urban planning: see city planning.

town planning: see city planning.

regional planning: see city planning.

economic planning, control and direction of economic activity by a central public authority. In its modern usage, economic planning tends to be pitted against the laissez-faire philosophy which developed in the 18th cent. Proponents of laissez faire believed that an economy works best when there is little government interference. The contemporary economic model of rational expectations offers perhaps the strongest critique of economic planning in its assertion that economic forecasting, both by individuals and competing businesses, is generally rational. In this model, government control of economic policy can only lead to complication, since any change instituted by central authorities has already been anticipated by the market. The level and type of central planning in any economy is generally connected to the sort of political regime that dominates. In recent years, heavily structured economic programs have been associated in particular with socialism, communism, and fascism. Economic planning also became an important part of public policy in nations that did not adopt those doctrines, even in Western capitalist societies where the notion of a free market is a fundamental tenet. Central planning under the Western capitalist governments came into particular importance to combat the economic hardships that existed in many nations between World War I and World War II. In most societies, the occurrence of war tends to subordinate all private activity to a unified national effort and thus increases national economic planning. Central planning increases in importance during a recession, or any serious economic decline. Planning can involve the use of direct controls—such as rationing and price, rent, and wage limits—or indirect controls, such as monetary and fiscal policy. Since the 1930s the U.S. government has used a variety of direct and indirect controls. The limited economic success and ultimate collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe has opened up intense debate about the perils of total central planning.

city planning, process of planning for the improvement of urban centers in order to provide healthy and safe living conditions, efficient transport and communication, adequate public facilities, and aesthetic surroundings. Planning that also includes outlying communities and highways is termed regional planning.

Early City Planning

Many ancient cities were built from definite plans. The fundamental feature of the plans of Babylon, Nineveh, and the cities of ancient Greece and of China was a geographical pattern of main streets running north and south and east and west, with a public square or forum in the center. Such a gridiron plan was used in the ancient Peruvian city of Chan Chan. It was also followed by the Romans, as in Lincoln and Chester in England; in all their towns the Romans emphasized drainage and water supply and practiced zoning. In medieval cities, built with military security in mind, the only relief from the extremely narrow streets was the space formed by municipal and church squares. The living conditions of the poorer citizens were given little attention.

With the Renaissance came the truly monumental views—wide avenues and long approaches creating vistas of handsome buildings. The new aim is seen first in special sections of a city, such as Michelangelo's grouping on the Capitoline at Rome and Bernini's piazza of St. Peter's. In most European cities through the 17th and 18th cent. there was fragmentary replanning of medieval streets. After the fire of 1666 in London, Sir Christopher Wren devised a superb plan for a complete rebuilding of the city, but the plan unfortunately was not carried out. In the 18th cent., Mannheim and Karlsruhe, Germany, were laid out geometrically; Emmanuel Héré planned Nancy, France; John Wood produced grand architectural streets and squares at Bath; and the new part of Edinburgh was laid out. In the early 19th cent. John Nash planned certain sections of London; central Vienna was improved; and Baron Haussmann remodeled Paris to produce the celebrated boulevard system with its spokes-and-hub design.

Legislation that enabled cities to make and carry out planning designs was enacted earlier in Europe than in the United States. Such laws were passed in Italy in 1865, in Sweden in 1874, and in Prussia and Great Britain in 1875. Planning in Great Britain was especially concerned with slum elimination; its greatest exponent was Sir Patrick Geddes. At the turn of the century Sir Ebenezer Howard was the founder of the modern garden city movement. The first English garden city, Letchworth, was begun in 1903.

City Planning in the United States

In the United States, early New England towns, formally disposed along wide elm-lined central roadways or commons, exhibit a conscious planning. Annapolis, Md., Philadelphia, and Paterson, N.J., were built after plans; but the most celebrated example is the city of Washington D.C., laid out according to the plan devised (1791) by Pierre Charles L'Enfant, under the supervision of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson—a rectangular plan with diagonal main thoroughfares superimposed and the Capitol as the central feature.

In the 19th cent. Frederick Law Olmsted was a pioneer in city planning, especially in developing parks. State legislation enabling cities to appoint planning commissions and in some cases giving them authority to carry out the plans began in Pennsylvania in 1891. The work of Daniel Hudson Burnham for the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, 1893, was a stimulus to city planning, and Burnham, with Edward Bennett, drew up a plan for Chicago, much of which was put into execution. In 1901 a commission composed of Burnham, Charles Follen McKim, and Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., devised a scheme for the modern development and beautification of Washington, D.C., adhering to L'Enfant's original plan as a basis for all new operations.

A wide influence on planning in U.S. cities was exerted by the zoning laws adopted in New York City in 1916, which controlled the uses of each district in the city and regulated the areas and heights of buildings in relation to street width. The important Regional Survey of New York and Environs, completed in 1929, took into consideration legal and social factors as well as internal transit problems and various modes of approach to the metropolitan area.

