Why Urban Planning Matters to Everyone

In The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs makes one of the most important points about urban planning and city life: we can all understand it. She writes, “The processes that occur in cities are not arcane, capable of being understood only by experts. They can be understood by almost anybody.”

Edward Glaeser in his 2011 book The Triumph of the City, takes this a step further, we should all understand it. He writes, “Height restrictions, in Paris and New York and Mumbai, may seem like obscure arcana of interest only to planning professionals. Nothing could be more wrong.”

I relate to both, and fortunately they come together. The basic principles, which steer some of the most important decisions in our life from the home we live in to the community around us, we can all understand.

I know this because I’m not an urban planner. I became interested by observing the spaces around me as I traveled the world.

I began to see the connections between dense housing and good transit, good transit and clean air, and walkable streets and how easy they make it to connect with a culture and its people.

And the stakes are high.

Urban planning affects how we’ll get to work every day, how much we’ll pay for housing and what types of homes we can choose from. It affects whether we’ll be able to breathe clean air or if our children will have a higher risk for asthma. Frankly, urban planning will be key in whether we’ll be leaving our children a hospitable planet at all.

It influences what social and professional opportunities are close by, how hard it is to get to airports, neighboring cities, or back to our hometown, and at what financial and time costs. It decides whether we’re nearly forced to sit in traffic, or whether we’ll be able to go on a bike instead. And when we do bike, it decides whether it will be pleasant and safe or if we’ll have to constantly watch out for cars that could kill us.

Urban planning is water, and we are fish.

Recommend Reading to Understand The Basics

Note: I have included affiliate links here to Bookshop.org, a place where you can buy books online that supports independent bookstores. It will also throw a small percentage my way. However, it’s best to order directly from your local bookstore and support them. But if you want it shipped, choose Bookshop, not Amazon.

Sometime I will write a more substantial reading list. For now, here are a few.

The #1 book to understand urban planning I think is Jane Jacobs’ The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Published in 1961, since it focused on the overarching principles, it’s just as relevant in 2024.

For understanding public transit from the principles of basic geometry, time, and space, I highly recommend Jarrett Walker’s book Human Transit: How Clearer Thinking about Public Transit Can Enrich Our Communities and Our Lives.

He also does a great job discussing how transit can’t stand on its own: good housing policy is critical.

Finally, use your own eyes. George Orwell said, “It is difficult to be certain about anything except what you have seen with your own eyes.” Explore cities and public spaces on your own, ideally on foot. This is what Jacobs did, and to build a better world, we must keep our eyes and ears open to reality.