ABSTRACT
Planners play an important role in shaping the environment. They take responsibility for guiding and managing the development of cities, and for shaping the future directions of city development. Planners focus on land use and work primarily in development control, policy, strategic and forward planning, and can be found working at national and local government level, in private consultancies and in governmental and non-governmental agencies. Planning and planners influence children’s lives and experiences. The policies they implement, the design ideas they support and the decisions that they take all manipulate and shape the environment in which children live, and thus materially impact on the quality of children’s lives. Planners outside specific child or youth oriented council initiatives seldom take children’s needs and views into account in development or policy planning. They are neither trained to work on behalf of children nor with children, though children are possibly even more influenced by the nature of their environment than their adult counterparts. Yet the decisions they take, the policies they implement, and the developmental trends they support do have direct impacts on children’s lives and well-being. Planners need to be aware of children and young people in the way they plan the environment and to be aware of how the decisions they make impact on children. In order to do so, planners need to have a better understanding of children’s lives and societal relationships and to have access to and support from child and youth centred policies and practice. In the discussion of physical environments, the emphasis is on environments that work for younger children. Where discussion relates to older children, the term ‘young people’ is used. This chapter then explores the relationship between planning, social and environmental change and children and young people’s lives. It looks at how changes and developments in cities over time have impacted on their lives and offers positive ideas on how future planning can be improved for children and young people.
