Choosing a career path can be mind-boggling. If, by any chance you were thinking about being a city-planner, this one is for you. The goal of this article is to help you discover the life of a city-planner. Have a good chat!
A city planner job is to organize and develop urban regions. You mainly work in dense areas. You can work on large spectrum projects like highways or in smaller scale projects like a new dog park.
City planners design cities. They are responsible for the organization of the urban area. They have to keep in mind every aspect of a city when developing new parts of the city or when they redesign older parts of the city. Urban planners identify community needs and develop short- and long-term plans to create, grow, or revitalize a community or area.
City planners works by contract. On a typical day, they will become aware of every aspect of the area they have to work on. After mastering every aspect of the area, they will think on how to develop and organise that area with the contract fulfillment in mind.
A majority of city-planners work for the government and other public organisations. For example, a city planner can work for the department of transport and plan the path of the next highways. Other city planner work for private companies. These private companies can be, for example, contractors.
To become a city planner, you have to obtain a degree from an accredited urban or regional planning program. In Quebec, some universities have the degree under urbanism. You can pursue a master's degree that include considerable time in seminars, workshops, and laboratory courses, in which students learn to analyze and solve planning problems.
The average salary for an urban planner in the United States is around $74,350 per year. The lowest it can be is around $40,000 per year and the highest is around $120,000 per year.
A city planner will have to do on-the-job training to familiarize himself with the companies he works for. In addition, it's well-received by future employers a degree in engineering, architecture, economics of politics.
The dangers are minimal. But, sometimes you will be on ongoing construction projects and will have to wear the required gear on site to protect yourself of possible work incidents. On a psychological side, you will have to maintain a good mental state because creativity is you're more precious tool.
When a software will be powerful enough to take every aspect of a city in consideration when organizing and planning the urban space, they will replace us. However, I don't think it will be soon. In addition, the human touch is very important in our line of work because we organize in some manners, human lives.
City-planning is not a life full of dangers, the age of retirement is on par with many other jobs. However, city planners leave behind them a more organize, efficient and beautiful cities. Their work can be profitable for many generations to come.
For my part, I'm starting my degree in urbanism next September at UQAM. I'm super excited about this next chapter in my life and cannot wait to start making a difference in my community! Will you joined me?