Bridging the gap between planning evaluation and programme evaluation: The contribution of the PPR methodology

Abstract

Despite the potential advantages of a closer link between planning evaluation and programme evaluation , both fields have been developed independently. This is mainly due to significant differences between them, particularly in terms of historical background, evaluation scope and contexts, the articulation between theory and practice, and the timings of evaluation. This article advocates bridging the gap between these two fields, and presents the Plan-Process-Results (PPR) methodology as an example of, and a contribution to, this bridging process. PPR is a methodology for evaluating planning and plan implementation, integrating elements from three types of planning evaluation, based on rationality ex-ante, performance and conformance.

Evaluation of marine spatial planning

“…This is likely a consequence of the expectation that evaluation should provide information about the tangible achievements of interventions. Measuring the impacts of interventions is a fundamental concern of programme evaluation, from which planning evaluation has drawn much inspiration [22,23].…”

“…Oliveira and Pinho, for example, propose that the impact of plans on the urban development process be determined by comparing how the city was before plan-making, how it would be without the plan, and how it actually is following adoption of the plan [23,49]. Laurian and co-authors argue, from their experience of evaluating local plans in New Zealand, that in spatial planning more than in other policy area, counterfactual analysis is not suited to identify independent effects of interventions [14].…”

“…Four of the models are prescriptive, that is, their authors present them as the preferred way of conduction planning evaluations [14,23,24,47,49]. The two others are enumerative, that is, they enumerate and describe possible criteria, steps or processes for evaluation [25,46].…”

“…The Plan-Process-Result (PPR) methodology was developed by Oliveira and Pinho based on the PPIP with the purpose of evaluating urban planning in Portugal [23,49]. It assesses different aspects of planning and plans from the viewpoint of three theories of planning and planning evaluation: rationality (of plan contents), performance (of the planning process) and conformance (of results with objectives).…”

“…Four key functions are analysed, namely those of coordination (of different aspirations, activities and investments), investment (in society and the built Table 2 The nine steps in Oliveira and Pinho's PPR methodology [23,49].…”