Alewife — all three current or growing biotech centers — allowing for the creation of thousands of new housing units. She also created the Resilient Cambridge Plan, an urban development project to address the impact of climate change through green infrastructure projects.

“I’m filled with a lot of emotions: gratitude for all that Iram has contributed, sadness that she will no longer be a colleague, excitement for her new adventure, and appreciation that she will remain very much a part of the Cambridge community,” Huang wrote in a statement.

At Harvard, Farooq’s intimate familiarity with Cambridge’s planning rules and relationships with city staff will likely help smooth the approval process for the University’s constant churn of building renovations. Just this year, Harvard has overseen renovations on the undergraduate Adams House’s Russell Hall and Westmorly Court, Harvard Yard’s historic Wadsworth House, and the Graduate School of Design’s Gund Hall.

Melissa Peters, Chief of Planning Strategy for Cambridge, will replace Farooq as Acting Assistant City Manager of Community Development until the city conducts a search for a permanent replacement in 2025.

Farooq will leave her post as assistant city manager on Jan. 24.

—Staff writer Angelina J. Parker can be reached at angelina.parker@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @angelinajparker.

—Staff writer Jack R. Trapanick can be reached at jack.trapanick@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @jackrtrapanick.