Jane Jacobs in the context of "City planning"

Urban planning (also called city planning or town planning in some contexts) is the process of developing and designing land use and the built environment, including air, water, and the infrastructure passing into and out of urban areas, such as transportation, communications, and distribution networks, and their accessibility. Traditionally, urban planning followed a top-down approach in master planning the physical layout of human settlements. The primary concern was the public welfare, which included considerations of efficiency, sanitation, protection and use of the environment, as well as taking account of effects of the master plans on the social and economic activities. Over time, urban planning has adopted a focus on the social and environmental "bottom lines" that focuses on using planning as a tool to improve the health and well-being of people and maintain sustainability standards. In the early 21st century, urban planning experts such as Jane Jacobs called on urban planners to take resident experiences and needs more into consideration.

Urban planning answers questions about how people will live, work, and play in a given area and thus, guides orderly development in urban, suburban and rural areas. Although predominantly concerned with the planning of settlements and communities, urban planners are also responsible for planning the efficient transportation of goods, resources, people, and waste; the distribution of basic necessities such as water and electricity; a sense of inclusion and opportunity for people of all kinds, culture and needs; economic growth or business development; improving health and conserving areas of natural environmental significance that actively contributes to reduction in CO₂ emissions as well as protecting heritage structures and built environments. Since most urban planning teams consist of highly educated individuals that work for city governments, recent debates focus on how to involve more community members in city planning processes.

The City Beautiful movement is a reform philosophy of North American architecture and urban planning that flourished during the 1890s and 1900s with the intent of introducing beautification and monumental grandeur in cities. It was a part of the progressive social reform movement in North America under the leadership of the upper-middle class, which was concerned with poor living conditions in all major cities. The movement, which was originally associated mainly with Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Kansas City and Washington, D.C., promoted beauty not only for its own sake, but also to create moral and civic virtue among urban populations.

Advocates of the philosophy believed that such beautification could promote a harmonious social order that would increase the quality of life, while critics would complain that the movement was overly concerned with aesthetics at the expense of social reform. Jane Jacobs referred to the movement as an "architectural design cult."

The Death and Life of Great American Cities is a 1961 book by writer and activist Jane Jacobs. The book is a critique of 1950s urban planning policy, which it holds responsible for the decline of many city neighborhoods in the United States. The book is Jacobs' best-known and most influential work.

Jacobs was a critic of "rationalist" planners of the 1950s and 1960s, especially Robert Moses, as well as the earlier work of Le Corbusier. She argued that urban planning should prioritize the needs and experiences of residents, and modernist urban planning overlooked and oversimplified the complexity of human lives in diverse communities. She opposed large-scale urban renewal programs that affected entire neighborhoods and built freeways through inner cities. She instead advocated for dense mixed-use development and walkable streets, with the "eyes on the street" of passers-by helping to maintain public order. She suggested preserving the existing city fabric, including old buildings and established communities.

In urban planning, walkability is the accessibility of amenities within a reasonable walking distance. It is based on the idea that urban spaces should be more than just transport corridors designed for maximum vehicle throughput. Instead, it should be relatively complete livable spaces that serve a variety of uses, users, and transportation modes and reduce the need for cars for travel. The first of the ten principles of New Urbanism is walkability.

The term "walkability" was primarily invented in the 1960s due to Jane Jacobs' revolution in urban studies. Within a few decades, the concept became popular because of its health, economic, and environmental benefits. It is an essential concept of sustainable urban design. Factors influencing walkability include the presence or absence and quality of footpaths, sidewalks or other pedestrian rights-of-way, traffic and road conditions, land use patterns, building accessibility, and safety, among others.

This is a list of urban theorists notable in their field, in alphabetical order:

• Christopher Alexander (1936-2022)
• Donald Appleyard (1928-1982)
• Michael E. Arth
• Christopher Charles Benninger (1942)
• Walter Block (1941)
• Ernest Burgess (1886-1966)
• Peter Calthorpe (1949)
• Manuel Castells (1942)
• Ildefons Cerdà (1815-1876)
• Gordon Cullen (1914-1994)
• Mike Davis (1946-2022)
• Constantinos Doxiadis (1914-1975)
• Andrés Duany (1949)
• Richard Florida
• John Friedmann
• Joel Garreau
• Patrick Geddes (1854-1932)
• Jan Gehl
• Paul Goodman
• Percival Goodman (1904-1989)
• Adam Greenfield
• Peter Hall (1932-2014)
• David Harvey
• Ebenezer Howard (1850-1928)
• Arata Isozaki
• Allan Jacobs (1928)
• Jane Jacobs (1916-2006)
• Kiyonori Kikutake (1928-2011)
• Rem Koolhaas (1944)
• Kisho Kurokawa (1934-2007)
• Fumihiko Maki
• James Howard Kunstler
• Le Corbusier (1887-1965)
• Loretta Lees
• Henri Lefebvre (1901-1991)
• Jiří Löw
• Kevin A. Lynch (1918-1984)
• Rob Krier (1938)
• Richard L. Meier (1920-2007)
• Lewis Mumford (1895-1990)
• Saverio Muratori (1910-1973)
• Clarence Perry (1872-1944)
• Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk
• Miguel Robles-Durán
• Witold Rybczynski
• Thomas Sieverts
• Camillo Sitte (1843-1903)
• Edward Soja (1940-2015)
• Ignasi de Solà-Morales (1942-2001)
• Kenzo Tange (1913-2005)
• Robert Venturi (1925-2018)
• William H. Whyte (1917-1999)
• Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959)
• Sharon Zukin (1946)