Calling all planners in the Commonwealth!

With politicians asking questions about the value of higher education, and some universities fearing financial ruin as a result of Covid-19, time to revisit one of my 2002 columns for Planning.

My column in Planning in 1987, has a contemporary feel in 2020 as issues of mass unemployment and Council cuts come to the fore once again.

In a week when my term of office as President of the Royal Town Planning Institute came to a close, I also faced being made redundant.

Back in 2006 I wrote an article in Planning, which recalled my working environment in 1973. Here it is.

On World Town Planning Day 2019, I was part of an event in Dundee organised by RTPI (Scotland) with the theme "Through the Years, Across the Globe". Discussion during and after prompted me to ponder Scotland's messages to an international audience of planners and urbanists.

The recent World Urban Forum was an opportunity to show UK engagement with urbanisation as a global issue. It was missed.

The EU has rightly made the issue of Ireland a central element of the Brexit negotiations. What might be the territorial  impact of creating an external border between Ireland and Northern Ireland?

The 2006 World Urban Forum was a significant step on the road to creating a New Urban Agenda. Here is my first hand account from July 2006 of how we went about re-inventing planning.

Earlier this week I was honoured to receive the OBE for services to planning, at an investiture at Buckingham Palace.