I’m revising an early essay I wrote interrogating planning theory in practice. It’ll be the first entry in my Student Papers Archive. I needed to do some background research on the two theories under scrutiny: Rational Planning and Postmodern Planning. In addition to peer reviewed journals from the planning realm, I found this exceptionally helpful chart comparing Modernism and Postmodernism.
From the URL cited on page 2, I noted the author is Professor Martin Irvine at Georgetown. But a copy-paste of the URL didn’t take me to the chart; instead it forwarded me to the professor’s homepage. And I couldn’t find the chart there. The last revision is dated 2012, but this side-by-side certainly is relevant 10 years later — and will remain so.
I want this chart to live on. I don’t know if the host site’s future update(s) will retain it. So much web ephemera is lost without us knowing. So, I’m doing my part by sharing Professor Irvine’s Modernism vs Postmodernism resource here. Researchers, check it out and please be sure to cite the original author if using the chart.
The office of Edward W. Soja at UCLA Urban Planning after the 2015 In Memoriam celebration of Ed’s life. Before going home, I posted my “Epitaph for Edward W. Soja” to say goodbye, and to promise Ed that I would keep the flame lit. Photo: Jonathan Pacheco Bell
Congratulations to my fellow UCLA Bruin planners graduating today 👏🏽 You’re the next generation of planning. We’re in good hands.
Draw on our past to inform (y)our future. See the work of Edward W. Soja, Jackie Leavitt, Leo Estrada, VC Powe, Marty Wachs, John Friedmann and many others who rest in power.
Senior Project poster by Victor Rosales. Image credit: Victor
I’m celebrating the graduates in my Senior Projects class at Cal Poly Pomona Department of Urban & Regional Planning! Today we big up this researcher:
Will ADU Resources Expedite Implementation?
By: Victor Rosales
Abstract: In the City of La Habra, California, there was not enough Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) being built to address the housing crisis. One of the main obstacles was a lack of ADU resources and materials available to the public. While the city’s municipal code is accessible for public review, a large portion of the community does not understand how to interpret zoning codes or how codes apply to individual projects.
With this understanding of the problem, I worked with city staff on creating supplemental ADU materials, with the intended goal of increasing the amount of ADUs built within city limits. In 2021, the city’s Senior Building Official created an ADU Summary handout with basic outlines of development standards and simple graphic aides. This newly introduced resource, along with the assistance and communication from staff to the community, resulted in an upsurge in ADU plan check submittals and new construction. City staff tracked the progression of these newly built ADUs though paid plan checks, Certificate of Occupancy, surveys, and California Department of Housing credit logs. The data showed an increased number of ADUs constructed in the last 6 months of 2021, which correlated with the timing of the implementation of the ADU Summary. By providing supplemental materials for ADUs, the City of La Habra was able to increase the amount of ADUs built in their community in 2021. Additionally, staff revised and enhanced these readily available resources to support ADU development. As a result, the amount of plan check submissions has nearly tripled in the first six months of 2022.
Upon studying the City of La Habra’s approach to ADUs, I offer several policy recommendations for resources and information that support expediting ADU implementation in cities.
Victor Rosales at CPP Senior Projects Poster Session 2022. Photo: Jonathan Pacheco Bell
Senior Project poster by Stacy Lee and Eric Ji. Image credit: Stacy and Eric
I’m celebrating the graduates in my Senior Projects class at Cal Poly Pomona Department of Urban & Regional Planning! Today we big up this team:
Wildfire Mitigation & Resilience Strategies: Best Planning Practices across Local Jurisdictions in Southern California
By: Stacy Lee & Eric Ji
Abstract: Increasing forecasts of prolonged and more severe fire seasons can be attributed to several factors: urban density growth; fire suppression and fuel buildup; and climate change. Many of these issues are amplified in Southern California, especially in the wildland-urban interface (WUI). Land-use policies must begin to proactively strategize around the immutable outbreaks of future wildfires as expanding boundaries of development and very high fire severity zones cross onto each other.
This qualitative research empirically analyzes the survey response consisting of a list of 19 planning strategies for wildfire mitigation on a Likert scale on compatibility, feasibility, and necessity of each local jurisdiction across four counties. The Counties of Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, and San Bernardino with areas of very high fire severity zones identified by CAL FIRE were contacted with the survey request. The 18 responding jurisdiction responses scored each strategy to display the compatibility, feasibility, and necessity on a scale from 0 to 4, and cross analyzed by any implemented strategies in the corresponding jurisdictions or alternative policies in lieu of the strategies presented in the survey.
