Urban Land Use Planning

Creating a city land use plan that is efficient, economical and ethical
By Allison Vaughn, Photographer / Owner Von Groveland Photography Urban land use planning is a set of disciplines which officials gather to formulate a plan that utilizes the most efficient and ethical use of land available. Plans must be thoughtfully and cautiously developed that is of most benefit to the communities which lie in and around the land in question.

City planning land use utilizes many different avenues of structural planning including architecture, landscape, physical layout, aesthetics, alternative costs and the materials. Urban land planners also work hard on selecting building materials that impact landscapes and species in a beneficial, non-destructive way.

When creating an urban land use plan, it is important to understand and acknowledge the following:

1. Create urban land planning that is safe from potential threats.

2. Construct a city land use plan that is aesthetically pleasing.

3. Include plans for transportation use in urban land planning.

4. Take advantage of land use urban planning tools.

Compose a city land use plan that is safeguarded from potential threats

Urban land planners must heed caution to potential threats including economical and natural. Planning must include an understanding of how these changes may affect the land use around them. Tragedies including tornadoes, floods and hurricanes can play a detrimental role in maintaining land use effectively as well as contributing to the process of urban decay.
Try:  Use tools to help analyze and predict environmental and social changes such as SCALDS, provided by the US Department of Transportation and Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Both programs will help anticipate scenarios that may negatively affect land use, and develop strategies to help improve community livability.

Creating a city land use plan that is aesthetically pleasing

It is important that land use is aesthetically pleasing to the average community occupant. Roads that are too far and in between, or land that is barren of trees may play a role in a residents dissociation of the land itself, therefore contributing to the process of urban decay and neglect.
Try:  Taking a Community Image Survey not only helps community members feel useful in the planning of their community around them, but gives urban planners important knowledge on what the average resident finds visibly appealing.

Include transportation in urban land planning

Effective planning of land use must include transportation structures; structures that are efficiently and strategically placed as to not make transportation more difficult by placing said structures too close or too far apart.
Try:  Integrate the tool Smart Places, as it helps to develop and evaluate alternative plans in urban land use. Smart Places offers user-friendly tools for design, structuring and evaluating land planning scenarios. Urbanism also includes a simulation program to help factor out positive or negative scenarios.

Utilize the multitude of land use urban planning tools available

Take advantage of the abundant land use and urban planning tools available. Such tools help bring together the vast array of data that is created when an urban land use plan is produced.
Try:  CityGreen allows the user to measure, map, and analyze the land for ecological and technical uses. Soil Data Viewer helps aid the urban land use planning company by structuring soil-based maps. These maps will help ensure that proper precautions are known for different types of soil present on the land available. Such soil data needs to be well known and analyzed before any structure is built.

• Keep in mind, areas with higher real estate values often have outlaying structures of urban decay. To help prevent land from falling pray to neglect, understand the major changes in global economies, transportation, government policies, and demographics that have helped to generate conditions that promote urban decay in communities.