Why urban planners should strive for 'the photo album standard'

"My family had Slide Show Night when I was growing up. Not every Saturday, but a whole bunch of Saturdays. Either my sister or I would be in charge of setting up the projector, the screen, and loading the carousel. During the show, there'd be a few landscapes or skylines taken during vacations, but almost all the shots were up close. Like most dads, mine wasn't a professional photographer, but he did a good job of capturing memory triggers: faces, gestures, and decorations."

"Years later, when I graduated college and started working on transportation studies, that same camera came with me. It seemed natural to shoot study areas before and after team meetings. When I'd put together slide shows to document the work we did, I kept noticing two distinct types of picture: the charming local ingredient (e.g. historic train caboose), and the oppressive transportation ingredient (e.g. wide arterial with turn lanes on all corners)."

"I'd look at those pictures and recall how dangerous it felt getting those shots to document the transportation "improvements." My industry of highly educated professional planners and engineers was defining success in ways that didn't make sense when you looked at the pictures I took of the study areas. Infrastructure projects were being executed in ways that prevented residents and visitors from taking a comfortable walk around town."

A family practiced Slide Show Night that focused on close-up images of faces, gestures, and decorations as memory triggers. Children received cameras, spent money developing film, and documented everyday Gen X activities like playing in the woods, sledding, beach trips, and birthday parties. The same camera later accompanied transportation studies, producing photos of study areas before and after meetings. Two recurring image types appeared: charming local elements and oppressive transportation features such as wide arterials and numerous turn lanes. Photographs revealed that professional planners and engineers often measured success by vehicular outcomes, producing designs that made walking uncomfortable and undermined community character.

Read at Fast Company