Urban & Regional Planning

What is this course about?
The Urban and Regional Planning program teaches strong foundations in urban and regional planning, with the opportunity for students to develop more specialised knowledge in emergent areas, such as environmental design, planning for better structured cities, and sustainable management.

Urban and regional planners are increasingly involved in formulating policies, guiding urban and environmental initiatives, and in managing the social, environmental and economic impacts of development. The program places considerable emphasis on students learning appropriate communication, reasoning and analytical skills for making valuable contributions to the wider emergent professional roles.

There is also an opportunity to specialise, by selecting from the range of options offered in the Housing Studies or Heritage Conservation streams.

Who should take this course?
Professionals wishing to develop their skills in urban and regional planning would be well suited to this course.

Program Coordinator: Martin Payne

Professional membership
The program is accredited by the Planning Institute of Australia. Masters graduates are eligible, subject to professional experience requirements, for corporate membership of PIA.

Admission Requirements

Masters applicants should hold a bachelors degree with a credit average. Graduate Diploma applicants should hold a bachelors degree. Graduate Certificate applicants should hold a bachelors degree or possess experience which is considered to demonstrate the knowledge and aptitude required to undertake the course.

Core Units of Study

Total credit points required

Graduate Certificate 24
Core 18, Options 0, Electives 6
Graduate Diploma 48
Core 24, Options 0, Electives 24
Master 72
Core 48, Options 0, Electives 24

All Masters students must complete a Report or Dissertation. Candidates of sufficient merit, who complete the Dissertation, will qualify for the award of the degree with Honours.

Foundations of Environmental Planning
PLAN9063, 6 credit points, semester 1, classes: weekly

History and Theory in Urban Planning
PLAN9068, 6 credit points, semester 1, classes: weekly

Urban Design and Development Control
PLAN9069, 6 credit points, semester 1, classes: weekly

Planning Procedures
PLAN9061, 6 credit points, semester 1 & 2, classes: intensive

Planning Law
PLAN9062, 6 credit points, semester 1 & 2, classes: weekly

Land Use and Infrastructure Planning
PLAN9064, 6 credit points, semester 2, classes: weekly

Planning Dissertation 1 & 2
PLAN9010 (1), PLAN 9011 (2), 24 credit points, semester 1 & 2, classes: fortnightly meetings
(For Masters of Urban & Regional Planning students only)
(Dissertations are 12 credit points each and must be taken together)

Planning Report
PLAN9018, 12 credit points, semester 1 & 2, classes: fortnightly meetings
(For Masters of Urban & Regional Planning students only)

Option Units & Electives

Elective units without specialisation

Resource and Environmental Management
PLAN9065, 6 credit points, semester 1, classes: weekly

Economic Tools and Community Development
PLAN9045, 6 credit points, semester 2, classes: intensive,

Environmental Design and Planning
PLAN9048, 6 credit points, semester 2, classes: intensive

Metropolitan Planning
PLAN9067, 6 credit points, semester 2, classes: intensive

GIS Based Planning Policy and Analysis
PLAN9073, 6 credit points, semester 2, classes: weekly

Public and Community Finance for Planners
PLAN9073, 6 credit points, semester 2, classes: weekly

Development Project Planning and Design
PLAN9049, 6 credit points, semester 1, classes: intensive

Graduate Studio - Design Guildelines
PLAN9070, 12 credit points, semester 2, classes: weekly
Available 2011

Option units with specialisation

Heritage Conservation stream
Master - total 72 credit points
Core 48, Options 18, Electives 6

History and Theory of Conservation
ARCH9074, 6 credit points, semester 1, classes: weekly

Conservation Methods and Practices
ARCH9028, 12 credit points, semester 1, classes: weekly

Housing Studies stream
Master - total 72 credit points
Core 48, Options 12, Electives 12

Housing and Urban and Regional Development
ARCH9071, 6 credit points, semester 1, classes: intensive

Housing Policy and Assistance
PLAN9072, 6 credit points, semester 2, classes: intensive

Electives

Students are encouraged to choose electives from any graduate program. Students must refer to the web for timetables.

Students commencing in July semester should note that some units have prerequisite units offered in March semester. This may affect enrolment choice. Students should consult the student admissions coordinator () to ensure their length of candidature will not be affected.

Just want to study one unit of study as professional development?

For Professional Development courses click here

Educational aims and learning competencies

Teaching in the urban and regional planning program is directed towards a range of educational aims and learning outcomes. A fundamental aim is to teach planning as a scholarly and professional activity. Academic and vocational aims are entwined and mutually reinforcing, as indicated under the goals and objectives of the Faculty’s Strategic Plan 2000-2005.

Aims
The aims of the Urban and Regional Planning Program are:

To provide students with opportunities to study a range of relevant subjects and prepare for a variety of careers in planning practice, research and related areas.
To provide an educational program that engenders critical and reflective planning practice, and fosters competence in performing key planning tasks.
To equip students so they can respond flexibly to a wide range of situations and adapt to changing contexts.
To inform students about urban planning systems in Australia and other countries, and related procedures involved in urban development and managing the environment.
To enable students to meet the challenges of working in a multicultural and pluralistic society.
To instill ethical professional behaviour and probity.
To promote an ethical approach towards planning and managing the environment, while striving for social justice.
To promote the objectives of environmentally sustainable urban and regional development.
To promote competent and innovative investigations of and responses to planning issues, policies and outcomes.

