Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with urbanplanning

Why is there a wall at this intersection in Chicago?

enn — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 09:10:50 -0800

At what should be the three-way intersection of Paulina St. and W. Rosehill Dr. in western Edgewater in Chicago, there is a cement wall (looking north, looking south) that prevents you from turning from one of these streets onto the other, turning Paulina into a dead end. Why? (Paulina picks back up again at Bryn Mawr, where there is a normal T intersection.)

Slightly to the west on the same block, there is an alley that is also terminated in a similar way with a metal fence.

I haven't seen this anywhere else in Chicago and I'm curious when and why this street and alley were blocked off. I've always wondered if it had to do with preserving some kind of line of racial or class segregation. Or perhaps it was just a traffic-calming measure—but if so, there are many, many neighborhoods in Chicago where people complain about through traffic on residential streets, and I'm curious how this instance came to be treated so differently than others.

(Inspired by the discussion in this thread about streets designed to make it difficult to drive between very proximate places—common in the suburbs, but not in the city.)

Two Shell stations across the street from each other. Why?

staggering termagant — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 16:42:12 -0800

In my town, there's a Shell station on one corner of the intersection. On another corner of the same intersection, another Shell. There're also two Woolworths right across the street from each other, and two Pizza Huts. Why? Does anyone out there have any idea? I mean, any ACTUAL idea, not just supposition? Maybe someone who works in marketing, or urban planning? Also, are there any resources I could read that explain these kinds of business decisions? I've looked online and can't find any information. Thanks very much.

Calling all planners!

Polyhymnia — Fri, 04 Jan 2013 14:09:28 -0800

Should I go into Urban Planning? I'm in my mid-twenties, with a BA in Music and an MA in Anthropology. The MA was meant to be a PhD but I grew dissatisfied with my program fairly quickly and left after completing my master's. In the two years since, I've done two different AmeriCorps programs (one VISTA, one conservation corps) in an attempt to reconfigure my life plan. I struggled with finding a direction during this time.

I finally realized that my interest in both research and in social justice pointed somewhere in the direction of urban planning. I have a strong interest in community and economic development. More recently I got the opportunity to work with New York's Office of Emergency Management following Hurricane Sandy, which I loved. My current desire is to work for a community development non profit though I'm also pretty happy to let the wind take me where it wants.

However, I am wary of the fact that urban planning seems to be "trending" right now, a bit like library science was about five years ago (yeah, I almost went that route, too). So, here are my actual questions:

Current planners, where do you think the field is going in terms of hiring and job availability?

Will this be a wise investment in my education/career? Or will I end up in debt and still not very employable?

Finally, how do I best plan ahead in grad school to make myself employable if I do get my MUP, especially given my desire to do anti-poverty and community development work?

Any and all advice you can give would be very welcome and I'm happy to answer any clarifying questions if necessary.

Plus, if I moved to Canada I could get that sweet iron ring.

bumpjump — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 12:28:41 -0800

Civil engineers, talk about yourselves! What do you do, what's your average workday like, what kind of money do you make and how did you get to the point in your career you're at right now? If you look at my post history you'll see that I've been trying to figure out a career path for several months now. I've been reading posts on various civil engineering forums and r/engineering and it seems like a good blend of applicable skillset, work/life balance, and income. Plus, transportation engineering is really interesting to me.

I'm also interested in an MUP/MCP (Master of Urban Planning/Master of City Planning) and after reading posts both here and on planning forums, having an engineering background could provide a good perspective as a city planner if I chose that route.

Here's a long list of cumbersome questions:

What do you do for a living and how did you get to where you currently are in your career?
What's your average workday like?
What was your salary when you started out and what is it now? (If you don't feel comfortable posting your salary, could you give a range?)
How much do you work in an average week and how much free time do you have to pursue other non-work things? Do you have passions in non-engineering areas and if you do, are you satisfied with the amount of time you have to engage in them?
What was the most difficult academic aspect about undergrad as a civil engineering student (a certain class, the pace/workload, etc.)? How did you overcome it?
Is there anything you regret about your career path, academically or professionally?

Thanks so much. AskMe has been incredibly helpful.

Urban Plannin'

timpanogos — Mon, 07 May 2012 13:47:01 -0800

I'm looking to make the jump from the public sector to perhaps a career in urban planning. Can you share your experience with me? Right out of college I was offered a position in the legislative branch and have worked in the same office almost five years. I'm feeling the itch and have covered transportation, business, infrastructure, and municipal issues for the office I work in during that time.