These findings are used to develop a scale of adoptable strategies based on the context of each jurisdiction as well as possible alternatives and narratives to adopting feasible strategies.
Stacy and Eric at CPP Senior Projects Poster Session 2022. Photo: Jonathan Pacheco Bell
Senior Project poster by Thuy Le Xuan Cao and Alejandro De Loera. Image credit: Thuy and Alejandro
I’m celebrating the graduates in my Senior Projects class at Cal Poly Pomona Department of Urban & Regional Planning! Today we big up this team:
Youth Homelessness in Eastern Riverside County: A Mental Health Approach Towards Achieving Social Integration
By: Thuy Le Xuan Cao & Alejandro De Loera
Abstract: Youth homelessness is an ongoing crisis. Transitional-aged youth need support when exiting institutional systems. Without access to stable living environments, youth are exposed to trauma. Without coping strategies for stress, they’re vulnerable to chronic or cyclical homelessness. Hostile environments and poor living conditions create struggles for street survival. To combat this crisis, youth-centered housing and transitional programs target their unique needs. Youth mental healthcare influences this development as preexisting conditions including housing insecurity, mental health issues, substance use and family dysfunction have psychosocial consequences exacerbating barriers to housing stability. This project examines access to services for wellness and removal of hidden access barriers so unhoused youth can integrate into society.
Youth homelessness is prevalent in rural and nonrural areas and correlates to mental health issues magnified by rural conditions. Supportive services must be tailored to rural homeless youth needs. Beyond skill building, homeless youth require tailored interventions including non-housing case management, mentorship, counseling and mental health treatment. The creation of safe communal spaces promotes social cohesion where youth may interact and gain social capital from peer mentorship. Notably, planning itself creates a barrier to collective action due to formalities required for programs to exist legally.
We’ve created recommendations for 3 stages of intervention: Primary interventions include successful outreach focusing on preventative services for at-risk youth. Secondary programming offers local and short-term supportive programs with flexible hours for youth in crisis. Tertiary support prioritizes community partnerships to offer continuous, long-term services where homelessness occurs. *Abbreviated from original
Thuy and Alejandro at CPP Senior Projects Poster Session 2022. Photo: Jonathan Pacheco Bell
Next semester at Cal Poly Pomona I’m teaching a course on Advocacy Planning, Community Organizing, and Social Change inspired by the work of the late Paul Davidoff: pauldavidoff.com
Cal Poly Pomona seeks a Dean of the College of Environmental Design
The new Dean must be an innovative, strategic, and collegial academic leader who embraces the mission of Cal Poly Pomona, is committed to student success, and will be a champion for CPPENV. Ideally, the new Dean of ENV will take office in the spring but is expected to do so no later than June 2022. Review of applications will begin December 6, 2021.
Academic Search is assisting Cal Poly Pomona in this search. Please see the profile for the position here:
To ensure full consideration, inquiries, nominations, and applications (PDF preferred) should be submitted electronically, in confidence, to: CPPENVDEAN@academicsearch.org
Nominations are encouraged. If you have a nomination for the position, please send the name, position, and institution along with an email address if you have it, to: CPPENVDEAN@academicsearch.org
Nominators and prospective candidates may also arrange a confidential conversation about this opportunity with the senior consultant leading this search, Cynthia M. Patterson, at: Cynthia.Patterson@academicsearch.org
I was a contributing writer for UrbDeZine from 2014 to 2019. UrbDeZine is/was an online magazine covering urban planning, historic preservation, and architecture in seven US cities. Why the slash/verbs? Because the fate of the magazine is unknown. From its aggregator page at Planetizen, we see the last original article published in October 2019. UrbDeZine has been offline since late that year undergoing a “redesign and reorganization” as described on its currently-staticholding page. I write this entry in the waning days of November 2020 noting the relaunch period listed is Summer 2020. I hold out hope it’ll go-live again, but I’ve come to grips with the possibility that UrbDeZine may not come back.
This is dispiriting for a few reasons. First, because UrbDeZine was a passion project of its editor, who always supported the contributing writers, including unpublished and unknown authors, myself included. Second, because the writers added so many original essays, critical reflections, and news stories that advanced conversations on the built environment. Third, and most personally, because I started to find my voice on its pages. My earliest public commentaries on urban planning appeared in UrbDeZine.
