Popular Video Game Makes Planners Out of Schoolchildren

With more than 41,300,000 registered users, if you haven't heard of Minecraft yet, you probably will soon. "It's a video game
created by a couple of Swedish guys named Markus Persson and Jens
Bergensten," says Goodyear. "Launched in 2009, Minecraft allows you to construct
elaborate worlds from basic building blocks, either alone or with other
players."

So what makes it a terrific tool for training junior planners? One particular project called Mina Kvarter,
or "My Blocks," asks players to develop concepts for specific Stockholm neighborhoods, "where
outdated housing projects from the 1950s and ‘60s were due for
rehabilitation." According to Carl Manneh, "[O]ne corner stone of the ‘My Blocks' project is to give the people
who live in these areas the opportunity to be part of shaping their
future neighborhood. That's where Minecraft comes into play; giving
people a tool to visualize their ideas of how they want to change their
part of town."

Goodyear notes that Minecraft is expanding its engagement with real-world planning and development. "Minecraft and UN-HABITAT have now announced that they are teaming up to work on Block by Block,
which will allow people around the world to use the game to re-envision
their neighborhoods – and to come up with concrete ideas that can be
implemented by planners in real life."

So don't be surprised if you see Minecraft at a community meeting, or on your child's computer screen, sometime soon.