We are updating the comprehensive plan!

Planning efforts are almost complete for the ten-year update to the City's comprehensive plan.  

The Columbia Compass: Envision 2036 process kicked off in October 2018, and we so appreciate how engaged you all have been!  Our final round of public meetings occurred in January 2020, in conjunction with the December 2019 release of the draft plan.  Please visit our website at www.columbiacompass.org or follow us on Facebook or Twitter @ColaCompass for more information about the planning process and plan!

Find out more and get involved!

The Columbia Plan: 2018


The Columbia Plan: 2018 is the comprehensive plan for the City of Columbia; providing a strategic 10-year vision, including objectives, goals, and policies to help guide the city's future development and growth.

Comprised of 9 elements, a policy matrix and supporting maps, The Columbia Plan outlines the needs and goals as identified by the citizens of Columbia, City staff, and other experts, to shape the city. The plan's elements include Demographics, Community Facilities, Housing, Natural Resources, Cultural Resources, Economic Development, Transportation, Future Land Use and Priority Investment. These elements are supplemented with the policy matrix which is a quick overview, ranking, and timetable for all policies recommended within the plan.

The Columbia Plan 2018 (Final Edition)
The Columbia Plan 2018 logo


Updates to The Columbia Plan: 2018

In addition to neighborhood, area, and corridor plans that have occurred since the 2008 planning process, updates to specific elements of The Columbia Plan: 2018 have been made.

Cover page of The Columbia Plan: 2018, 2009 update.


Update to The Columbia Plan (2009)
This brief update provided a glimpse of the 2008-2009 year in review.

Cover page of the Plan Columbia Land Use Plan, which includes a photo of the fountain at Finlay Park with downtown as a backdrop.


Plan Columbia: Land Use Plan (2015)
This planning process resulted in replacement of the Land Use Element of The Columbia Plan: 2018, and laid the groundwork for the rewrite of the City's Zoning Ordinance and Land Development Regulations, which is currently underway.  

The future land use maps in this element are updated regularly to incorporate modifications as well as newly annexed property; the document text was most recently amended 12/5/2017.

Cover of Walk Bike Columbia Plan, which shows a woman on a bicycle, a bike on a bus, parents walking children on a sidewalk, and a woman in a wheelchair



Walk Bike Columbia (2015)
This planning process was adopted as an replacement to the bicycle & pedestrian section of the Transportation Element of The Columbia Plan: 2018.  



Additional information about the planning process is available at www.walkbikecolumbia.org.




For more information or questions about the above, contact Leigh DeForth, Comprehensive Planner, at (803) 545-4864 or [email protected].