The Geographic Information Science and Technology (GIS&T) Body of Knowledge has quickly become an essential reference for the GIS field. Compiled by the University Consortium of GIS, the academic GIS network, the original GIS&T Body of Knowledge was published as a book in 2006, and featured high-quality, peer-reviewed chapters on a wide range of GIS topics. I found the work useful as a graduate student, although I felt the section on how GIS was applied to cities was somewhat limited. Therefore, I jumped at the opportunity to contribute an entry to the new version of the GIS&T Body of Knowledge, which will appear as an online publication, although it retains the same rigorous editorial process. The article falls within the work’s “Domain Application” section, which includes descriptions of how GIS is used in various application areas. To complement my knowledge of GIS, I recruited my colleague Prof. Joe Grengs to serve as a co-author for the entry. Prof. Grengs has a background in both planning and engineering, teaches the University of Michigan urban planning program intermediate GIS course, and has published widely on how GIS can be applied for the analysis of urban transportation and equity. We invite your feedback on our resulting entry. The abstract and link are below.

Professionals within the urban and regional planning domain have long utilized GIS&T to better understand cities through mapping urban data, representing new proposals, and conducting modeling and analysis to help address urban problems. These activities include spatial data collection and management, cartography, and a variety of applied spatial analysis techniques. Urban and regional planning has developed the sub-fields of planning support systems and Geodesign, both of which describe a combination of technologies and methods to incorporate GIS&T into collaborative planning contexts. In the coming years, shifting patterns of global urbanization, smart cities, and urban big data present emerging opportunities and challenges for urban planning professionals.

Citation and link: Goodspeed, R. and Grengs, J. (2017). Urban and Regional Planning. The Geographic Information Science & Technology Body of Knowledge (4th Quarter 2017 Edition), John P. Wilson (ed). doi:10.22224/gistbok/2017.4.2.