The modern profession of town planning mainly arose in reponse to the urban problems caused by rapid industrialisation from the late 19th century. The rapid growth of towns ‘shook contemporary habits and concepts’ (Benevolo, 1967). Social reformers recognised the need for corrective intervention to deal with the growth forces unleashed by modernisation.
Pioneering professionals often worked first in another built environment area like architecture, surveying, engineering or landscape architecture. Planning was a chance to exercise a distinctive overall spatial and social vision that drew on specialised inputs.
Town planners could either design entirely new urban areas (such as suburbs and garden cities), or develop ways to reform and reorder existing ones to provide plenty of space and light, clean water and adequate drainage (through urban renewal).
Early town plans concentrated on securing adequate provision for key urban needs:
housing
commercial and industrial uses
railways and roadways
water, sewerage and energy supply
open space and recreational areas.
Each element of a well-planned urban environment would work alone and as part of the whole. A town plan also had to be affordable, and to fit the designated site. The vision of what the town or city could become was critical. The drawings produced were as important as the vision itself.
Planning today retains its commitment to ideal urban environments, but has to work within challenging political contexts. The task of reconciling competing development and environmental goals in the interests of ‘sustainability’ usually falls to the planning function in government. Much attention is now directed at better managing existing cities than creating completely new ones.
Pioneering professionals often worked first in another built environment area like architecture, surveying, engineering or landscape architecture. Planning was a chance to exercise a distinctive overall spatial and social vision that drew on specialised inputs.
Town planners could either design entirely new urban areas (such as suburbs and garden cities), or develop ways to reform and reorder existing ones to provide plenty of space and light, clean water and adequate drainage (through urban renewal).
Early town plans concentrated on securing adequate provision for key urban needs:
housing
commercial and industrial uses
railways and roadways
water, sewerage and energy supply
open space and recreational areas.
Each element of a well-planned urban environment would work alone and as part of the whole. A town plan also had to be affordable, and to fit the designated site. The vision of what the town or city could become was critical. The drawings produced were as important as the vision itself.
Planning today retains its commitment to ideal urban environments, but has to work within challenging political contexts. The task of reconciling competing development and environmental goals in the interests of ‘sustainability’ usually falls to the planning function in government. Much attention is now directed at better managing existing cities than creating completely new ones.
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