Richard L. Meier

Richard Louis Meier (1920 - February 26, 2007) was an US regional planner, systems theorist, scientist, urban scholar, and futurist, who was Professor in the College of Environmental Design at University of California at Berkeley. He was an early thinker on sustainability in planning, and recognized as a leading figure in city planning and development. He is not related to the New York-based architect Richard Meier, with whom he was often confused.

Born in 1920 in Kendallville, Indiana, Meier grew up the oldest of five children in a family of modest means. His father was a German-American Lutheran schoolteacher, choirmaster, and organist. His mother became seriously ill shortly after the birth of her youngest child, and much of the running of the household fell to young Meier. He earned a bachelor's degree in chemistry from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1940, and a master’s and a doctorate in organic chemistry from UCLA. Meier earned his Ph.D. in organic chemistry at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in 1944.

During World War II, Meier worked as a Standard Oil research chemist in Richmond, California. Even before taking his Ph.D. in organic chemistry at University of California at Los Angeles in 1944, Meier made his mark as a generalist and futurist, persuading the newly established department to teach leading-edge developments in nuclear chemistry and physics. Meier began talking with Berkeley scientists about the post-war implications of atomic energy and weapons. He founded along with his colleagues, what is now called, the Federation of American Scientists, a non-profit organization focused on consolidating scientific knowledge to aid national interests.

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