As I look ahead to the future I would like to work for a city or maybe a small county and I could either get an MPA but super wonky policy kind of bores me. I like to get my hands dirty, talk to people, and get out in the community. I wonder if an urban/municipal planning master's degree would help me get there... either working for a firm or working for a city as a city planner working on transportation and RDA projects.

Has anyone made this jump? Would you advise against it? Do you love it? Do you have it? I'm not super math oriented but I can hold my own. I have street smarts and am good on my feet. Just wondering if I want to devote 2 years to something I may already have the skills for. Thanks.

A Freeway Runs Through It

M.C. Lo-Carb! — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 09:50:54 -0800

I'm looking for examples of cool, walkable mixed-use urban areas that existed before or grew up around freeway interchanges, and that still work despite being so close to major highways. I am working on a project (for my job) that involves planning for a future urban area on currently undeveloped land in the suburbs. The goal is to create a "sense of place" here that transcends typical suburban car-based office/retail/commercial/strip development. However, one of the challenges will be the intersection at this location of two future highways, likely with an interstate-style interchange.

I'd like to find examples of vital, interesting neighborhoods that exist in spite of nearby grade-separated interchanges that preclude easy pedestrian, bicycle and traffic circulation. I'd like to learn how these neighborhoods remained connected and pedestrian-scale, rather than developing in the typical big-box retail and office complex style so common to urban highway intersections.

Do such neighborhoods/developments exist? Is there one in your city that I could study? Thanks!

Avenue then street, or vice-versa?

secretseasons — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 19:18:07 -0800

When you state an intersection in a city that has avenues and streets (or some other system where N-S is one set and E-W is another set), is there a convention for which you name first? In other words, how should people interpret something like "9th and 11th"? If there's a convention, is it universal? Or, does it vary from city to city? I guess I'm looking for answers to two closely related questions:
a) If there's a convention that applies to everyone, what is it? Tell me more about this convention. Does it come from New York? From some great proto-urban-planner?

b) If there isn't a convention for everyone, but there are different conventions for different cities, then I'd love to just hear about what it is in your city.

I moved to Duluth, MN a couple years ago. We have N-S avenues and E-W streets. But, I don't know what the local convention is so I'm always really explicit.

There were no train stations. There were no downtowns. Hey, ho, nowhere to go: Ohio.

carmicha — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 11:07:07 -0800

What are your favorite interesting or telling U.S. pop culture references to urban planning issues, including the image of city/suburb/exurban/rural areas as places to live and the process of creating community? I'm interested in songs, TV shows, movies, video/MMO games, art, slang, etc. If you think current events (e.g., disaster planning in Japan or public squares as democracy tool in Egypt) will affect pop culture expression of and attitudes towards planning, feel free to expound. As this is for a talk (to professional urban planners), links to visual depictions are especially welcome. They can be funny or serious, cursory or technical. See, for example:

Monorail! or
Seinfeld or
Chinatown or
Chrysler's Superbowl Ad Referencing Detroit.

The more, the better; thanks for your help, MeFites!

Gifts for someone who is attracted to cities

Anonymous — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 21:10:52 -0800

[XmasGiftFilter] So I'm looking for gifts related to urban planning / urbanism in general. This is sort of an attempt to use Metafilter as a "people who liked x also liked y" function, since it's full of people who like this particular x. Apologies for cluttering ask.mefi with yet another post about holiday gifts, but, here goes. Posted anonymously, because the person I'm buying gifts for reads metafilter occasionally:

So my girlfriend is very much into urbanism, on both a personal and professional level. Which, well, as someone who is also very much into those things, I feel pretty lucky, right? But I'm a little bit stuck on what to get her for Christmas. I'm looking for things that are related to urban planning, urbanism, and/or municipal politics in the United States, that are also well-written and engaging instead of seeming like work.

She's read Caro's Power Broker and is right now reading, and loving, Jane Jacobs' Death and Life of Great American Cities -- she avoided Jacobs for a while, just on a sense that her stuff wouldn't be current or entirely relevant anymore, but has been pleasantly surprised. If there's anyone out there writing about contemporary municipal planning and politics in a way that's one-tenth as engaging as Jacobs' stuff, I know she'd like it. She also loved Buzz Bissinger's A Prayer for the City (his book on Ed Rendell's administration when he was mayor of Philadelphia). So things about urbanism in the abstract are good, but things about actual city adminstration and campaigns to make cities better are better.

