Rational-Comprehensive Planning Theory | Radical Planning 101

I'm kicking off a new series of short videos about the fundamentals of urban planning for planners and non-planners alike. In this video I'll discuss the urban planning's first major theoretical frame work - the rational-comprehensive theory of planning. While rational-comprehensive planning is a somewhat taboo subject today, it pervades every aspect of the profession.
Sources/Reading List:
Michael Brooks - Planning Theory for Practitioners.
Stephen Grabow & Allan Heskin - "Foundations for a Radical Concept of Planning," www.tandfonlin...
Seyed Navid Mashhadi Moghadam & Mojtaba Rafieian - "If Foucault were an urban planner: An epistemology of power in planning theories," doi.org/10.108....
Rahder, Barbara - "Cracks in the Foundation of Traditional Planning," www.plannersne....
Sam Stein - Capital City.

[@acheyawachtel9409]

For the love of planning, please do more of these I NEEED these

[@jdavidlim1098]

bro this is literally the channel i've been waiting to find 😭😭😭 love

[@packman2321]

I think I feel this in social theory too. I'm going off largely academia (rather than jobs putting it into practice) but it is apparent that a lot of awareness of personal bias and history is stated, but the method of learning still involves fairly basic narratives of education built around the idea that the student/reseacher etc can dispassionately take in and assess things, and a failure to recognise that argumentation is often just testing how good at rhetoric you are, rather than the validity of points. The structure keeps recreating the modernist problem we swear we've identified.

[@lucasamo]

Thanks for making this video. Could you give some relevant reading material on the topic? I'm a first year in undergrad studying urban planning and would like to look into this topic more.

[@F3XT]

same

[@radicalplanning]

I just added my list of sources in the description - totally forgot them earlier.

[@user-jr1nj6lw8d]

Love this Video ❤ synoptic planning

[@TheJayman213]

Love this new format. Longer videos are also good.

[@Cinephile-gy6fb]

Loving this! Looking forward to the rest of the series!

[@mieke_illustration]

Thanks for creating this channel! I just started my Master's in Planning and we're learning about the different theories in planning at this very moment. Looking forward to more of your videos!

[@ladislaoquintanilla8566]

I’m in urban planning undergrad and your videos are so digestible and informative. Please don’t stop 😩

[@Cinephile-gy6fb]

Going hard!!! Love your vids J!!!

[@tuhenyedanmuatjitjeja9109]

thank you for the video, very informative and straight to the point.

[@LostSky866]

This is great! I hope you touch on Soviet planning.

[@outofthisworld5225]

THIS IS AMAZINGG...PLEASE DO MOREE

[@chrisanry2733]

Hey Josh! Love your work! You mention the communicative planning video at 4:00. This is still coming, right?

[@radicalplanning]

thank you! and yes, but probably not until the summer. my next video is on transactive planning which is somewhat of forerunner to communicative. that will come out this week!

[@bgtyhnmju7]

Good video. Happy to see you're still working on these, and I look forwards to more.

[@SebastianGutwein]

Thanks for these great videos. I think the playlist is out of order. Looks like the first one is sorted as number three.

[@whattheheckisthisthing]

I'm so glad you're making these videos

[@mfaran727]

Waiting for your discussion on incremental planning approach. This video is now a month old. Please continue the video at faster pace. Developing states need to hear this. Love from Pakistan! :)

[@radicalplanning]

coming out this friday!

[@F3XT]

can you give some book recommendations on those different theories?

[@radicalplanning]

I just added my list of sources to the description. I think it will be difficult to find a single book about all of the theories of planning that isn't just surface level, but I highly recommend Capital City by Sam Stein, which touches on most of them.

