Ian Caine discusses rapid urban growth in unincorporated communities at acsa 109

Image: ACSA

Ian Caine attended the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture’s 109th Annual Meeting to present a recent urban planning effort in Comfort, Texas. Comfort, like 90% of its neighbors in the Texas Hill Country, does not have a municipal government.

Comfort Vision 2050 offers a plan tailored to the realities of life in an unincorporated community, providing a list of 75 Strategic Initiatives that are small-scale, diverse, and possible to achieve without the benefit of municipal government. The research highlights the need to develop regional planning strategies that can address the needs of unincorporated communities, which after all need urban planning for all the same reasons that cities do: to prevent the fragmentation of local ecologies, maintain critical infrastructures, ensure access to housing, preserve physical and cultural history, attract and keep good jobs, expand critical services, facilitate civic discourse, and ensure timely decision-making.

American Planning Association Honors Vision Plan for Comfort, Texas

Image: American Planning Association Texas

Comfort residents discuss the future of their community in one of four public forums. Image: CURPR

The Texas Chapter of the American Planning Association (APA) has awarded Comfort Vision 2050 with a Grassroots Initiative Award at the Gold Level, “[h]onoring an initiative that illustrates how a neighborhood, community group or other local non-governmental entity utilized the planning process to address a specific need or issue within the community.” A jury of leading planners from the APA-Colorado and APA-Texas Chapters made the selections. UTSA’s Center for Urban and Regional Planning Research, led by Ian Caine, facilitated the vision plan in collaboration with the Comfort Area Foundation (CAF) and National Association for Community Asset Builders (NALCAB), with financial support from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Comfort Vision 2050 addresses the political realities of life in an unincorporated community, establishing a novel approach to urban planning that is decentralized, non-governmental, incremental, actionable, coordinated, measurable, and transparent. The plan specifically provides a list of 75 Strategic Initiatives that are small-scale, diverse, and achievable without the benefit of municipal government. 

Thank you to the CAF and NALCAB for initiating the process and to the UTSA team, which included William Dupont, Professor of Architecture; Corey Sparks, Associate Professor of Demography; Bill Barker, FAICP; Matthew Jackson and Thomas Tunstall of UTSA’s Institute for Economic Development; and student researchers Elizabeth Striedel, Ivan Ventura and Diego Sanchez. Most importantly, congratulations to the residents of Comfort for making such an important investment in your community’s future!