Social Media in Urban Planning

On Monday I participated in a presentation on Social Media in Planning at the American Planning Association’s annual convention in New Orleans. At the session, my co-presenters and I discussed example projects spanning community-based planning, transportation, and professional development. Afterwards, the attendees broke into small groups to discuss their own experience and thoughts about using social media to engage the public. Here’s some links to the cases we discussed:

• I presented on Rethink College Park and some preliminary observations from my research on the Imagine Austin Comprehensive Plan.
• Jennifer Evans-Cowley, a professor at Ohio State, presented on the SNAPPatx project in Austin which seeks to aggregate content about transportation across several platforms. In addition, she told attendees about the Social Networking Applications for Planners Facebook group.
• Ryan Link, a planner with the Baker company, presented on More for 1604, an environmental impact statement for Loop 1604 in San Antonio, TX, and the Driving 95 corridor study in North Carolina.
• Shana Johnson, a planning consultant, presented on the APA Economic Division Blog she has spearheaded, as well as the Division’s use of Twitter.

In addition, many attendees shared their own experiences, and we had a lively conversation about equity, satisfying regulations, and integration with more conventional forms of public participation. We plan to propose a session on the same topic for the 2011 conference, to be held here in Boston.