[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="599" caption="Image courtesy City of Ottawa (http://ottawa.ca)"][/caption]   It’s no secret that residents of Ottawa find themselves pitted against the City far too often on planning issues. I was intrigued by a recent "Top Ten Reasons for Optimism" list in Spacing Ottawa by Alain Miguelez, especially his comment about the need for a more constructive  discourse around planning. Here’s my own Top Ten list of the obstacles we need to overcome before we can reach that goal:   1. Revise the Planning Primer Courses. The City’s Planning Primer courses are in need of a major overhaul. Aimed to bridge the knowledge gap, the courses are overly long and cover too much territory. Trimming the content considerably to the basic level that residents need at the introductory level and making the information available on-line rather than only being available as evening credit classes would be beneficial. Even better, as some Canadian cities do, would be to deliver smaller seminar-styled presentations that are designed for a specific community - in that community, upon request with a pre-determined number of registrants. 2. Drill down to find the relevant language in the Ontario Planning Act (OPA). Most planning matters undertaken at the city level occur within the parameters laid out in the Ontario Planning Act. Understanding how this impacts what is and isn’t allowed is complicated, and hindered by cumbersome legal language. Most people won’t bother to wade into it until something impacts them or their community -- by then it’s usually too late, and they are labeled ‘nimbyists’ when their arguments against something are powered by emotion instead of being legally based. An on-line simplification of the Act, undertaken by the province, would benefit Ontarians, not just Ottawans.