What Is Urban Planning? Video

PROJECT SUMMARY: “What is Urban Planning?” - It's a question that city planners often get from friends, family, and neighbors. In Fall 2014, a few friends and fellow urban planning students began discussing how we get this question frequently, and yet we each have different ways of answering it. An idea was hatched to poll our classmates on how they respond to this question, and make a video that anyone could share to bring these answers to life.

Betsy Cooper, Douglas Thomas, Adam Smith, and I worked together through the University of Michigan's Taubman College and the Agora Journal of Urban Planning and Design to produce this stop-motion sketch video illustrating some of the responses our fellow planning students gave us. Since we released the video in April 2015, it has been featured and shared by the Associated Schools of Collegiate Planning, Planetizen, and the American Planning Association. With over 170 thousand views on Youtube and 30 thousand views on Vimeo, it has also become Taubman College’s most viewed video to date. As we came to learn, this video tapped into a question commonly on city planners' minds, and communicated responses that many have been able to identify with. 

TEAM: University of Michigan Taubman College and the Agora Journal of Urban Planning and Design

ROLE: As a member of the Creative Team at the Agora Journal of Urban Planning and Design, I served as the project manager. In this role I also contributed storyboarding, voice narration, social media management, and production logistics.

TOOLS USED: charcoal drawing chalk and paper; Google Docs and Sheets; Facebook