Planners not in our plans?

Did I notice a hint of sarcasm in the article about the Planning Engineers’ Organisation (PEO) (‘Not another professional body!’, News, CM, January)?

Chris Blythe’s thoughts on why the CIOB is best placed to serve as a multi-disciplinary body of the built environment (CM, November 2004), exemplifies an organisation that strives to serve everybody, but struggles to serve anybody.

Take CM, for example. When did you last see an article of specific interest to planners? And as for technical features... forget it! I can’t comment on what might be in the Construction Information Quarterly, but the last time I contacted the editors to see if they were interested in a paper on a new technique in planning, I was told they had no editions planned that could accommodate such an article. The last CIOB contribution was Planning and Programming in Construction, published in 1991. Is this the CIOB’s standard text on the matter?

Information and knowledge management are the life blood of professionals. Maybe CM can change its ways. Until then I’ll be logging on to the PEO website to read papers by planners, for planners.