Letting Go: A New Planning Paradigm?
It has been a year unlike any other in my lifetime. Or in most people’s lifetime. The world around us is changing faster and differently than many of us ever imagined. Some of these shifts we hope will not be permanent, like our inability to physically come together to celebrate, to create, to grieve. Other shifts we hope will take lasting root and change criminal justice and urban planning systems (among others) that perpetuate racism and inequality even when its practitioners seek to do the opposite. Despite the moments of darkness, this year has exposed and plunged us into, it has amplified the light in ways both shocking and inspiring.
The light shines on hard truths that many of us have sought to avoid for too long. We see in 2020 that the systems we relied upon are flawed. This can feel overwhelming, but it also means that we can create new systems and reform existing systems to work better. This can start by listening to those who have been speaking out but were muted or silenced by white planning peers. Tamika Butler, Dr. Destiny Thomas, Jay Pitter and Lynn Ross continue to be among the powerful Black female voices in this journey. Each has started her own consulting firm, is forging brave conversations in the urban planning field, and is fueling a new generation of Black and Brown community builders.
Changing entrenched systems and “liberating transportation” requires each of us to be light bearers, as my friend Stephanie Gidigbi recently challenged me. Being a light bearer includes how we show up as individuals in our work, “What do you look like when the light is turned on?”
Transformation requires taking a hard look at what has been the traditional way of doing things and allowing ourselves “radical imagination” to try something new. Radical can be revolutionary, but within the world of planning it can begin with small steps. It is not so much an explosion, as a shift and a letting go. This can be frightening, especially in the public sector where there is little allowance for risk tasking and work is often done under the microscope of the press or Facebook critics. Yet, the public sector is exactly where this change must begin as agencies are forced to confront declining budgets; growing demands for greater accountability; persistent racial and economic disparities; escalating need for government services and public investment, and a future that becomes harder to predict with each climate event, public health crisis, new technology, or economic downturn.
Apologies for overgeneralizing the last 20 years of urban planning, but as I reflect it has been one steady process of trying to exert control over perceived chaos. (With both chaos and control defined by a small but powerful demographic.) Professionally I grew up and thrived within the New Urbanism and Smart Growth movements. In each there is a nostalgia for how cities were designed pre-automobile. Our planning approaches to achieve more walkable, mixed-use, climate resilient and transit-oriented places, again to oversimplify, have largely relied on increased regulatory interventions to create incentives for what we white folks defined as “urbanism” and disincentives for sprawl. Sure, there were lots of efforts to work with the market to achieve these outcomes, but more work was focused on trying to tame the market or direct it to enable improved public benefit.
There are many compelling economic, environmental, and social reasons for this approach and my friend, Kaid Benfield has compellingly described many through his years of writing. Yet, I am struck both by our blind sightedness on race and on how the planning process has become overly complicated and costly. Budgets for everything from station area planning to transportation planning to consolidated planning updates to comprehensive planning have skyrocketed. Planning itself has become more regulated. Our collective response to failures or shortcomings is often to add layers on, rather than to take layers off. The consulting industry has done well in this process with a parallel agglomeration of firms into mega planning, design and engineering corporations. Millions of dollars are spent each year by local, regional, and state planning agencies on detailed data analysis such as economic and fiscal impact studies, travel demand projections, and housing assessments to inform planning studies. We look to the past to forecast the future and put a lot of faith into these numbers to give plans their legitimacy.
For many government-led planning initiatives, community engagement budgets have grown, too, in part because we seek better ways to educate the public about what these numbers mean and to get their buy-in. Exciting engagement tools have been developed like design charrettes, scenario planning and online platforms for real-time polling and surveys, participatory budgeting, and virtual meeting facilitation. With the COVID-19 pandemic accelerating the use and refinement of these tools.
Good data is good, do not get me wrong. Yet, objectively speaking, despite all of our data the housing crisis has worsened in most large metro areas and in rural America; vehicle miles traveled continue to grow while transit ridership declines (even before the pandemic); greenhouse gas emissions rise as do traffic fatalities; and urban sprawl continues at its rapid pace. Through it all – across every measure and community -- racial inequality and persistent poverty deepened substantially over the last 20 years – despite all the ways we disaggregated the data to make the case.
Einstein is credited with saying, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.” So maybe instead of trying for ever greater precision through quantitative analysis and exerting more regulatory control, long-range planning should chart a new path. What this could look like should be open to lots of people’s different interpretations.
