Environmental Science Associates (ESA), a leading community planning and environmental consulting firm, welcomes Mary Laux back to its Northern California team. Laux began her consulting career at ESA in 2001 with the airports group, and has spent the last 16 years with AECOM as an Associate Principal/Planner managing large, multidisciplinary projects.
ESA is glad to have her back in our San Francisco office, where she will continue doing what she likes most: being a project advocate. “I really like being out at the beginning of a project, helping to shape a client’s vision and goals,” explains Laux. “It’s extremely gratifying to make a plan and then get it done.”
After receiving a Bachelor of Arts in Geography from the University of Colorado, Boulder – where she explored the interrelationship of people, environment, and our world – Laux ventured west. She explored a variety of career options, including a seabird study with the USFWS on a remote atoll at the northwestern tip of the Hawaiian Islands. But after enjoying her time in the wild, it became evident to her that she was most interested in planning spaces for people to live, work, and play. Since then, she has dedicated her career to community planning.
Laux is a city and community planner with an emphasis on policy and land use development and analysis. She has worked on planning projects for public and private sector clients; these projects have ranged in size from small infill projects to the master planning of sites spanning hundreds of thousands acres, both in the United States and abroad. From her wide range of experience, she has gained a diverse set of skills to effectively guide local jurisdictions and developers through the planning and entitlement process while encouraging environmentally sensitive decision-making along the way.