Bridging the worlds of academia and practice, Dr. Alfonzo is the Founder of State of Place, a data analytics platform that helps cities and social impact stakeholders make smarter planning, economic development, and investment decisions; the president of Urban Imprint, an urban design-behavior research and consulting firm; and an Assistant Research Professor at New York University, where she examines the links between the built environment and health in rapidly urbanizing Chinese cities.

An expert on the triple bottom line of urban design, Dr. Alfonzo focuses on how the relationship between the built environment and behavior impacts health, broadly defined to include physical, mental, social, community, environmental, and fiscal health, within the context of neighborhood revitalization. Dr. Alfonzo was awarded a Fulbright to examine walkability in China in the Fall of 2013, where she focused on the socio-cultural and policy challenges to implementing walkable development. Dr. Alfonzo has a Ph.D. in Urban and Regional Planning with an emphasis on Urban Design and Behavior, as well as a professional Masters in Urban Planning, from the University of California, Irvine (UCI), and a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture and Psychology from the University of Miami.