Any thoughts? I'm also looking for things that address some of topics and also are, well, pretty -- really good coffee-table type books on cities, for example, would be welcome.

Salary range for planning/analyst jobs?

soviet sleepover — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 16:49:31 -0800

Asking on behalf of a friend: what's the salary range for an analyst or entry level urban planner without credentials in the San Francisco bay area? (If it matters, assume the boss has already worked extensively with this person, likes and can rely on them, and knows what to expect. The job would be full or part time. I can follow up with them right away if mefites have any questions/clarifications/details they'd like to know about. Thanks!)

Detroit

ebesan — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 20:59:11 -0800

Tell me about Detroit real estate and urban policy today. How are they dealing with the damage, even collapse/abandonment of neighborhoods? For someone interested in the city, and specifically these distressed areas, how is the City managing them? Creative Zoning? Homesteading? What are the opportunities for an individual? Business needs? How much of the land itself is damaged from past industrial use? Are there programs for (brownfield) rehabilitation?

Urban Planning: MURP or CivE?!

alaijmw — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 12:45:31 -0800

So I think I want to radically change careers and head towards Urban Planning / Civil Engineering. Which degree should I get and how should I go about this? I've decided that urban planning would be a very interesting career and unlike my current career (ad sales) it could be quite fulfilling.

Now, how to go about this? I currently have a B.S. in Business/Marketing, but it looks like you don't need anything in particular to do a Masters in Urban Planning. I do have some concerns about going for a MURP, though.

-Urban planning as a field seems pretty hard hit right now
-Salaries never seem to get very high even with a masters

I'm not in it for the money, but I've got a good deal of debt as it is and changing careers would likely entail an immediate salary hit from my current sales job.

Those concerns lead me towards Civil Engineering. I actually considered doing engineering because I *loved* physics in high school but decided against it (partially because I didn't want to take the math classes... I never minded doing math in physics, but wasn't a big fan of math classes themselves).

Advantages that I can see with engineering:
-Better pay
-Broader degree that would allow for plenty of jobs outside strict urban planning
-I feel like my business degree and sales experience/people skills would give me a competitive advantage in the engineering field

Problems with engineering:
-I will need a lot of pre-reqs. A lot.
-Therefore it will cost more

So here are my questions:
1. Does civil engineering make sense if I want to do urban planning? Obviously the are related fields, but is it just pointless to go CivE versus MURP?
2. Would I also need (or would it make sense) to get a MURP in addition to CivE?

And the bigger, possibly more complicated question...
3. How do I go back and do engineering? I've found a couple engineering masters programs that will admit students to their masters programs without engineering degrees - some require hard science degrees, some don't - for those that don't (that's me!) they require lots of pre-reqs. I'd need undergrad math and science and then undergrad engineering.

4. If I could do the masters program (with what would likely be a year or two of pre-reqs), would it make more sense than getting a second B.S. in CivE? Could I even get a PE with only a masters?

The engineering path would take significantly longer than a MURP, for sure (although I'd likely do a semester or two of pre-reqs before a MURP to get my GPA up, so assume a MURP with take 3 years instead of 2), but it does hold some appeal to me... but am I crazy?

Thanks in advance for the advice - the other urban planning related posts I've found have been super helpful!

Help me plan for planning!

showbiz_liz — Wed, 12 May 2010 08:32:01 -0800

I think urban planning could be my dream profession. I also have no experience whatsoever, all the introductory jobs want experience, and I don't want to go to grad school without KNOWING this is for me. I am a college senior with one semester left before graduation. I majored in advertising and anthropology. Advertising made me realize I love working on big projects where you have to whittle a ton of data down and then come up with new ideas based on it. Anthropology made me fascinated by how people interact with their built environments, and also made me very aware of social justice issues.

So with only two semesters left to graduate, I took a class in the city planning minor, to see if I would like it. And I loved it! Every week I'd have some cool new fact related to planning and go around telling all my friends about it, but no one was excited as me. Everything we talked about was either something I felt passionate about already, or something that I couldn't believe I'd never heard of before. I deliberately chose a hard-to-research topic for my final paper, which I wouldn't normally do, and found out about the emerging field of food system planning, which I still can't stop daydreaming about working in.

So, I am going to graduate in December, probably with a 3.51 GPA. I am currently studying for the GRE and will probably do well enough on it. And I THINK I would love to go to school for planning.

