Routine?

[Greenescapist]

How routine do you feel your career is as a planner? If someone becomes bored easily with repetitive tasks, would you tell them to stay away from planning?

The issues and analysis that go into planning fascinate me, but I am afraid that a few years down the line, municipal planning work could become dull.

I appreciate any thoughts on this or suggestions on how you keep your planning career lively.

Thanks!

 

[tbombadill]

Very few routine days...

Green,
I've been a planner for 12 yrs. The only thing I find routine in this business is the need to constantly justify to developers and builders the need for certain ordinances and regulations. This will never change, so my challenge is to, every day, approach enforcement of planning regs from a fresh point of view, or at least a renewed sense of duty. If it were not for that, I find very little routine in doing this thing called planning. Among the reasons for my enthusiasm:

People change.
Laws change.
Planning changes.

The latest government buzzwords about groundwater conservation, limitations on well withdrawals, blah,blah, are a planner's dream. There's so much science in putting together these laws about water withdrawal, that to be an expert requires a lot of focus. The more time I put in, the more my role as a consultant to municipalities increases, meaning the more I have to know, meaning the more expert I am than the fella next to me, meaning the more I get counted on for my opinion, meaning the more time I have to put in to learning, blah,blah...endless cycle. But I enjoy the hell out of helping volunteers and town supervisors understand these various laws and how the law helps towns control growth and economic development.

Well, just my $.02,
T

 

[Downtown]

Green - I work in "current planning", and although a lot of the tasks that I do - code enforcement, site design, etc.... are the same day to day, each phone call, site visit and personality makes each day so different from the last. When I did GIS, that was very very difficult - every day at the same desk, staring at the same maps - horrible. But really, I very much enjoy municipal planning and the variety of what I do.
Kelly

 

[el Guapo]

GIS drove me into planning in a way. I didn't want to sit at a computer all day doing the same thing. Instead I sit at the computer all day answering posts on Cyburbia.

Thank God I dodged that bullet.

In reality, you can see as much variety as you want in this career.

Good Luck either way!

 

[prudence]

Ordinances

Wait until the Council asks you to revise the Adult Uses section of the Code...you days of RESEARCH will ever-changing.

 

[Chet]

Re: Ordinances

Wait until the Council asks you to revise the Adult Uses section of the Code...you days of RESEARCH will ever-changing.

Yeah. And they wouldn't let me and Prudence expense all those $1 charges without receipts.