City Planning

1 Introduction

1.1 Read the text title and hypothesize what the text is about. Write down your hypothesis.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

1.2 What do you know concerning this issue? List your ideas in the table left column “I know”.

1.3 If you know answers to these questions write them down in the space given after each question.

1.4 Circle in the list the words and expressions you know. Write down their translation in the table and calculate the percentage of your lexical competence.

City planning is the process of preparing programs to guide the development of cities and towns. City planners – the people who direct the process – advise local governments on ways to improve communities. They also advise governments and real estate developers who are planning entirely new neighborhoods and communities. City planners try to predict the future. They attempt to forecast such developments as large changes in population and industrial activity.

City planners deal chiefly with the physical layout of communities. They make proposals designed to beautify communities and to make life in them comfortable, enjoyable, and profitable. Their proposals include slum-clearance programs, projects to replace run-down housing, recreation areas, shopping centers, and plans to improve transportation and parking facilities.

A city planner’s day-to-day work chiefly involves improvements in parts of a community. But a planner views a community as a single system in which all the parts are dependent on one another. A planner may create a master plan and use it as the basis for all the work. The city planner’s suggestions for changes in any part of a community must follow the master plan. For example, the plan might restrict the height of buildings in residential areas.