Master of Science Planning
The State of Tennessee and the Knoxville region as contexts for education in planning
Tennessee is an urban state with the problems and challenges of an urban state. More than sixty-three percent of the population of the state lives in urban places. The state now has seven metropolitan statistical areas. Excluding the cities which are the centers of these metropolitan areas, there are another seventeen cities with populations of more than twenty thousand people. Cities in this latter group are growing rapidly and will soon be joined by other rapidly growing communities in the ten-to-fifteen thousand population range.
The most common characteristic of cities in the state is growth. All of the metropolitan areas of the state have experienced substantial growth since at least 1950, and this rate has accelerated since the 1990s. As agricultural areas have lost farm population through mechanization medium sized towns have grown by adding industry and becoming trade centers. Even in areas that are classified as rural, much of the development pattern is urban. State highways and many county roads are lined with houses on small parcels from which a family commutes to a nearby town for employment, education and services.
The continuing transition of the state from a rural to urban economy has brought its benefits in new opportunities and increased incomes, but it has also brought problems and challenges. Because so much of the transition from a rural to an urban society is represented by growth at the outer fringe of our cities, and by the suburbanization of the countryside, three challenges are pervasive: management of urban sprawl, deterioration of the environment, and increased volumes of local travel. All of these are closely related, different manifestations of the same set of activities. They are some of the problems of urbanization. Urban sprawl is decimating Tennessee’s environment and negatively impacting the quality of life of its citizens. Research has shown a sprawling pattern of development to be twice as expensive to local government as one that is better planned. Pollution and inadequate transportation planning add millions to our health care costs in the form of illness and injuries. Unplanned urban development separates poor inner city residents from jobs, increasing welfare costs. Effective planning is a means by which these types of challenges can be overcome.
State and local governments are trying to respond. The commitment of the state to planning is demonstrated in the recent passage of Senate Bill 2412, which requires local planning commission members to receive annual education in such areas as land use planning, transportation, natural resources land conservation, and economic development. The state recently adopted a growth management/annexation bill that affects every city and county in the state. Most cities over twenty thousand population, and many in the next smaller tier, have set up professional planning offices as ongoing elements of their local government. The Local Planning Office of the state provides planning services on a contract basis for smaller towns and counties that do not have in-house planning services, but they cannot meet all the requests for service being made of them. Trained professional planners are needed across this state to prepare growth management plans, work with engineers on transportation plans, prepare capital budgets to meet infrastructure needs in growing areas, prepare environmental impact studies to protect natural resources, work in local economic development organizations and do the many other tasks associated with long term growth and development.
The Knoxville region is the third largest metropolis in Tennessee, with more than 800,000 residents. It is among the most sprawling communities in the nation (as are other cities in the state and the South), but it is also rates as having one of the highest qualities of life. It is growing rapidly and has unlimited potential due to several factors, including the presence of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the University of Tennessee, as well as being the headquarters of TVA and the western gateway to the Smoky Mountains. There is much going on in this region in terms of development and planning. In many ways, Knoxville is just beginning to realize the importance of protecting what it has, while accepting the change that is destined to occur. It offers an outstanding laboratory for planning studies.
History of Planning at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville
When the impacts of urbanization were beginning to be widely visible in the state in the early nineteen-sixties, the small cadre of professional planners in the state was organized in a state chapter of the American Institute of Planners. That organization determined that a professional planning school was needed in the state. They formed a committee and charged the group with making a determination of what institution would be the best host for such a school. The committee collected data and made site visits to Memphis State University, Vanderbilt University, East Tennessee State University and The University of Tennessee, Knoxville. When they arrived on the UTK campus they discovered that there was an active on-campus committee of faculty investigating the possibility of establishing a planning degree program. The UTK committee was headed by Dr. William Cole, Professor of Sociology and long time chair of the Knoxville Metropolitan Planning Commission, and Dr. Lee Greene, head of the Department of Political Science, an and expert in state and local government. When the planners and faculty discovered each other they joined forces. Their joint work lead to the establishment of the MSP degree program in 1964.
The planners felt that a professional degree program was best located at UTK for several reasons. As the state land-grant institution there was an institutional commitment to public service and responsiveness to the needs of the state. The campus was also comprehensive, with departments in all the areas that would support an interdisciplinary program in planning: engineering, law, sociology, political science, economics, and geography (this is one of the main reasons that planning is most often located in the largest academic institution in the state). An architecture program was also being discussed. From the viewpoint of the professional planners, no other campus in the state came close to offering comparable support resources.
The Master of Science in Planning program at the University of Tennessee has met its charge in terms of substantially helping provide trained professional who have met the needs of the state and region. Since its inception, nearly nine hundred persons have come through the program and almost six hundred of those are graduates who now occupy leadership positions in the public and private sectors. About two hundred of the graduates are currently living and working in all parts of Tennessee in communities of all sizes - from Atoka, Collierville and Memphis in the southwest to Columbia, Franklin and Nashville in central Tennessee, from Union City in the northwest to Maryville, Johnson City, Knoxville and Chattanooga in the east. More would have graduated but many were lured into the job market after finishing their courses but before completing all degree requirements. Graduates are highly competitive in the regional and national job market. They hold high level positions in the public planning agencies of five of the six largest cities in the state. They staff many of the positions of the Local Planning Office of the State of Tennessee, and many have been employed by smaller cities to head newly established planning offices. In addition to these traditional positions, they also work as full time researchers at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (at least six), for the U.S. Corps of Engineers (at least four), numerous economic development and housing agencies, and for numerous planning or engineering/planning/ architecture firms. One holds a leadership position in the Appalachian Regional Commission, one was a top aide to the former Governor and one has just been appointed Deputy Commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Transportation. Two recent graduates staff the UTK Community Partnership Center. One graduate is actively campaigning for Mayor of the City of Knoxville and another ran a close second in a race for Mayor of Nashville in the 1980's. Several graduates have gone on to complete law degrees or Ph.D. and two graduates of the program have been elected members of the national board of the American Planning Association.