The Value of Planning Symposium

Value of Planning

Lecture Theatre 1 (B117),
Melbourne School of Design,
Masson Road,
The University of Melbourne
Melbourne, VIC

  • Symposium

The reputation of planning in liberal market economies such as Australia, the UK and the USA is at an all-time low it would seem. It was not always so and nor is it so today in East Asian countries where the value of planning is instead unquestioned. Planning and planners were blamed for the brutal comprehensive redevelopment of central cities envisaged during the 1950s-1970s even if much of the planning concerned was by architects and not university trained or professionally accredited planners. More recently in the UK planning and planners have been blamed for ‘locking jobs up in filing cabinets’. Yet the market and well-functioning civil society can hardly exist without some sort of public sector planning. If it did not exist, we would have to invent it! This alone suggests that planning’s successes must be at least as great as any failings.

This event brings together a panel of distinguished university scholars and practitioners – David Adams, Sue Parnell, Gerrit van Knaap, Anthony Yeh, Belinda Yuen and Phoebe Harrison from the UK, USA, Australia, China/HK, Singapore and Australia to give their opinions on the value of planning – its successes and the often overlooked failures that result from a lack of or the wrong type of planning. The evening will be an opportunity to hear 6 short presentations and to ask questions. The discussion will be chaired by Sydney-based journalist Elizabeth Farrelly – a regular commentator in The Age on urban planning issues in Australia. The intention is to stir debate and begin to re-value purposeful and progressive urban planning whichever part of society this may emanate from.

Image credit: visualspace