The essence of urban planning is the deliberate coordination of the activities of many individuals through disciplined research and creative invention. Maps, budgets, and programs are tools to help coordinate activities. Planning comprises five functions: research and information, general goal formation, specific plan making, coordination, and the furnishing of assistance and advice. Of these, however, the making of specific plans is the pivotal function of a planning office. A plan is a coordinated system of some kind intended as a guide to action. The term “policies plan” describes a new instrument necessary for bringing physical, social, economic, and political considerations into an adequate state of coherence. The top executive of any organization must play a pre-eminent role in the exercise of the planning function. His integral ties to operations and his responsibility for coordination make this essential. A metropolitan policies plan could be created only through the workings of a unit of government capable of resolving metropolitan political questions and making authentic metropolitan-level decisions.