Problems:

I only took the one class in planning, and I don't have any related experience- my club/internship experience is all in graphic design and marketing.

I looked into planning tech jobs, which don't require a degree, but all of them wanted a year+ of GIS experience. I've never even used GIS.

I can't take more planning classes because I'm going abroad next semester.

My professor (well, grad student) was no help whatsoever when I asked her about this. She basically said "do more research and then get back to me." So that's what I'm doing now.

My actual question: What can I do to gain relevant experience, if the traditional method of working as a planning tech or doing a planning minor are not options? I want to make myself attractive to grad schools, but I also want to make sure that I really want to do this with my life.

What have I spent my life on?

Big Fat Tycoon — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 10:15:53 -0800

How do I apply to Master's programs when I don't have either real academic credentials or a particularly distinguished career reputation? I'm interested in applying to Master's programs in three related areas: Planning, Architecture and Landscape Architecture, all at UBC in Vancouver. Here's the problem: I have a bachelor's degree in Computer Science that I completed in 1999, and almost no experience in any of the aforementioned areas except at a layman's level. Even worse, in my current "career" in software (first as a developer, now as technical support), I've had far from an illustrious career -- it's not a solid ten years of experience I have, with the concomitant excellent professional references that might subsitute for a lack of academic ones.

So... how do I get those "three letters of reference" that seem so important, and the related exposure I need? I have my own vague ideas -- mostly in the area of volunteering and making an impression there -- but I'm interested in what other people have to say. Also, is it a crazy idea to contemplate applying for next year's admission (Sept. 2010)? Given that the application deadlines are around December 1st this year, I'm thinking it might be a pipe dream.

What are good urban planning programs for people with bachelor's degrees in visual arts?

Kattullus — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 09:02:43 -0800

My sister is entering last year of art school this fall but she wants to seek an urban planning graduate degree afterwards. What are good urban planning programs for people with bachelor's degrees in visual arts? This previous question is very similar but is focused on where someone with a computer science BS should go. She's already looking at Rutgers, Pratt and UC Berkeley.

More debt please!

Team of Scientists — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 15:50:38 -0800

I don't want to pursue a career in the field for which I received my degree. Help guide my search for a grad school field. I just finished an undergrad electrical engineering degree. Recently I came to the realization that I'm just not that interested in EE (well, at the very least I'm not interested in DSP). I'd like to choose a new career path and start prepping for grad school.

Here are the paths that I have considered so far:

Urban Planning

Pros: AskMeFi actually sparked my interest in planning in a question I read a while ago. Someone said something about being interested in data/statistics and maps, which are things that interest me. As does the notion that I can work toward effecting change in an area socially, economically or environmentally. I understand that this is probably the mindset of many bright-eyed planning students for whom reality gradually sets in. Regardless, I think this is a career choice that could leave me very fulfilled.

Cons: It seems that the pay is modest. I currently owe about $40k in student loans, and I'm concerned that a planner's salary wouldn't afford me the ability to live comfortably while I'm paying off my loans. The job market is also apparently rather bleak for planning right now, although it's difficult to see what the economy will be like after two years of grad school.

Patent Law

Pros: I have the requisite engineering degree already. I can attend a less competitive school that is well known for Intellectual Property/Patent Law. I have confidence in my intellectual ability, and I think I could be a very successful law student if I was willing to put in the hours. Also, this profession has potential for better pay.

Cons: Law school is notoriously difficult, and I don't think I'd want to put in the hours necessary for success. Ambition is not a character trait of mine, and I think that the profession is loaded with ambitious people.

Engineering related to Green Energy -

Pros: This is another profession that could be very fulfilling for me in the sense that I could be bettering the world around me (pardon my naivete again). I already have an EE degree. I haven't done enough research to say, but I imagine that a Masters in a technical field would attract a somewhat generous salary. Please enlighten me if I am wrong about this.

Cons: Just a lack of information. I don't really know what kind of options are out there in Green Energy. Would I go get a masters in EE? Mechanical? Chemical? Are there any engineering programs that are specifically tailored to green energy production? Also, as mentioned above, I just didn't have that much interest in DSP engineering during school (I realized this rather late when my peers were all excited about their senior projects and I was filled with dread). However, the main turnoff for me in my EE program was...well, the digitalness of digital signal processing. I don't particularly enjoy programming or working with discrete time signals. As power engineering is focused primarily (entirely?) on analog signals, I believe this won't be a problem. Again, enlighten me if I'm wrong.