[@F3XT]

​@@radicalplanningthank you very much

[@basedmuscleman6539]

any book by murray bookchin :)

[@alexwithclipboard]

Hi there! I've watched a lot of your videos, and while I think I understand the concepts you're arguing for, I'm a little disappointed with the tangible evidence you're offering in order to support your sweeping condemnations against the planning discipline. For instance, you said in this video that planning students are taught to minimize public gathering spaces. That is not true. I know because I am a planning student. There is enormous emphasis put on public gathering spaces. I'm also perplexed by the example you offered, where you claim that Richmond's parks department is replacing the Robert E. Lee statue with a flower garden to "restrict the potential for social movements", when this change is being made in response to a social movement. They're not trying to steal your protest spot. The protesters only went there in the first place because of the statue that they have now removed, because you asked them to! I assume the comment about surveillance is in reference to the "eyes on the street" doctrine. I would think that encouraging consistent foot traffic and providing clear sight lines would be the least offensive way to deter crime from your perspective. This follows a theme. It feels like in every Radical Planning video I watch, mundane design features like infill development, flower gardens, sight lines and even walkability itself are part of a coordinated attack on the working class. If you've seen my videos from last year, you know that we definitely have some differences in our ideology. That's okay. Should cities use eminent domain to save community gardens or let developers build on them? Reasonable people could disagree. What bothers me is the anger you're directing at other urbanists who don't want to overthrow capitalism along with car dependency. Urbanism is not inherently left or right. For instance, I support reclaiming parking spaces for sidewalk space, bike lanes, or restaurant seating. Maybe Karl Marx would think the restaurant seating was an "enclosing of the commons", but it makes my city a better place, so I'm going to show up to those council meetings and fight for it to stay. To me, the fact that restaurants are making a buck off of formerly "public" space is a fair trade for a more livable city. The yimbys you refer to as unwitting unpaid lobbyists are making a similar decision. They aren't fighting for capitalism, gentrification or any of the other evils you often bring up. They're fighting for policies that will allow more people to live in cities. You should respect them for doing it, or at least leave them alone. My point is that urbanism is already not a huge tent. Subdividing the tent by preferred economic system won't get our cities fixed any faster.

[@radicalplanning]

The direct quote is “planners can do this in multiple ways including…” I did not say “planning students are taught to minimize…” In 2020, I protested daily in Richmond at Marcus David Peters Circle. It was an amazing gathering space created by the people of Richmond. There were daily barbecues with free food, performances, games, and most importantly genuine protest. The circle was locked down by the Commonwealth of Virginia (they own that piece of land) for over two years and in its place they put a flower garden that does not allow entry. Furthermore, the protests were not solely about the statues, the protests were about demanding that BIPOC people can exist in public without being harmed by the police. One of the demands was to keep Marcus David Peters Circle open to the public in perpetuity. For surveillance I am referring specifically police surveillance, usually implemented through Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED), which is why I used a CPTED graphic to illustrate that. You're putting a lot of words in my mouth. I've never spoken against infill, I've never spoken against restaurant seating, I've never spoken against eyes on the street, and I've absolutely never spoken against walkability - I am a bicycle, pedestrian, and transit planner professionally. If you watched my 15 minute city video, you'd know that I support all of those things. What I am speaking against is the idea that using our cities as machines of profit as i believe that is destroying them. And if that is my ideology - which I have made clear in my videos - why would I ever want to help make a big tent with the people who push the policies that I am working against? Asking me to ignore my preference in economic system is the same as asking me to support capitalism. There is no shortage of neoliberal urbanist youtubers and they all seem to do really well. If you want that sort of content, just stick with them. From the radical perspective there are almost no voices on this platform. I work hard on these videos, I provide my sources, and I offer an alternative way of think of cities. I am not concerned with reform, with design, or with promoting the neoliberal solutions.

[@alexwithclipboard]

I don't just want to watch content I already agree with, that's why I watch your videos. And I appreciate the real research you've put into some of them, especially around housing. Part of the reason I'm frustrated with left-nimby content is because there are so many people who need housing and would never be able to afford market rate with their current incomes. But the resources meant to subsidize their housing are currently being spread to lower-middle income people who would be able to afford homes if only developers were allowed to build them. I'm also focused on transit ridership. If a condo full of rich people is built next to a train station, that's going to increase ridership. Even if it has no impact on housing affordability. (I think it would, but just for the sake of argument.) In New Jersey, where I live, the number one obstacle to housing construction near transit is zoning. Trust me, I've looked at every single train station one by one. I'm really excited by mass deregulation measures like in Boston that will allow so much more housing to be built near transit in the next decade. Won't that be a good thing?

[@bbyng7316]

You both add much.

[@kozara8202]

Gosplan but evil lmao