A project-oriented approach to GIS education for urban planners

The paper argues that there is still a gap in the provision of GIS education for urban planners who are among the main users of GIS in local government throughout Europe. This gap is both quantitative. in tenus of number of courses available at undergraduate and post-graduate level, and. more significantly, qualitative in nature. As planning departments are at the forefront of GIS use across local government in Europe. and many of the problems of implementing GIS stem from data related and organisational issues rather than technical ones, the paper argues that GIS courses ought to be introduced in the undergraduate and post-graduate curricula of planners with emphasis on organisational and data-related issues, and on practical projects. The latter in particular need to be developed at the large scales to which planners normally work (1:1000- 1:10,000) to bring to light the many problems and opportunities that planners will find in their professional lives.