I am an urban and regional planner by profession and have worked in local and central government, private consultancy, education and training. I have gained experience in many parts of the world, including Western, Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, a number of African Countries and several countries in Asia. My focus is on participative and integrated approaches and capacity building linking urban planning to wider issues of urban and regional management and policy including adaptation related to climate change.
At present I run my own consultancy and am also an associate of the Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies, Erasmus University, Rotterdam, Netherlands. Prior to this I had a number of roles at IHS including head of urban management, responsible for urban and regional development strategies, for consultancy and for projects dealing with planning and capacity development. I have worked in practice for a number of years involved in both planning and implementation.
My areas of expertise include urban management urban and regional planning, climate change, low income housing and upgrading, governance, policy development and evaluation. My areas of focus are strategic and spatial planning and institutional development working with combinations of capacity building, technical assistance, guidelines and manuals. Consultancy work has included long-term involvement in Egypt, where I led the team from Culpin Planning which developed and supported implementation of the Aga Khan award winning Ismailia Demonstration Projects. Other extended involvement was in Indonesia, as team leader supporting a major programme of decentralization of integrated urban infrastructure development, IUIDP. In India I worked over a number of years on developing decentralized training for urban management and in Vietnam on the National Urban Development Strategy.
Recent assignments include:
Netherlands 2021-22 online and in person training for for IHS. Coordination of Action Planning exercise and SimCity exercise for Green Infrastructure specialization.
Netherlands 2021-22 module on social and economic resilience in the context of climate change for the Hague Academy. This used the case of circular economy policy in Amsterdam and the application of the four lenses tool of Doughnut Economics Action Lab (DEAL)
Netherlands/ Ghana 2020 Remote evaluation of DEALS programme of VNG in Ghana
Netherlands/India 2020 remote input on capacity building and curriculum development for urban management in Kerala
Vietnam – 2017-2020 the institutional and urban planning aspects of the formulation of the National Urban Development Strategy for Vietnam
Vietnam – Capacity development strategy for the Northern Mountains results based programme
Mongolia – Support to local government on district level planning in Ulaanbaatar.
Kosovo – Evaluation of the MuSPP programme for UN-Habitat.
Ghana – Advice on strategic planning integration for the Ghana Urban Management Pilot programme.
Palestine – Institutionalisation of strategic planning.
Egypt – Development of guidelines for strategic planning.
Evaluation Egypt, UK, Romania and Kenya
EU – Development of guidelines for integrated development for the European Commission.
Training and education 1984-2021 activities with IHS in Rotterdam, but also in Germany, Egypt, Poland, Romania, Armenia and Turkey.
Countries of work include Armenia, Bangladesh, Egypt, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Kosovo, Libya, Mongolia, Namibia, Netherlands, Nepal, Poland, Romania, South Africa, Tanzania, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States, Vietnam and Zambia.