The state of planning - have we lost our roots?

Abstract

Planning originated and has been kept alive and relevant by input from outside its professional field. Influential figures such as Ebenezer Howard in England and Michael Joseph Savage in New Zealand were not from a professional planning background, and neither was Jane Jacobs, who alerted professional planners to the social damage done during planning's 'concrete jungle' era.  Since then, renewed emphasis on urban design, for all its benefits, is not a return to the roots of 'town planning', because it may be commercially rather than altruistically driven.  Today planners need to be alert to voices from outside the profession, to keep it relevant.  These may include those warning of money's instability, community building initiatives such as Project Lyttelton, or those seeking practical responses to global ecological issues, such as the Transition Towns movement.  The need to be alert to 'outside' voices implies that continuing professional development will often require informal research rather than more conventional course attendance.