My personal attachment wants to see these back online, and there’s interest from some readers, too. The articles pop up in searches but the links don’t work. Now and then, a reader will contact me asking where they’re at. There was enough interest to create a workaround.
Below are my writings from UrbDeZine, in PDF. This list entails works wherein I manually saved the article before it went offline. Most of my articles are accounted for. Some, but not all, of the PDFs retain working hyperlinks in the text. Also, a disclaimer: some of my views have evolved since the original publication of these commentaries (most notably, I’m no longer so stringent about informal housing).
By providing access to these works, I hope to contribute to the public discourse that helped me develop and mature my thinking about today’s vexing urban planning problems.
“We Are a Movement”: Students Advance Embedded Planning at the 2019 National Planning Conference, UrbDeZine. May 14, 2019.
An Open Letter to the Pasadena Planning Commission Urging a Comprehensive Overhaul of the Second Dwelling Unit Ordinance, UrbDeZine. December 12, 2016.
The American Planning Association just published the Planning for Equity Policy Guide and #EmbeddedPlanning praxis is featured in the Further Reading section.
Thank you Miguel Angel Vazquez, AICP for your ongoing support and all committee authors for including the #PlanMag op-ed in this important resource for planners.
It’s incredibly humbling to be listed alongside planning luminaries Paul Davidoff, Norm Krumholz, John Forester, and Ruth Glass, who created the term #gentrification.
From Los Angeles to Seattle to Detriot to Boston to Norfolk, VA and back: “WE ARE A MOVEMENT” 📢
TODAY—I’m at @ucimurp delivering the Medina Family ADU Story in Prof. Lynda Hikichi’s class UPPP 275: Site Development. This is the 9th rendition of this public talk and the 2nd time UCI Urban Planning & Public Policy hosts it, thank you! If you’re on campus or nearby, come through: Room 3240 in the SBSG-Social & Behavioral Sciences Gateway building, 11:30am—12:30pm.
ABSTRACT: This presentation puts a human face on California’s housing crisis. Through storytelling, reflection and #EmbeddedPlanning praxis, presenter Jonathan Pacheco Bell @c1typlann3r, a zoning enforcement planner in South Central #LosAngeles, presents the story of the Medina Family from the #SouthCentralLA community of @FlorenceFirestone, who built an informal backyard Accessory Dwelling Unit #ADU for extra income after the sudden passing of their head of household. An anonymous complaint triggered inspection and eventual demolition of the dwelling for code violations. Jonathan himself ordered its removal. Attendees will understand the emotional roller coaster the family endured while embroiled in this regulatory process, and Jonathan’s inner conflict with the outcome. To help himself cope emotionally and to spotlight this family’s housing struggle, Jonathan has turned the experience into a speaking tour offering takeaways for planning policy, practice, and pedagogy. Jonathan will explain the @EmbeddedPlanning approach at the story’s core. This talk will inspire emerging planners to adapt and respond to the problem of housing insecurity with empathetic, activist, street-level planning #praxis.
We brought the Medina Family ADU Story to Stanford Engineering on November 15, 2018. The Medina Family experience happens across all spaces, places, geographies, and jurisdictions. We need new audiences and new advocates. Photo courtesy of Derek Ouyang at Stanford SUS.
If you’ve been to my Medina Family ADU Story, or plan to attend an upcoming talk, you’ll see I get choked up. Happens every time. I don’t even try to suppress it anymore. This was a harrowing experience for the Medinas, and for me. My #EmbeddedPlanning praxis rejects the technocratic detachment of Rational Planning orthodoxy. When we shed tears, those tears are earned.
For the Medinas, removing the backyard dwelling built to generate income after the passing of their head of household worsened the stress that started it all. Ordering the removal after knowing the Medinas’ story made me question strict enforcement of #InformalHousing. The dwelling was not substandard—it was simply out of zoning compliance. All of this predated California’s relaxed State ADU Laws, so the only option was to demolish it. This was in 2016. After 10 years on the job, I’d finally realized that “Penalties or Demolition” was a false dilemma fallacy in #ADU enforcement. We’re trying to change this outcome for other folx.
The ending part is emotional for me. I conclude with slides featuring each member of the Medina Fam. I wanted audience members to understand the impact of rigid zoning on real people. I wanted to evoke an emotional response. And every time it works . . . on ME.
The final slide is of little Janelle. Janelle represents the future of #LosAngeles.
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