The Lost Art of the Plan
The Institute's book on the planning profession's lost soul, and the method for winning it back.
- 100Questions the companion Field Guide answers, free onlineSource: CityThink Field Guide
- 3Ways planning knows a city: by its numbers, by its history, and by the lived experience of the people in itSource: The Lost Art of the Plan
The problem
Planning traded vision for process. Plans became compliance documents: long, careful, and unread by the public they are meant to serve. The profession lost the consensus that a plan is a picture of a city's future, argued for in public and judged by what gets built.
What was built
A book length, visually led argument in three movements: the history of American planning and the consensus it lost; the diagnosis of a profession that traded vision for process; and the method for winning it back. Its companion Field Guide answers 100 questions planners actually ask, free at planforplanning.org/guide.
Source: planforplanning.org
How it was done
The method in one line: comprehensive planning is seeing the city whole.
- Know it three ways
Hold the numbers, the history, and the lived experience of the people in the city at once; no one of them alone is enough.
- Be comprehensive
Plan for the whole city, not for the category in front of you.
- Be human centered
Solve problems of the human condition, and judge the plan by what it does for them.
- Evaluate the last plan
Say plainly what the prior plan got right and wrong, then try again until it is right.
Documents and artifacts
Credits
- PublisherInstitute for Civic Service