Within the context of the challenges and innovative approaches described earlier, the GRHS 2009 had identified promising trends and opportunities for urban planning to be re-established as an effective tool for the management of human settlement in the 21st century.Opportunities exist for incorporating the informal sector contribution in urban development, for responding to environmental concerns and to manage the carbon footprint of cities and the risk and vulnerability to natural disasters and conflicts, while at the same time ensuring that planning contributes to managing the growth of cities and to providing shelter for their inhabitants.The project will therefore contribute positively to a new paradigm of urban/regional planning that is proactive, strategic, flexible, phased, spatially integrated and linked with municipal-level budgeting and finance systems, to contribute to sustainable urban development.Despite its aspirations, strategic planning is still regarded as too complex and ineffective. There is still ample room to make it more appealing, by documenting successes and providing simplified tools. In this context, it is intended to develop simplified tools and to continue the revision of existing ones, in order to best incorporate the principle of sustainability. Attention to the participatory process around strategic planning will be maintained to ensure its objectives are relevant for all groups, and particularly the urban poor.One way to disseminate new approaches will be via institutions of education. The 2009 GRHS found that, in more than half of the world's countries, not a single university offers a degree in urban planning, whereas even in countries with established planning degrees the programmes may emphasize the older ‘rational planning' model with little attention to current trends and approaches. This programme component will help to address that gap through partnerships with the international Association of Planning Schools.An ultimate form of impact at the normative level will be achieved through supporting countries in updating their national urban policies and urban planning frameworks. The 2009 GRHS found that the planning frameworks in many developing countries still reflect a colonial legacy; such laws and regulations could be modified to facilitate the implementation of some of the new urban planning approaches discussed above. Likewise multi-level planning systems may feature overlapping responsibilities and lack coherence. UN-Habitat will engage where opportunities will be highest to influence ongoing reform processes, however, it is aware that achieving results at this level may well take years, and thus may not lie within the present programme component timeframe.Urban planning at the neighbourhood and city level can play an important role in promoting sustainable urban development and in contributing to improved quality of life in the community. The project will pay particular attention to the planning of urban expansions, and mechanisms for guiding land occupation towards more orderly patterns, with higher densities and better proportions between built-up and street space and wider landscape connectivity and ecosystem functionality.The project will aim at filling several gaps at the normative and operational levels, namely gaps in policy development and analysis, comparative benchmarking, availability of good practices, capacity within national and local actors, as well as institutionalized mechanisms for peer learning and other forms of capacity building. The project strategy is developed at 3 levels:At global level it will develop tools and guidance to support local action, reform and learning, including awareness materials, technical tools, documented case studies and analysis of good practices. At national level, it will work on national urban policies as well as to analyze planning frameworks as a way to identify opportunities for introducing innovations and engage in reform processes, and will work with key stakeholders for capacity building and awareness.At city level, it will develop pilot activities for implementation of planning initiatives and provide expertise on key urban planning issues to local governments and other stakeholders groups.A loop of feedback to gather lessons learnt and develop policy inputs will also be nurtured from local to global level.
