University of North Carolina, by John A. Parker, Head, Department of City and Regional Planning, University of North Carolina
Early in the 1940’s educators and planning agencies in the southeastern part of the United States were discussing the need for planning education in their region. TVA and state planning agencies in the southeast had brought an international reputation to the region as a center of planning activity. Lack of a regional training program meant that competent personnel to staff such agencies had to be imported from other parts of the country.
In 1944, at a meeting attended by representatives of TVA and state and local planning agencies in the south, it was agreed that such a program was needed, and that the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill would be the logical center for its activities. Described by Jonathan Daniels as “the capitol of the southern mind”, the University of North Carolina had long been recognized as the leading educational institution in its region.
In 1944, within the University itself, there was developing a growing enthusiasm for a planning program. The following year the President of the University set up a committee made up of five department heads and the Dean of the Graduate School to consult with TVA and other planning officials on the feasibility of providing for the education of planners.
In September of 1946, Frank P. Graham, then President of the University , announced the establishment of the new Department as follows: “Our University is rich in resources needed for the training of planners. The Department of City and Regional Planning has been established to facilitate the development and co-ordination of these resources and to organize a professional program for the training of planners.”
With the help and advice of University faculty, TVA, professional planners, and the General Education Board of the Rockefeller Foundation, a faculty was selected and studies of the proposed program were matured and approved. The full program leading to a Master’s Degree in planning began in January, 1947.
In spite of the reputation the University had achieved through the work of Howard W. Odum, Rupert B. Vance, and others, as a center for regional study and regional research, it was agreed that the most urgent need was for personnel trained in urban planning, and that the development of an educational program in regional planning should be postponed until the city planning program was fully developed. It was also agreed that in view of the large number of small cities and towns within the region, the need was for the mature general practitioner who could take his place within a year or two after graduation as director of planning in such communities. For this reason it was decided that for the time being emphasis would be placed upon training at the graduate level. Collaborating with the Department today in the training of planners are members of the faculties of the Departments of Economics, Political Science, Sociology and Sanitary Engineering; the Institute for Research in Social Science, and the Institute of Government at Chapel Hill; as well as representatives of the Departments of Architecture and Landscape Architecture at North Carolina State College which is part of the Consolidated University of North Carolina.
Since the Department opened its doors, four years ago, more than half of the student body has come from outside the region, with the largest contingent coming from New York City.Curriculum
The curriculum has been developed largely under the direction of a faculty who received their training at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and reflects the M.I.T. approach, adapted to the needs of the southeast and utilizing the resources of its institution and region. Close collaboration with federal and regional programs in nearby Washington and TVA has also had its effect on the curriculum.
As at Harvard and M.I.T., students enter the program having specialized as undergraduates in one of a variety of fields among the design sciences and social sciences. The length of the course leading to the Master’s Degree is generally two years, but varies in individual cases, depending on the previous training and experience of the student.
In order to establish a common base for which students from diverse backgrounds can move ahead in their consideration of problems of community development, special orientation is given. Students without a design background are given instruction in design theory, methods and techniques as they apply to the practice of city planning. This course is concerned with abstract design, civic design, and land planning. Likewise students from architecture, engineering and landscape architecture are introduced to basic courses in the social science fields.
A series of problems dealing with the development or redevelopment of a subdivision, a new town, an existing town, a central area or a neighborhood, and a state or region, constitute the core of the planning curriculum. As will be described later such problems are frequently undertaken with the advice and participation of the locality concerned.
Running concurrently with these problems, and whenever possible coordinated with them, are a series of courses in transportation and circulation, sanitary engineering, housing, statistics, planning and government, planning legislation and administration, and planning methods and techniques.Relations with Planning Agencies
In keeping with the tradition of the University, student projects are undertaken not only for their educational value, but with a view to being of service to the community. Nearness to Washington, TVA, active state planning agencies, and to a large number of rapidly growing cities and towns has provided opportunity for collaboration on a number of projects under the joint supervision of the staffs of such agencies and the faculty of the Department.
Each spring the first-year students are assigned individually or in groups to a city in the region for the purpose of preparing a preliminary study toward a master plan. The faculty selects the communities to be studied, estimates the cost of expenses involved in such a project, and develops an agreement with the local administration by which the community pays such expenses as travel, subsistence, and the cost of blueprints, photostats, and duplication of the report. The local planning board meets at regular intervals with the students. In the absence of a planning board a special committee is appointed by the mayor. Final results are presented by the students to a joint meeting of the city council and the planning body.
Fourteen such projects have been undertaken and officially presented to communities since the Department was founded in 1946. Aside from the educational value of these studies, they have encouraged and assisted a number of communities in the development of comprehensive planning programs. Four years ago one North Carolina city had a permanent resident planning staff. Today nine cities in the State have initiated continuing programs with technical assistance.
Planning agencies in the region, as well as in other parts of the country, collaborate with the Department on its internship program. All students are required to undertake a three-month practice period in a planning agency between their first and second year. Reports are submitted at regular intervals by the student and the agency, and the performance of the student is taken into account in shaping up his second year program.
Agencies collaborating with the Department in its internship program include TVA, the state planning and development agencies in Tennessee and Virginia, and municipal agencies in Illinois, Ohio, New York and North Carolina.
Problems concerned with the redevelopment of central areas are frequently undertaken at the request of city officials, and when completed are presented by the students at meetings of officials and citizens.
Student theses generally include a field project which is developed in collaboration with a planning agency, and are conducted under the joint supervision of the faculty of the Department and the staff of the agency.
Such projects as outlined above are common to most schools of planning in America. They are described here only to illustrate the extent to which the Chapel Hill program is tied in with the development of the region.Research
At the time the Department was established it was agreed that a research program in city planning would be conducted by the planning faculty under the auspices of the Institute for Research in Social Science. Research projects now in progress are closely related to the problems of the region, and to the educational program of the Department.
Projects currently under way include investigations into methods of encouraging dispersed growth of cities, and a study of the organization, scope, and co-ordination of the work of agencies concerned with the comprehensive development of small cities and towns.The German Group
This year the Department is engaged in a training program for a group of eleven German City Planners under the auspices of the Department of State and the Office of the United States High Commissioner for Germany.
The training at Chapel Hill is part of the State Department’s reorientation program under which selected specialists in various fields are brought to the United States to observe how their chosen field functions in a democracy.
The Germans are regularly enrolled in the Department. They receive orientation in American Government as well as a special series of seminars in American Planning. Groups of German officials in other fields have been placed with such American universities as Harvard, Syracuse, Chicago, California, and Duke.
Several members of the German group have been developing programs for projects to be undertaken after they return to Germany. These include the study and evaluation of city planning in Germany today as compared with other countries, and a proposed plan for the establishment of a School for City Planning in Germany.