Engaging students and community in urban environmental sustainability: CommUniverCity San José

•A network leadership model enables flexibility, nimbleness and adaptability.•Continuity is a key ingredient for effective community–university partnerships.•Super-bridgers are essential to the long-term viability of these partnerships.

Critical components for achieving urban environmental sustainability are the collaborations between urban universities and their surrounding communities. This paper critically examines CommUniverCity San José, a unique multidimensional partnership driven by community priorities, through the lens of two, highly successful, long-term projects that have resulted in significant positive change in the urban environment both in terms of the direct, tangible impact on the local community, as well as broader policy change in one of the largest cities in the U.S.