Because I know a lot of my planning-interested friends read this blog, I thought I would note that I just noticed the urban planning website Planetizen has published what I believe to be the first-ever comprehensive guide to Urban Planning graduate programs in the U.S. and Canada. The directory includes program rankings, and here is their top ten programs:

1. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
2. The University of California, Berkeley
3. University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
4. Harvard University
5. University of Pennsylvania
6. University of California, Los Angeles
7. Cornell University
8. Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
9. University of Southern California
10. University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

Based on their grainy graphic I don’t think the University of Maryland program I am enrolled in is in the top 25, I suspect partly due to the small size of the program (roughly 50 students and a dozen faculty.) For those who are curious I think the Maryland program is a good choice for students interested in studying the Washington-Baltimore metropolitan area, smart growth, and for those interested in strongly community-based planning. Another good source of information about planning programs is the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning that publishes this detailed guide with enrollment and other information on every accredited program.

On an unrelated note, newcomers to the field might be interested in Planetizen’s post on “Top Plannng Issues of 2006.”