Book excerpt: This book is intended to serve as a guide to public spirited men and women, students and professionals who may want to participate effectively in the planning of their cities, environs and habitat. The book provides guidelines for the planning of regions, cities, projects for habitat and project evaluation of planning proposals. It provides food for thought to the state legislators, guidelines to the policy makers and lessons to the enforcement agencies in resolving issues with equity. It hopes to demonstrate to the reader, through examples, how these issues have been handled by the author during his 52 years of experience in regional and city planning and urban development. The author's considerable experience as consultant with organizations like the World Bank, HUDCO, City & Industrial Development Corporation of Maharashtra, Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority, and many government and non-government committees dealing with urban issues is reflected in the content of this book.