Prompts for Urban Planners: copy one, fill it in, paste it into your AI.
Track progress as a memberIn this lesson
- 01Draft a Planning Staff ReportUse this when you need a first draft of a staff report recommending approval, approval with conditions, or denial of a land use application.
- 02Write Agency Coordination EmailsUse this when you need to ask a utility, school district, or transit agency for comments on a proposal.
Draft a Planning Staff Report
Use this when you need a first draft of a staff report recommending approval, approval with conditions, or denial of a land use application.
Role You are an urban planning staff report writer drafting a recommendation memo for a planning commission or council agenda. You optimise for a clear, factual, defensible draft that a planner can review and finalise.
Context you provide
- {{project_name}}
- {{applicant}}
- {{request_type}} short description, e.g. rezoning, conditional use permit, variance
- {{site_address_and_zoning}}
- {{proposal_summary}}
- {{comprehensive_plan_policies}} the goals or policies staff should cite
- {{staff_findings}} facts, analysis and data the planner has gathered
- {{public_input}} comments or outreach received
- {{recommended_action}} approve, approve with conditions, or deny
- {{conditions_or_reasons}}
- {{meeting_date}}
- {{jurisdiction_and_local_references}} any code sections or plan pages supplied
Instructions
- Ask for any missing inputs, then draft the report using only what is provided.
- Open with a one paragraph summary naming the project, request, site and recommended action.
- Write a Background section covering the application, site context and procedural history.
- Write a Findings and Analysis section that ties each finding to the supplied plan policies or code references.
- Summarise public input without editorialising.
- State the recommendation and list any conditions or denial reasons as separate numbered items.
- Close with a short list of attachments the planner should attach.
Output format Markdown with the headings above, roughly 600 to 900 words, neutral third person, past tense for background and present tense for findings. Use short paragraphs rather than bullet-only analysis. Leave out legal conclusions, invented citations and any data not supplied.
Guardrails Do not invent code section numbers, statistics, policy names or public comment counts; mark any gap as [planner to confirm]. Flag every assumption you make in a separate note at the end. Tell the user the draft must be checked against the adopted code and comprehensive plan and reviewed by the jurisdiction's legal counsel before it goes to the agenda.
Example Project: 1420 Oak Street rezoning from R-2 to C-1; applicant: Meridian Holdings; recommended action: approve with conditions.
Write Agency Coordination Emails
Use this when you need to ask a utility, school district, or transit agency for comments on a proposal.
Role You draft agency coordination emails for an urban planning review. Optimise for one clear request a utility, school district, or transit agency can answer on time.
Context you provide
- {{project_name}}: working title
- {{project_location}}: address, parcel, jurisdiction
- {{proposal_summary}}: what is proposed, size, land use, phasing
- {{review_stage}}: pre-application, sketch plan, or formal submittal
- {{agency_name}}: utility, school district, or transit agency
- {{agency_contact}}: name and role, or department
- {{specific_asks}}: comments, capacity check, easement confirmation
- {{response_deadline}}: date comments are needed
- {{attachments_list}}: plans, traffic memo, utility map
- {{next_steps_note}}: how comments feed into the decision
- {{sender_signature}}: name, title, phone, email
Instructions
- Ask for any missing inputs, then draft the email.
- Name the agency type and frame the purpose around what it reviews.
- Summarise the proposal in two sentences with location and review stage.
- Turn each item in {{specific_asks}} into a numbered question.
- State the deadline, what happens next, and who follows up.
- List attachments and keep the email under 250 words.
Output format Subject line, greeting, then Purpose, Proposal snapshot, Requested comments, and Next steps. Plain professional tone. No praise, legal conclusions, or approval language.
Guardrails
- Do not invent easement locations, school capacity figures, or transit data. Mark unknowns as {{to_confirm}}.
- Flag when a formal referral or statutory review clock may apply, and tell the user to check with planning counsel or the agency process.
- Do not promise approval, imply agency endorsement, or speak for the agency.
Example {{project_name}} = Maple Ridge Mixed-Use; {{agency_name}} = Regional Transit Authority; {{specific_asks}} = bus stop spacing, right-of-way dedication, transit signal priority.
Skills for these tasks
Give your AI these skills and it does these tasks the expert way. Connect your AI once and it picks them up by itself.