10 things to do to improve cities in PH

One of the biggest gaps we have to address in urban management is that many countries, particularly developing ones, conduct a top-down process of planning. While there are methods that try to be inclusive, implementation and practice still tend to exclude civic participation.

I wrote this article to reverse that top-down thinking, encouraging citizens to take action about their cities. These are 10 simple, not-too-expensive ways to improve our home towns.

As always, thank you, Inquirer!

Click here to read the full article. 

The EnP Board Review Series: Part 7 – Laws governing Environmental Planning

This is a list of laws governing the practice of environmental planning. This list links the law titles to online sources for easy reference.

Any profession is governed by specific laws, and it’s no different in environmental planning. I’ll try to keep this as concise and organized as possible, since you’re going to be reading through a whole lot of legal terms and frameworks.

Sharing all that Green Talk: A Meet-up of Environmental Bloggers

I recently had the privilege to attend a green bloggers meet-up that was hosted by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources. I’ll be sharing overviews of the presentations during the event, and, as always, link the importance to environmental planning.

The Blog Talk was held in celebration of biodiversity and wildlife protection and aimed to engage bloggers to further the campaign for environmental protection. It covered a range of topics: The Philippine commitment to the COP21 or the United Nations Climate Change Conference, the Stop Illegal Wildlife Trade Campaign, and progress updates on the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act. The event also featured two environmental champions in the Philippines: veteran journalist Howie Severino, who shared tips on how to approach environmental storytelling, and award-winning singer-songwriter and activist Noel Cabangon, who serenaded the group with his music on climate change and disaster recovery.

The EnP Board Review Series: Part 6A – Urban and Regional Planning History and Principles

This is the sixth part of the EnP board review series. I’m going to provide a timeline and discussion on urban and regional planning history.

This lengthy part 6A post is going to cover the subject on history and principles. As much as this is the most enjoyable part of the review (it is for me, anyway), only a mere portion of this may crop up in the exam.

Tips

• Cluster the contributions according to their similarities, don’t memorise one by one. It’s what I already did for this post, so you don’t go back and forth on sudden, familiar terms.
• Repeatedly read through the timeline to appreciate the development of urban planning.
• Names are important, dates are for reference. Works are for deeper appreciation. Principles matter the most.
• I’m linking the names of the urbanists to the most concise biographies I can find online. Refer to those for backgrounders, and to this post for their roles in urban and regional planning history.

Let’s start with the Ancients.

EnP Board Review Series: Presentation on Planning & Information Management

I had the pleasure of helping out during the 2016 UP Plano Board Exam Coaching Sessions, and was tasked to give a review on planning and information management. This is a compilation of selected topics on planning data, beginning with hierarchies and structures, and continuing well into frameworks, statistical analysis on socio-economic information (population projection and demography, location quotients, etc.) familiarisation with research terms, and an overview of GIS history. I picked out said topics because the exam questions on data and information revolve around these.

Items needed: Calculator, pen and scratch paper