Using Impact Models for Long-Range Planning

Course Details

This presentation demonstrates a modernized workflow for developing land-use change scenarios, communicating their impacts to the public through web-based planning solutions, and helping stakeholders make educated decisions about long-range plans.

As cities change rapidly, determining what future communities should and will look like has never been more difficult for urban planners. Fortunately, scenario planning, aided by modern GIS technology, helps them address the challenge. Scenario planning that enables planners to project different futures and communicate their impacts to the public helps cities move toward dynamic, adaptive planning.

In response to their city’s shifting shape, and in an effort to modernize the planning process, a female-led team of planners and designers from Boulder, Colorado, is piloting a new approach to web-based scenario planning in their subcommunity plan. Representatives from the Boulder Planning and Development Services Department share their data-driven method for developing and evaluating land-use scenarios.

This course illustrates how adopting digital planning processes increases community engagement, reduces bias, and encourages equitable and inclusive planning that models development and land-use impacts on critical indicators like housing and jobs.

Learning Outcomes

• Gain insight into a data-driven approach to land-use impact modeling
• Understand the benefits of modernizing the planning process with digital tools.
• Discuss approaches to community engagement that simplify technical information in order to empower and educate communities about the impact of land-use changes.