I've all but ruled out law school, but I decided to leave it in here in case any IP/Patent zealots could make a compelling case for the profession. The main purpose of this post is fact-finding. Specifically, what type of person would be a strong candidate for each of these careers? Are there any related fields that you think might spark my interest?

tagging online maps for urban planning and design

jk252b — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:20:24 -0800

How has your organization/neighborhood/town/city/region/etc... used interactive web-based map tagging sites (ie, Google Maps, ZeeMaps)? I am exploring the potential uses of online mapping sites for the field of urban planning/design. Looking for specific links to maps that have been created to help gather data from residents during initiatives like neighborhood planning, park redesign, infrastructure repair, etc...

For example: a map to identify locations of potholes in Cambridge, MA.

Another example: A site to map bedbug infestations around the world

These are pretty basic examples. More like them would be good. Even better would be links to maps that are connected to more extensive community planning or development process where the goal is to make it easy for residents to geographically display information they know/gather in their own neighborhoods.

I'm sure there are millions of maps out there, but they're hard to find because this is all decentralized (ie, hosted on a bajillion different sites, rather than all listed through one main site).

diagonalism - a new science of mental health

anazgnos — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:02:20 -0800

What is this odd geographical feature in Long Beach, CA? See the diagonal strip running from the upper left to lower right on the google map. It can be followed for several miles northwest from the linked point. Zoom in and check it out, and you'll see that it's pretty well defined for the several-mile span both by surrounding development and non-development.

I've had it suggested that it may have been an old rail line, but haven't found anything concrete on that. There's nothing really visible or tangible to it at ground level, but I'm curious why seemingly everything developed in the area has stuck precisely either within or without that diagonal footprint relative to the surrounding street grid. If it was a rail line removed sometime in the 60s or 70s, that'd probably explain the way it looks now, but I'd love to find out what, if anything, was there.

Thanks!

call numbers or regulations

mustcatchmooseandsquirrel — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 05:12:30 -0800

Looking into graduate school. With my skill set and interests, would I be better off in urban planning or librarianship? I speak English and Russian fluently, and French on an intermediate level. I am really into details and planning/organizing things. I like to research one aspect of something extensively, resolve it, and then move on. On good days, I even enjoy explaining things to people. I like interacting with people and public speaking. I also like cooking, yoga, and biking but I don't think those are relevant.

If I went into urban planning, I would want to focus on environmental/sustainable issues or on (public/bicycle/pedestrian) transportation. (This school sounds appealing.)

If I went into librarianship, I do not know what I would want to focus on but I would want to ideally have a job that had some sort of international component so that all of my language knowledge won't just be for naught. (I know that the government sometimes hires....)

Either way, I do not want a job that forces me to be alone at a computer for 9 hours a day with no human interaction. Also, ideally, I want a job sometime after graduation. (Er, and I want to go to a grad school that offers some sort of funding and that will help me get internships during school?)

I have a degree in Slavic Language&Literature and have work experience in IT (help desk) and in teaching English (in France). I am going to take the GRE in early November, my undergrad GPA was around 3.15 (though, 3.85 in Junior/Senior hours).

Figure 8 Urban Plan?

adamdschneider — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 09:36:23 -0800

Looking for a particular transit-oriented development website. I found it quite by accident some months ago, but I appear to have deleted the bookmark since. Here is what I can remember about it: it presented a specific plan for development, consisting of a figure 8 train loop connecting circular neighborhoods that are radially organized, all roads (which were not perfectly regular) radiating from the central train stop (I think) to the "rim" of the neighborhood. The city thus formed by the loop consisted of quite a few of these neighborhoods. It had an accompanying graphic showing an overview that I believe could be clicked on or zoomed in somehow to see the street-level plan. My memory's a little hazy at this point, and my Googling hasn't brought up anything. Thanks very much!

Urban Planning Career for an IT Consultant

sandmanwv — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 15:27:11 -0800

As a one-time IT Consultant (Business degree), should I choose planning as a profession? These posts (1, 2) have been real helpful, but I have some different questions.

When I was a kid I'd look up Census data at library and read Environmental impact statements on new Highway construction in my small town.

I’ve walked around most of the large cities in the United States wondering why they end up that way. Now I’m fascinated by how mass transit can (both positively and negatively) impact communities.

