As college presidents go, Eugene Trani made an outstanding mayor.

Trani, who announced Thursday that he's stepping down as president of Virginia Commonwealth University in July, was the rarest of local commodities -- a true visionary.

Not sharing that vision could be hazardous to your professional health if you were his subordinate. And if you lived in an adjacent neighborhood, Tranivision could be seen as a steamroller intent on pancaking preservation in the name of progress.

Trani, 68, is an empire builder. No one said empire building isn't dirty work.

To folks outside his supervision or beyond the reach of VCU's ever expanding footprint, Trani is The Guy Who Saved Richmond. His legacy will always be his extreme makeover of downtown, particularly the once-barren stretch of Broad Street between Lombardy and Belvidere.

It's a transformation that never fails to impress folks who've been away for a while and has earned Trani long-term endearment among those who watched it happen.

Richmond -- unlike, say, Ashland, Farmville or Blacksburg -- was no one's idea of a college town before Trani arrived in 1990. But September until May, from the Fan to Oregon Hill, from Carver to Jackson Ward, from the Arts District to Monroe Ward, it sure seems that way sometimes.

Any mayor with Trani's body of work -- from the Monroe Park campus to the medical center to the biotechnology research park to VCU's global outreach -- would probably puff up with pride and say the only way to go from here is governor.

Trani raised VCU's stock so high that Gov. Timothy M. Kaine may have to decide whether he prefers the office of vice president of the United States or Trani's old suite at 910 West Franklin Street. With 32,000 students, VCU is the state's largest school.

Yes, Richmond looks and feels a lot healthier since Trani arrived. But is urban renewal what Trani or any educator wants to be known for?

Trani has long had detractors among the VCU academic family. But the discontent spilled outside the university community and onto the pages of The New York Times, which wrote unflatteringly about VCU's research relationship with tobacco king Philip Morris USA.

Add a controversy this summer over the improper awarding of a degree to former Richmond Police Chief Rodney Monroe -- an episode that again called attention to VCU's cozy relationship with Mayor L. Douglas Wilder -- and suddenly the man who revived Richmond was accused of tarnishing the reputation of his school.

Trani said Thursday that his one regret this summer is the impression that "there is an air of fear and intimidation at VCU. That's not the VCU I know."

To hear others tell it, Trani was the intimidator. But this summer, laid low at one point by quintuple bypass surgery, he has been uncharacteristically low-key and on the defensive. The college president with unquestioned authority has not seemed comfortable with accountability. The result is a pall surrounding what we all assumed would be a victory lap before retirement.

Trani, who'll stay on at VCU as a professor of history, should now know what any emperor does: Sometimes, the empire strikes back.
Contact Michael Paul Williams at (804) 649-6815 or mwilliams@timesdispatch.com.