Urban Planning Creators You Should Know in 2024

The planning world is becoming younger, more diverse, and more media-savvy — and the ways we consume information are changing. While many of us turn to podcasts and TikTok for recipes, true crime, and cat videos, new media platforms like these also offer a wealth of important information on planning issues and discourse about how we build and get around cities.

From transit enthusiasts to urban historians to mental health experts, content creators across the internet are exploring planning issues in interesting and accessible ways, highlighting how planning touches practically every aspect of life and bringing unique perspectives to this wide-ranging field. Through engaging videos, insightful newsletters, and accessible explainers, these creators affirm that more livable cities are possible and empower everyday citizens to understand how planning and policy shape their world and how to take action.

We’ve compiled a short list of some of the top voices on social media and in the video and podcasting world that are amplifying important planning topics, serving up refreshing takes, and exemplifying passionate advocacy for thoughtful urbanism.

YouTube

Dami Lee

Dami Lee brings a fresh and too-often absent architecture perspective to urbanism, explaining topics like biomimicry, architecture in sci-fi movies, and the potential for building on Mars. In one video, Dami describes her process for designing a home that could “slow time” through the strategic use and manipulation of topography, sunlight, and water to create a calm, meditative environment. The channel also includes tips for architecture students and explanations of intriguing concepts such as how to appreciate shadows and how to design a building to maximize the enjoyment of rain.

Oh The Urbanity!

Montreal-based Oh The Urbanity! explores urban issues such as density and housing costs, bike lanes and the backlash against them, and winter cycling. The channel also features videos of cycling routes around Montreal and other parts of Quebec that offer both cycling tips and urban history. One video details nine key urbanist transformations undergone by Montreal, illustrating how walkability and safe, well-connected streets can be built in places where they didn’t previously exist. As a bonus, several videos give advice on learning French in Quebec.

Podcasts

Urban Planning Is Not Boring

Hosted by two former USC urban planning students, Urban Planning Is Not Boring explains planning concepts, how they impact our everyday lives, and why we should care. Through engaging interviews with planning experts and community activists and the hosts’ own experience in transportation planning and housing development, the podcast examines current issues and highlights the people working to make cities better. As recent students, the hosts are focused on engaging young planners, avoiding jargon, and offering valuable and accessible information on topics as diverse as homelessness, incremental development, and disaster planning.

Urban Roots

Urban Roots delves into the history of American cities small and large, seeking to amplify underrepresented voices and to preserve places of importance to women and communities of color. For each episode, the podcast hosts partner with local organizations to find significant sites and highlight the people working in preservation and equitable development. Episodes explore historic Black churches, significant Underground Railroad sites, cemeteries, recording studios, entertainment venues, and other sites that were instrumental in shaping the American experience.

TikTok

Dr. T. Panova

Dr. T. Panova looks at urbanism via the lens of mental health, offering a rare and valuable perspective on cities and their impact on our psyche. Many of Panova’s videos focus on “third places,” walkable neighborhoods, and the often overlooked spaces that make cities interesting and comfortable. Using examples from the United States and Europe, Panova makes the case that humans naturally gravitate toward places that are stimulating and walkable, and that the outdated car-centric design of many U.S. cities isn’t irreversible.

Streetcraft

If you want to learn about traffic engineering via accessible explainer videos, Streetcraft is a great place to start. Using animations and real-world examples, Streetcraft explains transportation planning concepts and illustrates how streets and intersections can be made safer and more pedestrian-friendly. Are you convinced that dangerous intersection in your town could be made better but don’t know where to start? These videos might be just the inspiration you need to advocate for change in your own community.

Instagram

City Glow Up

City Glow Up’s simple and effective format lets you quickly visualize the transformation of parking lots and strip malls into dense, mixed-use developments, or wide, dangerous streets into multimodal corridors. The page illustrates the power of smart urban design and architecture to completely alter the built environment and make places safer, more walkable, and more accessible.

Passionate Planning

Kristy Kilbourne’s Instagram page is all about career advice geared specifically toward planners. Whether you’re just starting your journey or are farther along in your career, Kilbourne’s page offers advice on building your portfolio, achieving job satisfaction, and advocating for yourself in the workplace. She provides her insights on industry trends, current planning topics, and more.

Substack

Street Stack

Street Stack explores a wide range of urbanist topics through accessible, enlightening, and often fun essays. Want to know more about place names and where they come from? Interested in the many forms of urban benches? How about an explainer of spatial data analysis via New York City dog registrations? Street Stack offers these observations and more, explaining urban concepts in unique and often surprising ways.

The New Urban Order

Drawing from a well of experience in urban policy, Diana Lind offers analysis of current planning issues like housing affordability, walkability, and public transit. The Substack features stories and case studies from around the world, highlighting unique angles like family-friendly cities and urban arts. Lind uses extensive sources and occasional interviews to explain timely issues such as the Supreme Court’s ruling in Grants Pass v. Johnson, a case that could have a major impact on homelessness policy in cities around the country.