@article{576,
  author = {Newfoundland St. John\textquoterights and Labrador},
  title = {Planning and Development Information},
  abstract = {<p>Annotation by Andrea Santi. This annotation is a critique of the City of St. John\’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, Planning and Development Information. In particular, their website was studied. In short, it has all of the city\’s current planning and development information and nearly all the links are in pdf format. Each link makes it easy for the reader to find what it is they are searching for within the topic, serving as a \“table of contents\” if you will. The information is laid out very clearly and logically which is also of benefit to the reader. From a reader\’s point of view however, I have to say that some of the studies are quite lengthy. Despite this, the strengths of the various texts lie in their organization and clearness. Photographs and maps also help illustrate facts in the text. Each map within the site is labelled and well-marked. Perhaps the greatest advantage to the reader is that they have the ability to view an individual section of a piece of literature (whether it be a municipal plan, development regulation, regional plan, heritage preservation study, etc.) and can access that quite easily and quickly through the individual links made available. On the other hand, an area of weakness with the website in terms of functionality is that one cannot access a full piece of literature in some cases. Instead, only individual sections can be viewed, which can be irritating for a reader if they are looking for a complete set of information as one file. A small criticism of the website lays in some design elements. For example, the text at the top which serves as an introduction to the page should be larger, as one nearly skips over it and moves right into the \“meat\” of the information. This leads me to another criticism which is that the abundance of text may appear overwhelming to some. Photographs relating to the key pieces of literature may be helpful to divide the areas planning and development information. The topics outlined are: development information bulletins and applications; St. John\’s municipal plan (and status sheet); St. John\’s development regulations (and status sheet); Northeast Avalon regional plan; downtown St. John\’s strategy for economic development and heritage preservation; heritage areas, heritage buildings, and public views study; the Battery development guideline study; Kilbride concept plan; Georgestown neighbourhood plan; and finally the George Street redevelopment study. After recently visiting St. John\’s myself, I can confidently say that this website includes a complete library of concise and up to date information concerning many key areas of St. John\’s. From a tourism point of view, many sections of the planning and development information have direct correlations. For example, as a tourist myself, I have visited six of the seven distinct areas outlined on the website. Given the character of the city and also its heritage elements, I believe that many, if not all, local people have also visited these distinct areas, and therefore they are more likely and able to participate in municipal decision-making.</p>
},
  year = {2002},
  journal = {Unknown},
  url = {http://www.stjohns.ca/cityservices/planning/index.jsp},
}