I’ve written some about my own personal journey about race and planning, but over the past nine months I’ve also been on a professional journey exploring new ways that public agencies can approach planning. Like any experiment there have been bumps along the way. But it feels that in these two projects some transformative seeds are being planted not only for MZ Strategies, but especially for those involved.
Greater Minneapolis-Saint Paul Regional Economic Framework
These 9 strategic priorities create the foundation for the Regional Economic Framework. Click here to read and hear Met Council Chair Zelle’s vision for the Framework.
In early 2020, when the year (& Minnesota) was still sleepy and covered in snow, discussions began between the Metropolitan Council (the regional planning agency for 7-County Minneapolis Saint Paul region) and Greater MSP (a private non-profit organization dedicated to providing public and private sector coordination and engagement across the 16-County Minneapolis Saint Paul region.) The former organization a few years earlier had adopted a long-range regional plan covering housing, transportation, water, and park systems after an extensive multi-year public engagement process. The latter organization was three years into its own extensive outreach and strategic planning process to identify regional economic competitiveness gaps and priorities. Yet the region never had an explicit regional economic plan and was not eligible for federal economic development funding given its relative economic prosperity despite deep economic inequality among certain communities and across racial lines. What would it look like for these two organizations to join and align efforts?
Then the COVID-19 pandemic struck. Like the nation, the Twin Cities metro area was catapulted into widespread economic crisis. Both organizations, with very different cultures, limited staff capacity and a sense of urgency entered into partnership to forge a regional economic framework that could meet federal requirements and enable businesses and local governments bearing the economic brunt of the crisis to be eligible for COVID relief funds. This involved something new -- coordinating across public and private planning efforts and an expedited planning process. Extensive data analysis had already been done by both organizations, but for slightly different geographies and some parts of the region were in counties covered by other regional economic plans. The team moved quickly not to recreate the wheels, but to align the wheels.
“Our region is embarking on a course change in addressing racial equity. We’re not going to be perfect. But as we search for solutions to difficult problems, we need to be introspective to avoid past mistakes and diligent in our efforts to view our work through an equity lens. Most of all, we need to engage the full range of voices in our region as we learn to celebrate diversity instead of tolerate it. I am humbled by the task ahead, but I believe in a teamwork approach within Met Council and the community at large. Together, we will be drivers for our region’s success.”
During this alignment, while noting that deep racial economic disparities and growing housing unaffordability were major challenges to the region’s competitiveness, George Floyd was murdered in Minneapolis and several neighborhoods of color became focal points for #BlackLivesMatter protests. The Center for Economic Inclusion called out the emerging regional economic planning process for failing to center discussions on racial equity outcomes. No region can prosper when 4 out of 10 people do not have the same access to opportunity. They joined and shaped the partnership and its approach. On August 12, the Met Council adopted the Regional Economic Framework. The plan includes 9 strategic priority areas some of which speak to traditional economic development issues like innovation and workforce development, but all acknowledge racial equity in their framing and actions.
Is the Regional Economic Framework perfect? No. Is it groundbreaking? Yes.
One of the lessons learned is that the greatest cultural difference between these three lead organizations was what engagement meant, who should be engaged, and how. Yet, this process proved that slow-moving public planning agencies can work quickly and can work differently. Going forward, a new partnership has been formed that hopefully creates a platform for deeper and sustained engagement across the diverse stakeholders each represents and a deeper understanding of what equitable engagement must entail for public and private, non-profit sectors. The 3 partners recognize the focus is less on the plan itself, but on its implementation and evolution. Specifically, each entity has taken on responsibility to reflect, build upon, or garner new input from its members and partners.
Chicago Equitable Transit Oriented Development (ETOD) Policy Plan
In early 2020, when the year (& Illinois ) was still sleepy and covered in snow, discussions accelerated among City staff and community stakeholders regarding the City’s recently adopted ETOD plan. The new Lightfoot Administration was still taking shape. Elevated Chicago, a collaborative focused on racial equity, arts and culture, climate change resiliency, and public health in Chicago’s neighborhoods, centered its work on ensuring the ETOD plan addressed the persistent racial segregation and displacement occurring in transit-oriented communities of color.
