User:Rcar/Humphrey Carver

Humphrey Stephen Mumford Carver (1902-1995) was an architect, author, urban planner, and an influential writer of social housing policy in Toronto. Born and educated in England, he became an active advocate of public housing policy in Canada after his arrival in 1930.

Career
Carver was a key official in the Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC), and it was through this federal body that Carver became a leading figure in post-war housing policy and community planning.

Publications

 * Cities in the Suburbs, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1962.
 * “The Excellent Experiment.” Rev. Toward New Towns for America. By Clarence Stein. Community Planning Review 2.2 (May 1952): 48-53.
 * Houses for Canadians: A Study of Housing Problems in the Toronto Area. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. 1948
 * Compassionate Landscape. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. 1975. (Autobiography)

Legacy
Carver was a driving influence in the institutionalisation of community and town planning within post war Canada. He was also key proponent in importing modernist planning policy and modernist architectual theories into a Canadian context. Although these typical idealistic modernist principles have been seen as outdated in recent years, his work on social policy, and his writing on housing and social practise, are still pertenet to the history of modern planning in Toronto, as well as influential in shaping that history.