Outlook for the environmental planning field in the future

[unxnx]

Hi, All,
My major is Chemistry, but I have great interest in Environmental Planning. I am now looking for information to learn about this field. I'm wondering if any one of you would give me some recently hot topics and future trend in this field. Any recommendations on the classical textbooks I can read will also be welcomed.
Your help will be greatly appreciated.

[Leavy]

i'd also like to hear what people think about starting off in an Environmental Planning career. is a Community Planning and Development program with a land use track adequate? what does the job maket look like?

Thanks for any guidance.
Lynn.

[unxnx]

I'm waiting day by day.
I'd like to focus on urban ecology.
Is there anyone who could give me any suggestion on this field about the concentrations?
I will appreciate your replies very very much!

[krbxtigerz]

I'm also interested in what the outlook is for environmental planning.
Is there going to be a big demand for environmental planers??

[Tide]

Currently there is a big demand for environmental planners. There have been several unfilled jobs looking for individuals with 5+ or 8+ years. Currently the entry market is very tight. If you are going to school right now environmental planning might not be a bad choice especially if more and more stimulus money is pumped into the economy because every transit and transportation job needs at least an EA if not an EIS so there will be work to be done. It's not my cup of tea, I chose not to go that route in grad school and may be paying for it now. I could have a job but would be bored if I studied environmental planning.

[krbxtigerz]

Originally posted by Tide

Currently there is a big demand for environmental planners. There have been several unfilled jobs looking for individuals with 5+ or 8+ years. Currently the entry market is very tight. If you are going to school right now environmental planning might not be a bad choice especially if more and more stimulus money is pumped into the economy because every transit and transportation job needs at least an EA if not an EIS so there will be work to be done. It's not my cup of tea, I chose not to go that route in grad school and may be paying for it now. I could have a job but would be bored if I studied environmental planning.

what kind of courses do you have to take if you choose your focus on environment planning?? what kind of salaries does an environment planner get after getting the master's degree?

[Tide]

I didn't go the environmental route so I'm not sure about courses, check with an advisor if that is your goal. Salary wise it would be comparable to any other planner just more specialized and, in my opinion, a much drier topic.

[nrschmid]

As a consultant I worked in environmental planning for 4 years, in addition to a ton of other planning specializations. My BUP is a general planning degree without any specialization. I prepared EISs (Environmental Impact Statements), EAs (Environmental Assessments), ECADs (Environmental Class Action Determinations), ESRs (Environmental Survey Requests), FONSIs (Finding of No Significant Impacts), etc.

I had one required environmental planning class during my undergrad at UIUC. It had absolutely NOTHING to do with what I did in environmental planning. If anything it was more of an ecology course. If anything, course work in land use planinng, physical planning, noise studies, waste management, local ecology, transportation planning, and historic preservation helped me more as I needed to determine what level of environmental impacts were caused by proposed improvements. Half of the environmental planning projects I worked on were for transportation improvements and the other half was for development. I agree, environmental planning is very dry (but still interesting and challenging). In some ways environmental planning, historic preservation, and grant writing (all of which I worked in) are similar because you spend most of the billable hours filling out forms and contacting agencies to verify everything.