Because of these interests, the excitement I had when reading through Planning school websites, and the closeness of the APA’s ideal skill set to my skills and interests—I feel that this is the perfect career for me. Caveats are: I am not super-idealistic (possibly a bit cynical, but very optimistic person) or very political. But I'm an effective communicator, make friends easily, enjoy analyzing statistics, and have been praised for my organizational skills.

Questions for those out there:
• Does fascinating subject == interesting jobs (most of the time)? The classes look absolutely fascinating
• What personality trait would be good to handle the “politics”—, which seems to be the most negative aspect of the planning profession?
• Do you typically work on “project work” or day-to-day work? Are these done in groups?
• Will my IT background help?
• Transportation planning—do I need to have a Civil Engineering degree?
• Is there an "ideal" joint degree to work on?

Help me find maps of the world's larger cities!

Lockeownzj00 — Sat, 17 May 2008 14:36:05 -0800

Help me find maps of the world's larger cities! I'm trying to find overhead maps of cities (I'm thinking major ones, i.e. New York, Shenzhen, Helsinki). I've had minor success with some google-fu but I'm not exactly sure the name of what I'm looking for. I got some results with "urban planning," but still, not much.

I'm trying to compare the layouts and evolution of cities that have had different reasons for being founded and different histories, so preferably something with a fairly zoomed-out view (so you can see its full lay-out, and street structure, but not necessarily specific things like street names). If there are any books I might need to consult, I'd be willing to do that too, but first I'd just like to see what the web can give me.

Thanks!

Where should a geek go to grad school to study urban planning?

zvs — Wed, 14 May 2008 12:20:10 -0800

Where should a computer science geek go to grad school to study urban planning? I've just graduated with a BS in computer science, but realized not so long ago that it wasn't really where I wanted to be in five years. What I really want to do is study urban planning, a pretty radical departure from my past academic career. That said, computer science is still where most of my skills lie, and I'd like to pursue a path that merges the two interests. I'll probably never escape technical work entirely.

Aside from MIT and Berkeley, I'd love to know if anybody has hints on where I could find a fairly nerd-oriented course of study in planning. I've heard good things about Waterloo, but I'm mostly working blind at the present time. My grades as an undergraduate engineer were OK (not good enough to guarantee MIT/Berkeley or anything), and at a well-regarded institution.

Thanks in advance!

[P.S.: I'm an American who also holds Schengen citizenship, so schools within either the US or the EU are definitely within the realm of possibility -- if they're taught in English, Spanish or Dutch.]

[P.P.S.: This is my first try at Ask, so if I'm breaking protocol please feel free to abuse me appropriately.]

Detroit Green City

blapst — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 09:09:35 -0800

Sometime in the last year I read an article in a print magazine about Detroit becoming the model sustainable city of the future. Help me find it. The first part of the article detailed how Detroit has crumbled since the 70s. The second part argued that because Detroit is so totally ruined and unprofitable and abandoned, it may be the only place where it is possible for a new model city to emerge with a much greater focus on local agriculture, green technology, and small business. There were also some photos of areas so neglected that meadows are sprouting and wildlife is returning.

I thought I saw it in the Utne Reader, but a search of their online archive has proved fruitless. If it's not UR, it's likely some other liberal/progressive monthly. Did anyone else see this article?

Two stories from San Fran planning history: sunny plazas and small parcels for small builders. Details?

salvia — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 21:53:46 -0800

I'm trying to track down two stories about recent urban planning history in San Francisco: 1) making sure plazas stay sunny at lunchtime, 2) making sure small builders could help redevelop a large area. Do you know these stories? Do you know of good online sources for San Francisco urban planning history? The first story, as I remember it, is that sometime (1970s? 1980s?), a researcher proved that people use San Francisco plazas that were sunny at lunchtime and did not use plazas in the shade. This research led to some guidelines about the height of new buildings to keep plazas sunny at lunchtime (via a citizen ballot campaign? a city law? a city planning document?).

This sounds obvious in retrospect, and is relatively standard planning practice now, but at the time it was fairly novel. Do you remember this happening? Have you seen it written up somewhere? I'd love to track down or confirm the details. My google searches have been confounded by a city law called the Sunshine Ordinance.

Another story I remember is that, as the area around the opera house (?) was being redeveloped, planners divided it into small parcels and would not allow anyone to buy more than two adjacent parcels, to ensure that small local builders did the construction rather than big developers.

If you recognize either of these stories, know any places that they might be written up, or know any other great online sources for San Francisco city planning history and lore, please let me know. Thanks!