Neighborhood Planning Topics

Topic: 1		Introduction to Neighborhood Planning The goal of Neighborhood Planning is to build social capital, which is the ability of the neighborhood to organize itself to identify problems and solve them in partnership with...
Topic: 2		Neighborhood Planning Models of Action Three approaches to Neighborhood Planning (or "models") are: Rational Planning, Community Organizing, and Assets Based Community Development (ABCD). Each of these...
Topic: 3		Metropolitan Forces Affecting Neighborhoods & Urban Growth Management City and regional change have important neighborhood impacts. The region's vitality and economic development can slip away from older neighborhoods and focus on the urban fringe. Metropolitan governments can...
Topic: 4		Neighborhood Strategic Planning "Ultimately it is the planning process, not the plan document, that brings about development". Neighborhood strategic planning can unify diverse community development activities such as...
Topic: 5		Background Information for Neighborhood Planning Neighborhood Planning always involves collecting background information. This section covers a range of planning tools used to describe neighborhood conditions and inform planning. The tools include...
Topic: 6		Built Environment of Neighborhoods People cannot plan or build the world without creating or changing themselves. The built environment is the physical counterpart of the social community. It reflects the neighborhood's history, culture...
Topic: 7		Building Community with Land Use Planning & Zoning The built environment is never more important than one’s relationships. But quality, attractive places can be built (or rebuilt) that foster and support social capital, helping, and economic development. On a fundamental level, there is...
Topic: 8		Neighborhood Housing / Making Housing Affordable Neighborhood character is affected in large measure by its housing. While housing affordability is a sought-after goal, neighborhood housing policy must be consistent with...
Topic: 9		Neighborhood Economic Development "At the very center of the community building challenge is the effort to revitalize the community's economic life". However broad economic conditionsmake this a challenge in neighborhoods, especially...
Topic: 10		Neighborhood Public Safety and Community Policing "When people started protecting themselves as individuals rather than as a community, the battle was lost." Community Oriented Policing (COP) is the public safety counterpart of...
Topic: 11		Community Education and Neighborhood Schools "Many schools are like little islands set apart from the mainland of life". Community Education, in contrast, is a philosophy (not a program) in which the school serves the entire community by providing for...
Topic: 12		Neighborhood Informal Helping & Assets Based Community Development People turn first to family, friends, and neighbors when problems arise in their lives. This "informal helping" is voluntary, spontaneous, individualized, flexible, based on self-reliance, and is...

The following books are excellent introductions to Neighborhood Planning.
You might want to consider them for your library. These often are
Recommended in the Selected Readings for each Topic. Pdf copies have not
been provided because the books still are in print.

1. Patricia Murphy and James Cunningham, Organizing for Community
Controlled Development, Renewing Civil Society (Thousand Oaks: Sage
Publications, 2003)
2. Peter Medoff and Holly Sklar, Streets of Hope, The Fall and Rise of an
Urban Neighborhood (Boston: South End Press, 1994)
3. John Kretzmann and John McKnight, Building Communities from the Inside
Out, A Path Toward Finding and Mobilizing a Community's Assets (Evanston:
Northwestern University Press, 1993)

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