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Town and Gown
Sumner Sharpe has a vision of urban and regional development that encompasses not only the communities within that region, but also the universities and other resources located within their parameters. A region that grows responsibly and also thrives economically is a living laboratory for urban and regional planning, he says.
“Regions are the economic engines, or drivers, of what is happening worldwide,” Sharpe says. As such, they are excellent case studies for the convergence of quality of life issues and local planning.
That theory is based largely on the changing dynamics of the world in which we live. Whereas the businesses and industries within a community once helped shaped its infrastructure (i.e: businesses attracted employees, who built homes in the area, thus driving the need for roads and services), that model is changing. Gone are the days when a job dictated where a person lived. Many people now create their own businesses and work from home via computers and cell phones.
“People can now live anywhere, so quality of life becomes more of an issue in attracting them to one community over another,” Sharpe says.
Sharpe is a fellow of the American Institute of Certified Planners and a member of the American Planning Association’s National Education Committee. Instrumental in the success of the Toulan School of Urban and Regional Planning at Portland State University, he is employed by Parametrix, a planning and environmental consulting firm, and is “Planner in Residence” at the Toulan School.
His teaching strategy involves hands-on theory and practice, especially within urban planning programs. Those programs won’t do well, he says, until communities see them as an asset to future growth. As an example of a successful program, he points to a case where GIS (Geographic Information Systems) students volunteered for projects identified by surrounding cities and counties. “Research is not in an ivory tower,” he says, “it’s out in the field. That’s really critical. In my mind, it’s the bottom line.”
Sharpe uses the term “transparency” when talking about this cooperative model. “There needs to be transparency in building a relationship,” he says, “so that both sides can look to each other.”
Urban universities, such as Portland State, or Boise State in Idaho, have an advantage in this model. Almost every urban and regional planning program around the country, Sharpe says, has some mechanism for reaching out to community partners.
State universities are particularly effective in building these relationships because of their inherent community ties and ability to connect with local values. A big part of dealing with quality of life issues is to be sensitive to a community’s unique features and work toward preserving those, not losing them.
In a state like Idaho, that advantage goes beyond the immediate area to encompass the larger region. “There are no programs in Nevada, Montana, Wyoming, eastern Oregon ... BSU has the opportunity to really be a regional resource,” he says.
To fulfill that role, a university or other resource must project out 20 years, he says, to see what lies on the horizon. One way to do that is to look at other cities that are already experiencing the population growth expected in the Boise region in the next 20 years, and see what they are dealing with. What are their issues? What resources are available to them? “The idea is to build those resources now and support for them will come as the area hits its target population,” Sharpe says.
As an example, he points to Portland’s light rail system, implemented in the late 1980s. Although not used to capacity at the outset, Sharpe says its use has increased as time has gone on and will only rise as an increase in population makes other forms of transportation less efficient.
In fact, Oregon offers a number of examples in the field of urban planning, in part because it was among the first states to adopt a series of statewide goals for both conservation and development. As early as the 1970s, the state required cities to create comprehensive plans to protect agricultural and forestry resource lands and to manage growth in the urban areas.
The Willamette Valley became sort of a poster child and state legislation followed. Other states have looked at Oregon as an example and see the importance of states enabling laws undergirding local plans and ordinances, he says. “I think that’s beginning to happen in Idaho. You need a shared vision of what you want to conserve and how you want to develop, and then be willing to invest in that politically and financially.”
Sharpe became a planner almost by accident. As an undergraduate majoring in geography, he took classes in economics and sociology — sort of an urban studies program. An urban sociology course got him hooked on city and regional planning. He went on to the Master’s in City and Regional Planning program at Cornell at a time when many people in the United States had never heard of urban planning, and did post-graduate study in London, taking advantage of the opportunity to tour through Europe where the discipline and practice were quite advanced.
After he returned to the United States, he served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Thailand for two years, teaching town and country planning at Chulalongkorn University, then returned to the states and jobs with a city planning office in Vancouver, Wash.; a regional planning agency in Portland; and directed a non-profit community development agency in Clark County, Wash. When the opportunity came to join the Urban Studies program at Portland State, he grabbed it and was there for 17 years before going into full-time consulting practice.
“It’s been a great ride,” he says. “I’ve had a great time. To work in the Portland region as a planner — Wow!”
Written by Kathleen Craven
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