Our Facilities

UEP is currently based in two buildings, 97 Talbot Avenue ('The Brown House') and 72 Professor's Row ('The White House'). These buildings each house a classroom, student lounge, and faculty offices. In addition, UEP is also the major user and manager of the Data Lab in the Tisch Library.

After its founding in 1973 as the Program in Urban, Social and Environmental Policy, the program was housed for a few years in the Political Science Department before moving into its first home at 38 Professors Row. The white Victorian house, which it shared with the Experimental College, was called Brown House, named after Benjamin Graves Brown, who held the first endowed chair at Tufts (in mathematics) from 1865-1903. Brown's daughter, Henrietta Noble Brown, received the first baccalaureate degree conferred on a woman by Tufts College.

In 1980, still located in Brown House, the program became the Department of Urban and Environmental Policy (UEP). Three years later Brown House was razed to provide land for the new Elizabeth Van Huysen Mayer Campus Center. UEP took up residence in its new home at 97 Talbot Avenue.

From 1915 through the 1920s, 97 Talbot was the home of English Professor Charles H. Gray and his wife Laura Gray, whose popular essays appeared on campus under the pseudonym Sam Pepys. From the late 1970s through 1983, the 97 Talbot residence was the home of the Decision Making Center and the European Center. When UEP took occupancy of 97 Talbot in 1983 as its new faculty and administrative offices, it re-adopted the name "Brown House" both to honor its first home and to reflect its elegant "brown-shingled" architecture. Although the color of the building subsequently changed to red, the name remains.