Associate Professor Emerita Lyna Wiggins with her horse, Marilyn Monroe.
The Bloustein School is saddened to announce the passing of Lyna Wiggins, Associate Professor Emerita, on November 10, 2024.
From the early 1970s, Lyna was involved in the development and application of Geographic Information Systems (GIS). At the Bloustein School, her research focus included studying the use and diffusion of the technology, particularly within U.S. planning agencies; examining the institutional issues in GIS implementation, with a focus on issues of data sharing; designing and implementing appropriate GIS for regional planning agencies; and integrating GIS technology with traditional urban and regional models. She was a pioneer in using GIS for energy facilities siting applications. GIS was her passion.
Lyna joined the Bloustein School in 1993 as an associate professor in the Department of Urban Studies and Community Health before it became the renamed graduate Department of Urban Planning and Policy Development. She also served as a researcher for the Bloustein School’s Center for Urban Policy Research from 1993-1999 and was a member of the graduate faculty for the Rutgers Department of Geography from 1997 until her retirement. She served as the program lead/coordinator at Rutgers’ Grant F. Walton Center for Remote Sensing and Spatial Analysis from 1995-2005.
She earned a bachelor’s in mathematics and a bachelor’s in city and regional planning from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, and went on to earn a Master of Science in Statistics from Stanford and a Ph.D. in City and Regional Planning from the University of California, Berkeley. Lyna also taught and conducted research at Cal Polytech, Berkeley, UCLA, and Stanford while earning her graduate degrees.
Before joining the Rutgers ranks, she taught as an assistant/associate professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning from 1988-1993, and as an assistant professor in the Resources Planning Program, Department of Civil Engineering, at Stanford University from 1981-1988. She served on academic advisory, planning, and curriculum committees as well as being an active advisor and departmental coordinator during all of her academic tenures.
Lyna served as PhD Dissertation Chair to numerous candidates, many of whom went on to gain tenure in some of the top-ranked urban planning programs across the United States. During her time at Stanford, MIT, and Rutgers she guided more than 20 candidates to successful dissertation completion and served as a dissertation reader/committee member of countless other Ph.D. and master’s thesis candidates.
At MIT, she personally served as the dissertation advisor to Clinton Andrews, who went on to join the Bloustein School ranks in 1997. Dr. Andrews, now a Distinguished Professor of Urban Planning, recalls Lyna graciously stepping in after the sudden death of his graduate advisor to guide him to timely completion of his dissertation work, accompanied by the admonishment that “the best dissertation is one that is done.”
Her academic and professional service also included serving as a reviewer, editor, or advisory board members for such journals as Journal of the Urban and Regional Information Association, International Journal of Geographic Information Science, Transactions in GIS, Journal of Regional Science, Environment and Planning A, Journal of Planning Education and Research, Journal of the American Planning Association, Environmental Impact Assessment Review, Regional Science Review, and Oxford University Press. Lyna was a professional member of Geographic Information Systems Certification Institute; Mapping Science Committee, National Research Council, National Academy of Science; URISA (Urban and Regional Information Systems Association) International, including serving as president and committee/division chairperson; Mid-Atlantic Chapter of the Urban and Regional Information Systems Association/ State Mapping Advisory Committee; and University Consortium for Geographic Information Science.
A few of her numerous accolades and honors included the 2010 Bloustein School Jerome Rose Excellence in Teaching Award; 2005 Horwood Distinguished Service Award, Urban and Regional Information System Association; 2003 Service Award, Certification Committee, Urban and Regional Information Systems Association; and 1998 Leadership Award, Urban and Regional Information Systems Association. Lyna was also the recipient of thousands of dollars in grants from New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, New Jersey Office of State Planning, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, National Capital Planning Commission; U.S. Department of Transportation; United States Navy and other state and private funded organizations. She conducted GIS requirements analyses, system design and implementation, internet mapping, metadata clearinghouse server construction, and more for environmental, housing, transportation, energy, and federal, state and local municipal projects.
She always had the interests of the students first in her mind. In addition to serving as the Urban Planning program director at the Bloustein School for several years, she was one of the school’s first GIS experts. She taught generations of students valuable GIS skills with enthusiasm and patience. As the 2010 recipient of the Bloustein School’s Jerome Rose Excellence in Teaching Award, the students that nominated her particularly appreciated the “real world” problems and applications she brought to her classes, calling the exercises she designed both instructive and fun. Lyna herself was known for her accessibility and helpfulness, and her devotion to and effectiveness in teaching was exemplary.
In a 2017 panel discussion talking about the history of planning at the Bloustein School, she talked about the development of her own passion for GIS applications as a graduate student. At one point during her graduate studies at Stanford and Berkeley, she went to Harvard’s new-at-the-time Laboratory for Computer Graphics and Spatial Analysis to get a better understanding of how to map regions physically, by hand, which she did for many years. And when computer usage became much more accessible in higher education in the 1980’s this became a much easier—but still arduous—process. Instead of having to do everything by hand, planners and students could enter data into computers… one line of code at a time.
Lyna retired from teaching and research in May 2020, at the start of the pandemic, and was able to spend time working on her quilting projects and riding her horse, Marilyn Monroe, whom she loved dearly.
She is greatly missed by the Bloustein School community.
Her public obituary may be found here: https://www.wrightfamily.com/obituary/lyna-wiggins-ph-d/