Urban planning - compare against the average actual outcome not the hypothetical best outcome

From Taipei urbanism by Noah Smith.  Marginally interesting piece but it prompted an idea.

I am usually pretty exasperated by urban planners and the fads that they indulge in.  Fads which, while nobly intended, usually end up causing negative unintended consequences which significantly outweigh the putative benefits which were being sought.  

Rent control, densification, imposed social integration, subsidized housing, connected trails, defunding police to fund social programs, mixed use neighborhoods, urban renewal, walkable cities, safe drug use centers, tolerance of homelessness, etc.  All well intended.  All usually quite destructive and erosive of city living.  

And all, surprisingly, seem to use Dutch cities in general and Amsterdam in particular as their lodestone.  If we do X we'll achieve Y, illustrated by a photo of a classy neighborhood in Amsterdam.  

My criticism is not so much about the individual proposed projects, though there is plenty to criticize.  My criticism is that urban planners almost always seek, and achieve, a circumvention of the will and desires of voters.  They ignore what residents want, restrict their choices and try and force outcomes that are unnatural, i.e. not desired by those affected.

One of the ironies of the past couple of years has been to see the playing out of two obviously incompatible urban policies.  Deep blue cities have always been deeply averse to the constitutional right to bear arms, imposing unconstitutional restrictions on both the purchase of guns and the carrying of guns.

At the same time, they have simultaneously indulged in policies to either defund the police or restrict police activities.  Or both.  

Consequently, while urban governments are doing their very best to preclude citizens from being able to protect themselves from the criminal element, those very same cities are massively inflating criminal activity, particularly violent crime.  

Smith's article prompted the thought - If Amsterdam is always the ideal, regardless of what citizens might want, to what degree have urban planners anywhere delivered on that purported ideal?

To reinforce, I don't think everyone wants to live in an Amsterdam environment and it is wrong to force that outcome.  I think we need to rely on free markets with sensible and stable zoning rule which reflect the needs and desires of residents and which don't change with the seasons or with the new emerging fads out of urban planning schools.

But if we are to Amsterdamize the world, how successful have urban planners been?  What have been the results when urban planners are given sway?

I don't have an answer, but it is interesting that no one seems to be asking that question.

In business, if we propose a strategy, we look at how well it meets the intended outcomes and examine how successful others have been with that strategy.  We do the same in science and medicine.  We look at outcomes.

I think about cities where urban planners have had significant sway and what do we see.  Do we find emergent Amsterdams or do we find . . . Oklahoma City, Leeds, England, Birmingham, England, Chicago, Detroit, Atlanta, etc. 

Taipei, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Manila - they all have their charms and their headaches.  Some are the result of planning, some from a clash of resident desires.  

Why should the notions and autocratic desires of urban planners outweigh the self-organizing emergent order of residents?  Looking at the outcomes where urban planners have had major influence, it is not clear that influence has been successful or even benign.