Learning Outcomes
Learning outcomes cover the key competencies that students will have achieved on completion of the Urban and Regional Planning Program. Graduates will be able to demonstrate the following:

A critical approach to the definition of planning issues and ability to discern how they are framed and addressed.
Skills using alternative modes of analysis and innovative research methods.
Competence in independent, self-directed learning.
Skills enabling learning from practical experience and application of ideas drawn from past practice to new situations.
A coherent understanding of planning as a professional activity operating within a complex context. In particular, students will achieve a knowledge of the following elements:
- Roles and basic structures of government,
- Planning procedures and legal requirements,
- Types of planning and policy instruments,
- Roles of private and public agencies,
- Management of change in the built environment,
- Human activities and systems operating within the built environment.
Knowledge of the scope of environmental planning in both the natural and built environments.
Skills in preparing basic planning discourses, including:
- Planning proposals and instruments,
- Planning studies, including impact, community, and economic,
- Development applications and approvals.
Competence with using key forms of information, methods and reasoning that are basic to planning practice.
Developing skills with working in groups, especially with listening, negotiating, and organising team work.
Developing skills in interpreting and understanding of planning issues and their contexts, and in making sound, appropriate responses.
Knowledge of key concepts in planning literature (history, theory, methods and law) and ability to draw upon this knowledge in responding to specific planning issues.
Developing a high level of competence in computer applications in planning, including internet and web based resources. Mandatory units and specialisations.

Career Profiles

Gabrielle Phillip

What do you do? I am now working for the Housing Policy and Strategy Directorate.

How did you get there? After I graduated with my Masters in Planning from the University of Sydney I worked for a Local Council as a Housing Officer and as a more traditional planner. As a Housing officer I worked at preserving low income housing stock and helping the council work with developers and the State Government to create new low income housing. As a planner, I also assessed the impact of proposed development applications.

Later I moved to the Department of Housing where I managed a number of housing programs including the crisis accommodation program and the community housing program. This involved a range of duties including setting budgets, providing advice to people running the programs and providing policy advice to senior staff about how these programs could be changed. Somehow I also managed to fit in finishing a Ph.D!

What is the one thing that sticks in your mind about your time studying planning at the University of Sydney? The staff are very well qualified and professional in their approach to study and supervision. In my area of specialisation (housing), the staff are well known both locally and internationally.

Stephanie Barket, BScArch/MURP

After she graduated as an architect, Stephanie Barker worked in inner city redevelopment for a couple of years. But before too long, she decided that planning was more her style, so she returned to study for a Master of Urban and Regional Planning.

"It was a shift from client-based work to having communities as your client." said Ms Barker, who is now a senior planner with Planning NSW.

"I did my master's thesis about the team that I'm now the senior planner for, basically looking at how new urban areas get created. I worked for a couple of years for Liverpool Council, which had a lot of that work going on. I'm now in a more strategic area, working on the new suburbs that cross all of Sydney.

Ms Barker is part of a new wave, trying to bring a more "sustainable approach" to urban development.

"Rather that doing things as we have been with car-dependant urban sprawl, [we are] actually building new communities that have high amenity, public transport and local employment." she said.

The Planning Research Centre

The Planning Research Centre's main purpose is to further fundamental research into physical planning and development. It also sponsors seminars in specialised fields, undertakes research and consultancy projects, runs professional development courses, and promotes the publication of research material. It has an active membership comprised of members of government and industry.

Who employs planners?

Planners are usually employed in four areas:

Government: Planners are involved in all levels of Government from local councils to State and Federal Governments. Local Government is perhaps the biggest employer, with planners being responsible for planning and assessing development within their council areas.
Private consultants: Consultants are most often employed by developers, local residents or on contract to local councils or other government bodies in Australia and overseas.
Private Companies: An increasing number of large companies employ their own planners on staff to handle development projects for that company.
A wide variety of other professions, including engineering, architecture, education, and environmental and recreation management also employ planners.

MASTER OF TRANSPORT MANAGEMENT / URBAN & REGIONAL PLANNING

The Master of Transport Management/ Master of Urban and Regional Planning award course is a path-breaking initiative in cross-disciplinary postgraduate education between the Faculties of Economics and Business and Architecture, Design & Planning. Integrating specialised study in urban and regional planning and transport management with carefully tailored study in key areas of urban and transport planning, the program offers urban and regional planners a specially crafted and cohesive program of study that draws together knowledge from the fields of land use and transport planning, urban design, transport policy, environmental management, transport economics. Although built around a core of essential knowledge, the program also allows students scope to undertake advanced study in one of more areas of urban, regional and transport planning. Students will be prepared for careers in local government traffic and planning as well as regional and national planning organisations as well as private consultants engaged in transportation and traffic management.

For more details of the Master of Transport Management/Urban and Regional Planning click here

For more details of the Master of Transport Management and Master of Urban and Regional Planning click here

The University of Sydney - Faculty of Architecture, Design and Planning