Jim Colman Inducted into the Australian Planning Hall of Fame
Jim Colman honoured for his contribution to planning
Many members will know Jim Colman, long-time member of ISOCARP, Vice President for six years until 2011, international planner, and the life of the party when the day’s work is done. Jim is a planning consultant based in Sydney and teaches part-time at the University of Technology, Sydney and the University of New South Wales.
All of his friends and colleagues and the members of his ISOCARP ‘family’ will be delighted to learn that at the Planning Institute of Australia’s National Congress and National Awards, in May, Jim was inducted into the planning profession’s Hall of Fame.
Jim could not be present at the Planning Institute of Australia’s National Awards presentations in May 2012, so he had a typically larger-than-life presence on the screen as PIA National President Dyan Currie read out the citation for his Hall of Fame Award – which was received on Jim’s behalf by the eminent Adelaide planner, designer and writer, Peter Jensen.
On 26 June 2012, in Sydney, Jim was personally presented with the award by the Deputy Lord Mayor of Sydney, Councillor John McInerney, at the Annual Planning Dinner.
The Award Citation read as follows:
James (Jim) Colman has shown outstanding contributions to planning over four decades, as a practitioner, and educator, a visionary and energetic advocate. This has included national and international contributions to planning at a time of significant change and challenge. Jim Colman exemplifies the values and ethics promoted by the Planning Institute of Australia for its members and the profession generally.
From an initial intensive period of involvement in architecture in Papua New Guinea, UK and West Africa, Jim Colman returned to Australia and commenced practice in town planning and urban design. As a sole practitioner he later moved into the broader field of environmental management, resource management, and strategic and environmental planning in both the urban and non-urban sectors. In the statutory planning field he has extensive experience in the preparation of local environmental plans, in development assessment work, and urban and regional strategic planning.
He has frequently been invited to teach at both undergraduate and graduate levels at seven east-coast Australian universities. He has written extensively for both the professional and popular press and has published three books on urban planning. In 1995 his work as a freelance writer was recognized by the award of the George Munster Prize by the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism at the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS). In 2002, he was appointed Rapporteur General and editor of the proceedings of the ISOCARP International planning congress in Athens.
Just a few months ago, Jim was a vital member of a very successful UPAT in Wuhan, China, and he is currently supporting the preparations for next year’s ISOCARP Congress in Brisbane as a member of the Local Organising Committee. All who know him will wish to join in extending our congratulations to a very active member of the Society, on being recognized as an icon of planning in Australia.
Jeremy Dawkins, June 2012