Planning and LGBTQ Communities: The Need for Inclusive Queer Spaces - Hardcover

"This book represents a clarion call to student, academic and practising planners and politicians to open their ears, eyes and minds to the question of sexuality. Petra Doan is to be commended for assembling this landmark contribution to planning scholarship, which highlights the challenges LGBTQ communities continue to endure in the twenty-first century whilst also showcasing the contributions they make in creating dynamic and vibrant cities." Paul J. Maginn, Associate Professor, School of Earth and Environment, University of Western Australia

"How can planners contribute to building urban societies that are truly diverse and inclusive? Planning and LGBTQ Communities helps answer this critical question as the authors unpack how LGBTQ residents, who also embody a range of intersectional differences, experience and shape urban life outside the familiar gay neighborhoods. This is a necessary contribution to an overlooked subject." Dr. Renia Ehrenfeucht, University of New Orleans

"Planning lags behind its sister disciplines in the scholarship of LGBTQ communities and issues. With Planning and LGBTQ Communities: The Need for Inclusive Queer Spaces, Petra Doan and colleagues close some of this gap. As a course text, their book will bring fresh ideas to planning students' understanding of diversity, and provides practical advice for the practice of planning. Cases presented extend well beyond the "iconic" locales and will make visible to readers layers of LGBTQ communities that have been relatively invisible to the institutions of planning." - Gwen Urey, Professor of Urban & Regional Planning, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona

 "Moving beyond conceptions of a static, bounded 'gay ghetto', this important and timely volume considers the varied ways in which LGBTQ identified individuals have occupied, moved through and transformed cities. Though mainly focused on US cities, the questions raised by this book are far from parochial, and encourage a wider reflection on the ways that planning serves the interests of diverse communities. A provocative plea that LGBTQ rights to the city should be recognised, and honoured." - Professor Phil Hubbard, University of Kent

"This book is a wonderful collection of excellent essays that addresses a key issue, how do we plan for LGBTQ people? Bringing together the world’s leading scholars, this insightful, perceptive and engaging book is a must read for all in planning, urban studies as well as geographies.  There can be little doubt that this is a groundbreaking book that will be useful for teaching as well as research." - Dr. Katherine Browne, University of Brighton

Although the last decade has seen steady progress towards wider acceptance of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, and queer (LGBTQ) individuals, LGBTQ residential and commercial areas have come under increasing pressure from gentrification and redevelopment initiatives. As a result many of these neighborhoods are losing their special character as safe havens for sexual and gender minorities. Urban planners and municipal officials have sometimes ignored the transformation of these neighborhoods and at other times been complicit in these changes.

Planning and LGBTQ Communities brings together experienced planners, administrators, and researchers in the fields of planning and geography to reflect on the evolution of urban neighborhoods in which LGBTQ populations live, work, and play. The authors examine a variety of LGBTQ residential and commercial areas to highlight policy and planning links to the development of these neighborhoods. Each chapter explores a particular urban context and asks how the field of planning has enabled, facilitated, and/or neglected the specialized and diverse needs of the LGBTQ population.

A central theme of this book is that urban planners need to think "beyond queer space" because LGBTQ populations are more diverse and dispersed than the white gay male populations that created many of the most visible gayborhoods. The authors provide practical guidance for cities and citizens seeking to strengthen neighborhoods that have an explicit LGBTQ focus as well as other areas that are LGBTQ-friendly. They also encourage broader awareness of the needs of this marginalized population and the need to establish more formal linkages between municipal government and a range of LGBTQ groups. Planning and LGBTQ Communities also adds useful material for graduate level courses in planning theory, urban and regional theory, planning for multicultural cities, urban geography, and geographies of gender and sexuality.