Governmental efforts to provide employment during the depression of the 1930s led to the building (under the Federal Resettlement Administration) of three experimental model communities—Greenbelt, Md., Greendale, Wis., and Greenhills, Ohio. Among the many subsequent planned communities built by private developers are Columbia, Md., and Reston, Va. The increase of traffic and crowding together of tall buildings have crippled the street plans of many cities—especially U.S. cities that have been handicapped by their rectangular or checkerboard layouts.

Contemporary Planning

In the larger U.S. cities, physical deterioration, crowding, and complex socioeconomic factors have produced vast slums. Most urban renewal programs of the mid-20th cent. were aimed at clearing these slums through the demolition of decayed buildings and the construction of low-income and middle-income housing projects. It was found, however, that the mere replacement of old buildings with new structures did not eliminate slum conditions.

In contrast to traditional planning, which concentrated on improving the physical aspects of buildings and streets, modern city planning is increasingly concerned with the social and economic aspects of city living. The process of city planning is a highly complex, step-by-step procedure, usually involving a series of surveys and studies, development of a land-use plan and transportation plan, preparation of a budget, and approval of a unified master plan by various agencies or legislative bodies. City planners are usually part of an urban planning board or governmental agency that must take into account the characteristics and long-range welfare of the people of a particular urban community—their employment opportunities, income levels, need for transportation, schools, shopping areas, hospitals, parks and recreational facilities. They must face the problems of traffic, congestion, and pollution; they must also consider the availability of police, fire, and sanitation services, the limitations posed by zoning and other regulations, and the problems of funding. In recent years, residents of many communities have demanded greater participation in the planning of their own neighborhoods, and some planners have worked closely with community groups during various stages of the planning process.

Contemporary examples of planned cities include Brasília, the federal capital of Brazil, Rotterdam, main seaport of the Netherlands, Chandigarh, the joint capital of the Indian states of Haryana and Punjab, Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan, and Abuja, the capital of Nigeria.

Programs pursued as a means of improving the urban environment and achieving certain social and economic objectives. Evidence of urban planning can be found in the ruins of ancient cities, including orderly street systems and conduits for water and sewage. During the Renaissance, European city areas were consciously planned to achieve circulation of the populace and provide fortification against invasion. Such concepts were exported to the New World, where William Penn, in founding the city of Philadelphia, developed the standard gridiron plan—the laying out of streets and plots of land adaptable to rapid change in land use. Modern urban planning and redevelopment arose in response to the disorder and squalor of the slums created by the Industrial Revolution. The urban planner best known for his transformation of Paris was Georges-Eugène Haussmann. City planners imposed regulatory laws establishing standards for housing, sanitation, water supply, sewage, and public health conditions, and introduced parks and playgrounds into congested city neighbourhoods. In the 20th century, zoning—the regulation of building activity according to use and location—came to be a key tool for city planners. Seealso Pierre-Charles L'Enfant.

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Any government program designed to encourage the industrial and economic development of regions beset by joblessness or other economic hardship. Most industrialized countries have adopted some type of regional development program since World War II. The most common method of encouraging development is to offer grants, loans, and loan guarantees to companies relocating or expanding in the region. France, for example, has offered subsidies related to the amount of investment and the number of new jobs created, as well as loans, interest subsidies, and free land sites. Tax incentives are also used to encourage companies to invest in depressed areas. In other programs, the government may offer low-cost housing for workers and assistance in developing power, light, transportation, and sanitation facilities. Seealso development bank.

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Use of measures designed to regulate the number and spacing of children within a family, largely to curb population growth and ensure each family’s access to limited resources. The first attempts to offer family planning services began with private groups and often aroused strong opposition. Activists such as Margaret Sanger in the U.S., Marie Stopes in England, and Dhanvanthis Rama Rau in India eventually succeeded in establishing clinics for family planning and health care. Today many countries have established national policies and encourage the use of public family services. The United Nations and the World Health Organization offer technical assistance. Seealso birth control.

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Use of government to make economic decisions with respect to the use of resources. In communist countries with a state planning apparatus, detailed and rigid planning results in a command economy; land, capital, and the means of production are publicly owned and centrally allocated, and the government makes both micro- and macroeconomic decisions. Microeconomic decisions include what goods and services to produce, the quantities to produce, the prices to charge, and the wages to pay. Macroeconomic decisions include the rate of investment and the extent of foreign trade. In most industrialized countries, governments influence their economies indirectly through monetary and fiscal policies. A few key economic sectors may be publicly owned, but the trend has been toward the privatization of industries that were socialized in the aftermath of the Great Depression and World War II. Japan is the most notable example of economic planning in a capitalist framework; government and industry cooperate closely in planning patterns of capital investment, research and development, and export strategies. Seealso capitalism, communism, socialism, zaibatsu.

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