APA Foresight
APA Foresight helps planners navigate change and prepare for an uncertain future.
With foresight in mind, planners can guide change, create more sustainable and equitable outcomes, and establish themselves as critical to a thriving community.
APA Foresight is about understanding drivers of change that are outside of our control, how we can prepare for them, and when it is time to act. Let's use the future to create great communities for all!
Interested in learning more? Reach out to Petra Hurtado, Chief Foresight and Knowledge Officer, or Zhenia Dulko, Foresight Manager.
2025 Trend Report for Planners
APA Foresight
The 2025 Trend Report for Planners features a list of over 100 existing, emerging, and potential future trends that the APA Foresight team and our Trend Scouting Foresight Community identified as relevant to planning. The trends are structured within three timeframes (Act Now, Prepare, Learn, and Watch), which indicate the urgency of planners' actions.
Tools and Learning Hub
Planning with Foresight
This edition of PAS QuickNotes introduces the concept of foresight to help planners imagine and prepare their communities for the future.
Dealing With Uncertainty? Here's How
This blog explores scenario planning as a strategic tool that lets you explore different ways that the future could unfold.
Foresight Interactive Course
Using the Future to Create Dynamic Plans interactive course gives planners the ability to imagine multiple plausible futures, use the future in their work, and plan with the future. This interactive, self-paced training includes how to use strategic foresight in planning with applicable tools and methodologies to equip planners with the essential skills needed to navigate change and understand how future uncertainties may impact communities.
Learn More About Trends
On January 29, 2025, the APA Foresight team launched the 2025 Trend Report for Planners, offering an engaging exploration of the emerging trends and signals shaping the year ahead.
APA Trend Universe 2.0
Trends and Signals Database
The Trend Universe is the place to find the key trends in planning identified by APA as part of its foresight practice, updated to reflect the accelerating pace of change of today and tomorrow. Here, you can find existing trends (act on them now), emerging trends (start preparing for them), and potential future trends (keep watching and learn more about them), all organized around eight general themes.
Foresight Communities
A Foresight Community is a multidisciplinary group of experts who meet regularly through a series of facilitated workshops. The community members are thought leaders in their fields and are chosen based on their ability to provide forward-thinking perspectives. APA currently convenes two types of Foresight Communities: "deep dive" communities on specific foresight topics (such as the recently concluded community on Artificial Intelligence) and a Trend Scouting Community dedicated to trend scouting and horizon scanning.
Topics We're Exploring
AI in Planning
Artificial Intelligence and Planning KnowledgeBase Collection
So far, relatively few planners routinely apply AI to their work. However, AI has tremendous potential to shape the communities planners serve.
Planning With Artificial Intelligence
This PAS Report provides the information planners need to understand the opportunities — and the challenges — that AI poses to the planning profession and our communities.
AI in Planning: Opportunities and Challenges and How to Prepare
This white paper summarizes the findings and suggests initial ideas on how planners can prepare for AI and its potential impacts, how planners can ensure AI-based planning tools are used in equitable and inclusive ways, and what the role of the planner should be in developing and using AI-based planning tools.
Climate Adaptation
The Use of Foresight and Scenario Planning in Hazard Mitigation and Climate Adaptation Planning
This PAS Memo offers guidance to planners on how to expand their use of foresight through exploratory scenario planning in both the hazard mitigation and climate adaptation fields.
Managed Retreat
This edition of PAS QuickNotes addresses managed retreat as a climate adaptation and risk management strategy, emphasizing the importance of community preparation, planning considerations, and funding for this process.
Decolonizing the Future
Decolonizing the Future: An Inclusive Approach to Futures
This edition of PAS QuickNotes explains the concept of decolonizing the future and offers three questions planners can apply in their practice to transcend colonial legacies and co-create inclusive futures where all people are acknowledged, respected, and protected.
