As the Golden State approaches its sesquicentennial of statehood, planners should stop and consider the transition of much of the State to an urbanized area, and what that means in terms of planning needs and planners roles.
Throughout the past century, California has experienced phenomenal growth. Especially in the post-WW II era, that growth has led to innovative land-use and environmental laws championed and administered by planners. Up until the 1980's, it was also accompanied by infrastructure investment such as the freeways, which rivaled earlier eras investments in water systems and railroads.
Today, for many California cities--and certainly for its largest city, Los Angeles--the future planning issues won t be how to control explosive growth that develops raw land. The challenge will be how to foster infill development in existing neighborhoods in a way that adds to their vitality or stability. This transition requires a different role for planners--both in their approach and skills. Planners in those cities will have to become instigators rather than regulators, proactive rather than reactive. They will find understanding neighborhood economic development more relevant to their work than knowing street standards for new subdivisions.
The roots of this transition are several. At this point in the State s history, many of its municipalities are now urbanized (or suburbanized by the standards of older Eastern cities). They have been filled to their borders with at least a first growth of development. The recession of the past five years had a profound impact not just on growth, but on the growth psyche that defined and motivated planning. First, there is the realization that growth is not inevitable and that cities, regions, and nations are in constant competition for economic activity. This leads to the realization that planners must be as useful to their communities in stimulating activity as they were in earlier eras in controlling growth.
Even the common definition of what is growth is in transition. In many areas, the growth that occurs will take the form of population growth through immigration and larger household size than growth in the form of expansive new development. Zoning codes and subdivision laws that shape new physical development are practically meaningless in dealing with this new form of growth .
In fairness to a balanced picture of the State, major areas--from the Antelope Valley to the Central Valley--will continue to experience the classic California growth/development patterns. But while the Sprawl Debate dominates professional journals, that is not the challenge most planners will face.
In the City of Los Angeles, these transitions in planning were drawn into focus as we completed the first comprehensive revision of our General Plan in 20 years. In 1974, Los Angeles was largely Anglo, proud of its new freeway system, and just completing the explosive growth that made it the nation s second largest city. Large tracts of raw land remained available for development. Twenty years later everyone is part of some minority group, with Hispanics being the largest at 40 percent. The huge bus transit system is supplemented by a growing rail transit system. After being racked by recession, riot, and earthquake, the City doesn t take development or its economic future for granted.
The recently adopted revision, called the General Plan Framework, had to take these changes into account in a fundamental way. The earlier centers concepts , whereby the City s low-rise character could be retained by concentrating development in discrete centers , was refined. Many of the boulevards that connect these centers were identified for a mixture of uses, with sections of intense, pedestrian-oriented activity. Development opportunities were related to the existing and new transit system for their mutual support. Incentives and standards for infill development and neighborhood design were added, in recognition that our growth would take this form. For the first time, economic development policies were made a part of the General Plan, including policies on retaining and attracting jobs, and on priorities for public investment to engender economic activity in certain areas.
Given Los Angeles 467 square mile land mass, the General Plan Framework policies are being tailored to the local needs and opportunities of 35 Community Plan areas. One third of these Community Plans have been updated, and the rest are underway.
In direct response to the transitions that are occurring, the Planning Department committed itself to producing an Annual Report on Growth and Infrastructure, to monitor trends and to influence the reinvestment in an aging infrastructure which is critical to established cities. Prophetically, the first annual report, covering 1990-94, chronicled not burgeoning growth, but a likely one percent decline in population (to 3,452,000) during this period of recession and earthquake.
If the role of California s planners is in transition, so are the planners tools. The usefulness of General Plans--at least as constituted by California law--is being questioned. In a provocative article in the APA California Planner (November/December 1996), Michael Multari points out, General Plans are required to be rational, comprehensive, internally consistent and long-term , whereas today s successful organization (and city) has the ability to be flexible, short-term in its actions, inconsistent, experimental and non-hierarchial . He suggests that shorter term action plans may be the most useful alternative to the traditional General Plan.
What is implied is that the requirements and philosophy of General Plan law fit more easily the growth and development patterns of post-WW II California than the realities of today. Rigid standards, whether embodied in General Plans or other planning documents, is an example. Fixating on street standards, parking standards and open space standards (so many acres of parkland for every 1,000 population) seems a little beside the point for those communities that are today dealing with reuse of existing buildings, managing traffic flow on existing road bed, and getting better utilization out of existing parks.
None of this argues diminished need for planners, simply a transition of their role. The evolutionary growth of established urban areas is different than the explosive growth into raw land that preceded it 20, 40 and 100 years earlier. California planners are learning to adjust to that difference.
Con Howe
Director of Planning
City of Los Angeles, California