Lesson 21 Neighborhood Planning

Question 1

The modern conception of neighborhood planning

Answer 1

traced to Chicago School sociologists in the early 1900s, notably Robert Park and E.W. Burgess.

Question 2

The neighborhood unit

Answer 2

proposed by sociologist Clarence Perry in the 1920s. Perry’s neighborhood unit – an idealized, aspirational version of neighborhood – was 160 acres (the acreage of a ½ mile square, within which Perry placed a circle with a ¼ mile radius), with a density of 10 units per acre and a population of 5,000.

Question 3

Neighborhoods are often difficult to define geographically, and definitions and boundaries change over time.

Answer 3

In some cases, boundaries are set for planning purposes based on roadways, rivers, or census boundaries.
Census tracts, which average 4,000 population, are often used as a proxy for neighborhood.

Question 4

Chicago started with 77 “Community Areas,” derived by Chicago School sociologists in the early 20th century

Answer 4

then in 1978 the city designated 178 neighborhoods based on a resident survey.
Later the City’s map contained 228 neighborhoods.

Question 5

Neighborhood planning

Answer 5

sub-city level of planning.
follows the same process as other types of planning, including collecting information, identifying key issues, setting goals, coming up with alternatives, selecting alternatives, determining the implementation mechanisms, and evaluating the progress towards the implementation of the plan.
Plan topics vary from community to community.
For example, crime prevention may be critical in one neighborhood, while historic preservation is important to another.

Question 6

Many communities undertake neighborhood planning.

Answer 6

The limited geographic extent of a neighborhood plan can have drawbacks, including a more limited focus, fewer resources, and often, limited political influence.

On the other hand, stakeholder engagement is likely to be easier since the issues being discussed are closer to home.

There is an opportunity to be more specific and detailed about future goals in the context of neighborhood-scale plans.

Question 7

For example, the City of Columbus, Ohio, has created plans for many of its neighborhoods. Also check out

Answer 7

The City’s document library has a variety of neighborhood plans.

Question 8

Chicago’s “Quality of Life” neighborhood plans

Answer 8

funded by a grant from the MacArthur Foundation.