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The development of cities nowadays is forced by strategic planning. It seems that design no longer fulfil thebasic needs of the city. Planning instead, seems to lead to the abandonment of design principles. However,we now see that design is coming back. There is an awareness that a city needs to be understood as acomplex interactive system and that design of public space is vital for a healthy city. The question is howthe designer can take part in the city development. Are people in urgent need for new instruments of urbanplanning and design to mark 'the start of urbanism? Is the theory of urbanism as a strategy still a fitting wayto approach urban planning at the moment, or are people in acute need of more personal, small scaledesign approach of urbanism taking into account, the 'genius loci'? Atlantis asked various people engagedin urban planning to voice their opinion on the subject.

Theendofstrategicplanning

Ir. Maurice G.A.D. HarteveldUrbanist and Architect, PhDCandidate Urban Design

This statement presupposes a rival betweenurban design and urban planning. As if we arein an everyday match, waiting for a winnerbefore sunset. It might be true, but are theyexchangeable or even replaceable? Imaginetwo actors, a designer and a planner, on theside of a stage:

First set starts in flash backs in a time whenlarge scale planning entered bombastically.June 30, 1889, the newspaper ChicagoTribune announced triumphantly: Between therising and the setting of yesterdays sunChicago added 130 square miles of land to itsarea and a quarter of a million souls to itspopulation

1This would be the beginning of a

new civic venture, the emergence of urbanplanning. The planner at the side of the stagecheers: game! New set, July 27, 1896, lateat night. At a dinner among many influentialpeople, Daniel H. Burnham, architect by origin,

presented a scheme destined to burgeon into aplan for the whole Chicago region. Encouraged

by various members of the group he workedfurther on it

2. With success: Great boulevards

and elegant malls were designed. The SouthShore Drive, the World Colombian Exposition,the urban design movement became known asThe City Beautiful. Now, the designer waves:

set, design scored! Third set, years later,Jane Jacob appears on stage, grumbling: TheChicago fair has snubbed the exiting modernarchitecture which began to emerge in Chicagoand instead dramatized a retrogressiveimitation Renaissance style. [] This orgiasticassemblage of the rich and monumentalcaptured the imagination of both planners andpublic.3 She is legitimating equality; it is a sideline in a major attack on modernism, but still. Infavour of the public life, both designers andplanners were seceded by the Canadian writerand activist. The designer and planner on

stage look somewhat puzzled. From out of thedark someone shoots: Out! Continuing set,Jacobs admirers, the urban sociologists of theUniversity of Chicago are streaking. Obviously,they make the rival between the designer andthe planner of no importance. While theirpopularity increases, people calling them theChicago School. Its easy to mistake with thearchitectural Chicago School of among othersBurnham himself. Another set, somedecades pass by. Both designer and planner,angry now, shout: Whose name it is? Whosegame it is? The quest for a better human and

built environment is cumulating. On stage thetwo actors are fighting back. Outside the city

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they form a new alliance; New Urbanism isborn. Its a new match: We are committed tore-establishing the relationship between the artof building and the making of community,through citizen-based participatory planningand design.

4 Both players smile: love

Set six, after twelfth congresses, finally thenew urbanists are entering Chicago. MaddenWells Darrow is seen as exemplary; StatewayGardens is even awarded with theNeighbourhood Charter Award. On stage, thedesigner steps forward: but thats planning.Than the planner furious begins to pace upand down: who called our congress inChicago Blocks, Streets and Buildings Today,and subtitle it provocatively The New CityBeautiful? Last set. June 29, 2004, eveningagain, from out of the new headquarter in thecity a statement is given: By responding to

new theories and challenges that are close tothe center of what we do, well be positionedfor greater success.5 To be continued

Can we imagine design without a plan,planning without designing? What worth isplanning without a design, designing without aplan? Would the expo in Chicago ever berealized without a preceded strategy or wouldtheir urbanization ever have taken placewithout designs? A simple answer could begiven. Nevertheless, would we? In any city theentertaining play continues, and luckily the

drama stays.

1Chicago Tribune, June 30, 1889, p. 42Burnham Dairies, Chicago Art Institute, entry for July 27,

18963Jacobs, J. (1961) The Death and Life of Great American

Cities, London: Vintage Books, p. 24.4Congress for the New Urbanism (2001) Charter of theNew Urbanism, p. 1.5CNU XII Shows New Urbanism's Progress (press

release CNU) June 29, 2004