Urban Planner @ Aga Khan Agency for Habitat

Job Summary

The Aga Khan Agency for Habitat is seeking an expert Urban/Rural Planner to facilitate the process and develop Habitat Plans in Pakistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Syria and India. They would provide support to Habitat Planning teams in the development of village relocation and urban planning reviews and designs. In addition to experience in planning implementation, government engagement and Advanced GIS, the individual would have strong written and research skills and cultural affinity with the regions in which AKAH works.  

Key Tasks and responsibilities

• Support the habitat planning lead in developing habitat plan(s) and associated documents in line with the “habitat planning framework” and “Green buildings guidelines “developed by the organization. 
• Facilitate the community visioning exercise to make it inclusive and future oriented. 
• Develop new tools (where needed) and refining existing tools for Community visioning exercise to realistically identify, assess and finalize the equity planning including the socio-economic and land-use planning priorities of villagers and suitable spatial options. 
• Prepare and analyze existing spatial and non-spatial data available and find the data gaps.  
• Develop existing socio-economic, infrastructure, and spatial rural / urban profiling of project villages 
• Identify key design components to bridge the socio-economic and land-use priorities.  
• Develop habitat assessment tools to acquire spatial and non- spatial data sets required for future planning  
• Conduct training sessions on Habitat Assessment Tools for the field teams.  
• Pilot and test the tools and refinement of Tools. 
•  Development of work plans for habitat assessments.  
• Analyze the acquired data and develop various design alternatives based on habitat planning framework and sharing with communities.  
• Overlaying land documents on proposed Land-use plans. 
• Managing conflicts and ensuring consensus on land-use plans and develop a pragmatic implementation measures.  
• Integrate hazard studies including HVRA, climate change data, Seismic Mirco-zonation in land-use planning process and model.  
• Develop detailed physical planning models for rehabilitation (whenever required) along-with its detailing which includes designing of scheme, land-grading works, infrastructure design with relevant professionals, urban/ rural design, horticultural & agricultural plan, parks & open spaces, public amenities, etc. Possess an ability to implement detailed land-use plans on ground with maximum accuracy through survey team. 
• Study land-use planning guidelines for rural setups, and devise effective land-use break-down for Habitat Planning in target regions for AKAH.
• Train local Government officials for replication of habitat planning framework developed by AKAH in the region.  
• Must have good understanding of modern surveying techniques using total station, drone or DGPS.  
• Support Habitat planning lead in organizing and managing meeting(s), orientations session(s) and workshop(s) and liaise with all the key stakeholders

Required Skills

Education: An advanced university degree in urban planning or built environment or architecture or in any relevant field
Experience, Skills and Competencies: Min 15 years of practical experience on habitat planning, spatial planning, urban/town preferably for peri-urban or rural areas .

• He /she must be registered Town Planner from PCATP or any other national/international affiliation is preferable.
• The incumbent must be skill professional with expertise in the latest planning & design software such as: Arc-GIS, QGIS, AutoCAD, Autodesk Civil3D, etc for data analysis.
• Strong communication and report writing skills are required. 
• Experience in liaising with multiple stakeholders which includes government officials, communities, architects, structural consultants etc..
• Independent, self-going person with minimum supervision, and leading a team of technical people