ABSTRACT
Asian economies on the whole are booming. Though the rate and extent of growth are uneven, the impact of this growth on Asian urban development is relatively similar. Rapid economic growth has a number of urban consequences: increasing rural to urban migration, mounting pressures to develop the urban fringe and rising demands for infrastructure. The skylines of major Asian cities and even the not-so-major cities are all being transformed at an unprecedented rate. It is an exciting and exasperating time for planners and planning educators in Asia. Economic growth is opening vast opportunities for the planning practitioner and perhaps it will increase the awareness of the need for high-quality planning education. Planning education in Asia is poised for a new era of expansion. This paper seeks to examine the challenge facing Asian planning educators and to raise questions about the type of planning education that might be equal to the tasks ahead.
