February 6, 2021 AZAPA Webblast

ASU STUDENT PLANNING ASSOCIATION
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
WHAT’S LOVE GOT TO DO, GOT
TO DO WITH PLANNING?
BY: NOAH SCHUMERTH
I’m a graduate student at Arizona State and a passionate (albeit cynical) New Urbanist. We spend much of
our time at ASU diving into urban theory, discussing the problems besetting the modern city and the
theoretical models that could solve them, from neotraditional design and walkable urbanism to automated
transportation and futuristic city concepts. In short, we spend a lot of time with urban knowledge. I certainly
spend a great deal of time fretting about how this knowledge might get applied to a planning career in the
not-so-distant future to create better cities for the next generation.
But to paraphrase Saint Augustine, knowledge is not enough to produce goodness, because it doesn’t
contain the motivation to be good. From the youngest planning student to the oldest leader of the
profession, one can be incredibly knowledgeable about how to plan – extolling the world’s best urban forms,
the most effective ways to build sustainable places, the best ways to engage the public – and still be a
horrific planner. Our planning history bears this reality out. Even the most efficient and theoretically
excellent plans are prone to fall short when they meet the real people and real needs of our cities.
What’s the alternative for planners? We can choose to lead with love for the places that we work. When we
love the people within our places who will reap what we sow as planners, we will notice the real challenges
that face our urban residents today, and see cities are more than maps, numbers on a page, or abstract
problems to solve. We’ll be more perceptive to the “wicked problems” of planning, ready to respond
continuously to keep improving as the consequences of our actions inevitably play out. Most importantly,
love is sacrificial, forcing us to leave our grandest notions of successful planning at the door to plan for
those who need our work and advocacy the most.
Love of place, and more importantly the people in that place, will bring out real goodness in our work as
planners.
What might it look like to plan by loving our place?
1. Look at the city – Watch for places that urban residents love and love to dwell in – and take
actions to preserve, improve, and expand those places.
2. Plan for places that last – the most well-loved places are those that have been left for
generations to leave their mark and adapt spaces to new needs. Encourage construction and place

ASU STUDENT PLANNING ASSOCIATION
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
2. Plan for places that last – the most well-loved places are those that have been left for
generations to leave their mark and adapt spaces to new needs. Encourage construction and place
design that emphasizes longevity and durability to create places that people can love and enjoy.
3. Plan prescriptively, not proscriptively – plan active to create the types of places that will serve
the community and allow people to thrive.
4. Build the humble city – the loveliest places are often at a very small scale, and at a human scale
where people linger and choose to inhabit a space. Encourage human-scale design, and remember
that the most effective and beloved places are often not the shiniest or most perfected parts of a city,
but are the ones where everyday people have a say in shaping the environment around them.
5. Ensure sustainability – if sustainability is ensuring that a place can be passed off to the next
generation, the one beyond our own, there are few things more loving than stewarding sustainable
places. Prioritize long-term environmental, social, and economic health, even in the face of shortterm
gains.
6. Reclaim space – Mark Bjelland, author of Good Places for All, describes reclaiming neglected
public spaces as a way to inject love back into them. Celebrate neglected spaces and provide
people with opportunities to write a new future for them.
This is not some “kum-ba-yah” version of love, driven by sentimental ideas of loving a place and buying into
imaginations of our cities that are at best stereotypical and at worst untrue. This is a real wrestling with the
question of why we plan and why we do any planning work at all. I think to build the sustainable and lifegiving
places of tomorrow, it is going to start when us planners take the lead and love the places that we
plan.
And as a young planner and graduate student, I am a firm believer that this is one of the only paths forward
to avoid cynicism and despair in the face of the difficult work of planning.