To date, TOD activity has not been equitably spread across the City. Only 36% of the community areas designated as TOD eligible have had any TOD activity, while 4 communities ( (Near West Side, Near North Side, Lakeview, and West Town) account for more than 50% of activity that has occurred. These neighborhoods are seeing the displacement of Asian and LantinX families and businesses. Black residents and businesses meanwhile were continuing to be lost in South and Southwest neighborhoods were persistent disinvestment steadily decreased economic opportunity for many. Previous studies by MPC, CMAP, the Chicago Community Trust and numerous Chicago scholars provided a deep bench of data on related trends. TOD studies and reports funded by CTA, RTA, Metra and the City existed but had not been formalized into City policies. The ETOD ordinance created a new opportunity for engaging community to shape the City’s TOD future.
And then the COVID-19 pandemic struck. A series of in-person planning spring workshops were scrapped and retooled quickly for on-line engagement. Elevated Chicago funded a local, Black woman-owned artist firm, JNJ Creative Design, to be an integral part of the planning process. In our engagement with community we involved 80 different stakeholders from across City departments; the transit agency (CTA); community-based development, arts and culture, and public health organizations; and local CDFIs. During this work, a series of violent killings occurred in the Black and Brown communities our work focused on, including within families of some of our work group members.
Watch Chicago poet Leslé Honoré’s powerful video “We Trained for This” created for Elevated Chicago’s 2020 ETOD symposium. (Source: Elevated Chicago)
Because the arts were woven into the fabric of our ETOD work, we used our planning process as a tool to provide a healing space through poetry and meeting design. Our discussions focused less on what level of density or parking minimum should be recommended (we had several studies already telling us the answer), but instead to define what equity meant for different people and what ETOD would like look, and feel like. Safe, walkable communities are not just a matter of zoning and design. A Black child is not safe when police violence takes the lives of unarmed Black teenagers. A Brown woman does not feel safe when being sexually harassed while riding the train or walking to the elevated transit station. So, how can an ETOD policy address these issues, and what does that mean for how City departments must work together in a more coordinated and thoughtful way with community?
On September 14, the City of Chicago released its draft ETOD Policy Plan, which is open for public comment through the end of October. The plan includes a number of specific policy ideas to make ETOD required and easier to accomplish. It gives equal weight to improved coordination across agencies including alignment with the City’s comprehensive planning update process just kicking off, and to building the internal capacity needed for improved engagement practices to elevate community voice in decision making. Central to all of this is creating a health and equity assessment tool that can be applied to all ETOD-related policies.
Is the ETOD Policy Plan perfect? No. Does it give community voice and priorities greater prioritization and ownership than other TOD plans around the country? Yes.
“Every Chicagoan, no matter what side of the city they reside on, should have access to both our world-class transportation system and the recreational, housing, and environmental benefits that come with it. The new eTOD Policy Plan will expand this access and give our most disinvested neighborhoods the long-overdue opportunity to enjoy these benefits while not being forced out of the community they call home. ”
Having been involved in a number of TOD planning efforts over the years, this one feels very different. Precisely because Elevated Chicago stepped forward to guide this effort as the City transitioned, it was centered from the beginning and consistently throughout on equity in process and outcome. We started not with the data – though data deeply informed the work – but in the lived experiences of those working, living, and grounded in transit-oriented communities. Rather than recreating the wheel, we asked why we needed the wheel and then gathered all the unused but perfectly reliable wheels and hopefully made a better bus.
For both projects, public agencies were forced through circumstances to let go of some of their planning control and to trust in other partners to be exactly that …. Partners. Partnership does not mean “join me to do things my way” but rather finding and leveraging the different strengths and perspectives each organization brings. The process should yield efficiencies and amplification. Both projects were done extremely quickly, within the world of planning, and neither required expensive mega consulting firms to achieve. MZ Strategies played a conductor role and helped to facilitate strategic connections, mitigate when needed, and wrote some of the prose. We will see what the long-term impacts are, but in both cases I am left to think and hope these illustrate new ways to create more resilient and responsive plans for the diversity of communities that these documents and policies encompass.
Deep gratitude to the McKnight Foundation and to the Chicago Community Trust, SPARCC and Elevated Chicago for enabling MZ Strategies to be part of these efforts; and to Michael Larson, Lisa Barajas and Todd Graham at the Metropolitan Council and to Juan Sebastian Arias, Katanya Raby, Sendy Soto and Eiliesh Tuffy with the City of Chicago for being incredible public sector partners and leaders.