Assessment of local comprehensive plans prepared for communities in the State of Indiana

Abstract

The Department of Urban Planning at Ball State University, in Muncie, Indiana, has prepared comprehensive plans for several communities across the state. Although the plans have been adopted throughout Indiana, the Department of Urban Planning has little understanding of how they have changed planning practices in their respective communities. It is possible that the comprehensive plans have been extremely influential in how planning decisions are made, or they have remained untouched and unused. Therefore, it is imperative that the plans be assessed on their quality and usefulness following their adoption. This thesis assesses eight comprehensive plans prepared by the students at Ball State University’s Department of Urban Planning. Four are assessed on their quality as comprehensive plans, and the other four are assessed on their quality and post-adoption usefulness. The later four are assessed more wholistically because officials at their communities agreed to speak to their usefulness in an interview. Ultimately, the assessments determined that, while the Department produces high quality comprehensive plans, there are few aspects from each plan that are implemented in real-world practice. This is largely due to issues of funding in each community the plans are prepared for. The implementation strategies in the plans often do not include information on or strategies for funding their proposals. This, and a general lack of available funding resources, has made it difficult for the Department’s plans to be implemented in their respective communities.