MIT Architecture

The big “finding” here—which is actually not that remarkable when you stop to think about it—is that “academic” and “professional” planners live and work in different worlds, and have developed different worldviews as a result of their respective perspectives. In structuring and developing partnerships between academic and applied planning—whether single semester research projects, internships, or ongoing university/community efforts—we would be wise to pay attention to these differences to ensure success for all parties.

Since 1974 the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has administered the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program to invest over $100B dollars in America's low-income communities, through housing, job creation, public services, and other community development projects.

Over the past decade, the U.S. Census Bureau has implemented the American Community Survey as a replacement for its traditional decennial “long-form” survey. This year—for the first time ever—ACS data was made available at the census tract and block group level for the entire nation, representing geographies small enough to be useful to local planners; in the future these estimates will be updated on a yearly basis, providing much more current data than was ever available in the past.