Elective courses
This list is an illustration only. Courses will be at the graduate level unless special permission is given by the program director and they include additional work to raise them to a graduate level.
Limited electives List A:
Classes on economic, political, and social concerns:
ARCH 5410/CSCL 5256
Suburbia. 3 cr.
Suburbia from origins in 18th-century England to the present. Historical changes and present challenges, especially in America. Ideology, mythology, planning, development, geography, transportation, the family. Specific sites and designs; representations in film, television, popular literature, and music. (John Archer, Katherine Solomonson)
CE5212/PA5232
Transportation Policy, Planning, and Deployment. 3 cr.
CE 5212 applies planning theory to transportation. It is oriented to first-year graduate students and seniors intending to concentrate in transportation, and while aimed at engineers and planners, is open to other interested students. Topics include: The Long View in Transportation, Constructing and Deconstructing, Transportation Plans, Topology and Graph Theory, Traffic Assignment, Network Design, Accessibility and Measuring Network Performance, Things People Do in Time and Space, Transportation Supply Management, Transportation Demand Management, Transportation, The Environment and Energy, Quality of Life and Traffic Calming, Special Needs (Children, Elderly, Disabled). Papers and Assignments include Analyzing the historic life-cycle of a transportation technology, measuring accessibility on networks with GIS, analyzing travel and activity behavior, and examining the effects of a particular transportation policy or set of policies in the Twin Cities area. Prerequisite, CE 3201 or equivalent. (David Levinson)
DHA8463/GEOG8980
Housing: Race and Class
Roles of difference (race, gender, class) in shaping distribution of housing, particularly in cities. Role of housing in patterns of social differentiation. (Jeff Crump)
GEOG 5371W
American Cities I: Population and Housing. 4 cr.
Emergence of North American cities; residential building cycles, density patterns; metropolitan housing stocks, supply of housing services; population and household types; neighborhood-level patterns of housing use; housing prices; intraurban migration; housing submarkets inside metro areas; emphasis on linking theory, method, case studies. (John Adams)
GEOG 5372W/ PA 5202W
American Cities II: Land Use, Transportation and the Urban Economy. 4 cr.
Urban economy, its locational requirements. Central place theory. Transportation, urban land use: patterns/conflicts. Industrial/commercial land blight. Real estate redevelopment. Historic preservation. Emphasizes links between land use, transportation policy, economic development, local fiscal issues. U.S.-Canadian contrasts. (John Adams)
GEOG 5605W
Geographical Perspectives on Planning. 4 cr.
Role of planning in reshaping 19th- and 20th- century cities in Europe, North America, and selected Third World countries. History of planning. Societal change, interest groups and power relations in the planning process. Citizen participation and practice in planning. (Roger Miller)
GEOG 8102
Proseminar: The State, the Economy, and Spatial Development. 3 cr.
Introduction to research in economic, political, and urban geography: conceptual research addressing interrelationship between political and economic processes and spatial dynamics of urban and regional development; empirical research documenting nature and extent of this interrelationship at different spatial scales. (Erick Sheppard and Helga Leitner)
LAW 6201
Land Use Planning. 3 cr.
(Bradley C. Karkkainen).
LAW 6903
Seminar: Cities and Suburbs: Race, Taxes, and Development in the American Metropolis
The seminar topics include; Metropolitan Demographics, Segregation and School Busing, Fiscal Disparity, Growth Management, Affordable Housing, and Governance (Myron Orfield).
PA 5004
Introduction to Planning. 3 cr.
History, institutional development of urban planning as a profession. Intellectual foundations, planning theory. Roles of urban planners in U.S./international settings. Scope, legitimacy, limitations of planning and of planning process. Issues in planning ethics and in planning in settings of diverse populations/stakeholders. (Kevin Krizek)
PA 5013
Law and Urban Land Use. 1.5 cr.
Role of law in regulating and shaping urban development, land use, environmental quality, and local and regional governmental services. Interface between public and private sector. (David Sellergren)
PA 5212
Managing Urban Growth and Change. 3 cr.
Theory/practice of planning, promoting, and controlling economic growth/change in urban areas. Economic development tools available to state/local policymakers, historic context of their use in the United States. legal, social, and economic implementation constraints. Interactions among economic, social, and demographic trends. (Edward Goetz)
PA 5221
Private Sector Development. 3 cr.
Roles of various participants in land development. Investment objectives, effects of regulation. Overview of development process from private/public perspective. (Warren Hanson)
PA 5231
Transit Planning and Management. 3 cr.
Principles/techniques related to implementing transit systems. Historical perspective, characteristics of travel demand, demand management. Evaluating/benchmarking system performance. Transit-oriented development. Analyzing alternative transit modes. System design/finance. Case studies, field projects. (Kevin Krizek)
PA 8081
Capstone Workshop. 3 cr.
PA 8202
Networks and Places: Transportation, Land Use, and Design. Now 4 cr.
Relationship between land use and transportation. Developing synthetic design skills for linking land use transportation in urban/regional settlements. Economic, political, legal, institutional frameworks for planning. (Kevin Krizek)
URBS 5101
The City and the Metropolis: An Exploration. 3-4 cr.
Advanced interdisciplinary examination of complex metropolitan environments using a grounded experiential approach. Examine the topic from historical, spatial, social, economic, political, policy and design perspectives. Day-long or weekend-long field trips are expected. (Judith Martin)
