Problems and Prospects of Urban and Regional Planning in Nigeria

Book excerpt: This book focuses on urban development and planning in Nigeria by analyzing the nature and determinants of urban and regional planning strategies and outcomes in Rivers State, Nigeria. The book is organized into fourteen chapters. The first chapter focuses on population growth and the development of the Nigerian urban system. The second chapter traces the roots of Nigerian urban and regional planning system. The third chapter discusses the institutional framework for planning the evolving planning institutions and the emergence of the planning profession in the country and Rivers State. Chapter four examines political and economic forces and the substantive urban planning issues and problems faced by planners in the PH metropolis. Chapter five focuses on PH urban politics, planning administration and institutions. Chapters six and seven focus on the responses of planning to environmental, housing problems, transportation, land use, local economic development, and urban services issues. It documents how urban development and planning policies pertaining to these issues affect urban population groups and how the populations have responded to the outcomes of conventional planning intervention and offers alternative policies. In chapter eight, the problems of plan implementation is examined focusing on the implementation of the Diobu Master Plan, while chapters nine, ten, and eleven present physical planning and development control within the context of local government system in Rivers State. In chapter twelve, the book presents planning for a new town, New Finima, in Rivers State, designed to resettle the Finima. Chapters thirteen and fourteen dwell on the problem of rural urban balance and regional planning in Rivers State and Nigeria in general. It focuses special attention on the problem of urban and rural disparities as the key issue facing regional planning and suggests measures for ensuring that urban planning promotes the welfare of all and enhances the opportunities for the procurement of benefits of development programs by all socioeconomic groups. The book concludes with chapter fifteen on planning imperatives to make the Port Harcourt metropolis livable.