I guess that one of the things you should consider in selecting a place to live is who is running it.  We selected the Swirling Epicenter many years ago based on a recommendation from a friend.  For the most part, the things he told us about the Swirl were true.  But there were a lot of things that we didn't learn about until we had lived here for awhile.  
Thing one came up when I was managing a small,  local fleet of construction trucks,  just thirty-some trucks.  If you exited I-25 southbound at the South Nevada Exit, the ramp became a two-lane street and turned to the east.  At the intersection of Tejon Street,  one lane became a right-turn-only lane, the other became a left-turn-straight-ahead lane.  Now think about this a minute.  If you are going straight ahead, you have to wait for the vehicles ahead of you in your lane to make a left turn before you can proceed.  There is no left turn arrow so traffic has to wait for an opening in oncoming traffic.  During rush hour the street got so backed up that it was not uncommon to see cars lined up out onto the freeway.  The right turn lane was usually clear after a couple of cars went through.  This set up is backwards from every place I have ever been.  I had trucks sitting at that stupid light for three or four or more cycles without getting through the intersection.   So one day I called the police and asked who I needed to see to address this.  They pointed me to the City Engineers.  After several unsuccessful attempts to talk to whoever designed the traffic flow, I finally spoke to one of the top dogs in the planning office.  I carefully explained the problem;  I used small words because I understood that he was an engineer.  I can't even begin to describe the conversation;  suffice it to say that I hung up the phone and went outside and bit river rocks in half for an hour or so.  At one point he suggested that we could just move into the right lane and go straight across the street.  I pointed out that that would be a violation;  he didn't think it was a very important violation.  (I asked the city cop who was in charge of DOT compliance and truck safety if he would cite a truck for moving into the right turn lane to go straight across.  He rattled off about four separate charges he would write for).  In short, the engineers in the city planning office didn't see the problem.  Even after I repeatedly asked him which lane would clear faster...used a little traffic engineer-speak on him...he couldn't grasp what I was trying to explain to him.  He finished our conversation by letting me know that the intersection in question was a city street crossing a state highway and so he really couldn't do anything about it anyway.  He assured me that the intersection in question, in fact the whole freeway interchange at that point, was on a five-year program and would be completely re-done.  Five years.  I had trucks sitting at that light almost that long.  
So anyhow, more that ten years later, the intersection is re-done, the streets widened, the lanes increased, and I no longer care.  
Thing two is something I still care a great deal about.  And it has to do with planning, again.   Our state and local leaders are always telling us we are on the verge of a drought.  We just finished a four- or five-year period that was referred to as a "drought".  The term, as interpreted by the brains in the colorful state, has more to do with storage of water in the mountain snowcaps than with the actual presence of water.  It takes awhile to catch on to this.  Several times in the last four years of drought I have waded through ankle-deep water in the WalMart parking lot, dodging the lightning and cringing from the thunder, wishing the drought would end.  Thunderstorms on the "Front Range" can be absolutely Biblical at times.  What do the engineers have to do with the rain?  Well, they didn't plan very well on how to get rid of it.  My house, and many others on our lovely little hillside, channel the roof run-off from the gutters into the ground and out to the storm drains.  The way it is set up, many houses' drains may run into common drain pipes before reaching the main conduit.  
My house, and several like it, have below-ground-level exits.  My back door is surrounded by a block stairwell about six by four feet in size and three feet deep with a drain in the bottom and stairs up to ground level.  When the rains reach the Biblical stage, the drain in the bottom of my stairwell changes roles and becomes a fountain.  The drain system cannot keep up with the run-off from a dozen or more houses and so it backs up and out any way it can.  My stairwell becomes a cistern with a capacity of about eighty cubic feet of water.  The back door is not  submarine-rated and allows a percentage of that water to come on in.  The first time I experienced this, I was flummoxed.  We soaked up the mess as best we could but couldn't really see a way to fix it.  Over the years, we have devised several plans, most only marginally successful.  As I sit here watching the next big one forming up over the big hill, I am hoping the sump pump, the coffer-dam, and my handy shop-vac will be able to meet the challenge.  Often during these calms-before-the-storm,  I spare a thought or two for the county planners who went with the minimum pipe diameter for residential drains;  I mean, in a drought-ridden area like this, who really needs sufficient drains?
Another example comes to mind.  The Swirl is home to the US Olympic Center and hosts several Olympic venues and housing.  Not long ago, a new skating arena was constructed right alongside the freeway.  The World Arena hosts lots of events;  I saw the "Last of the Breed" show there a couple years ago, my youngest daughter's high school held their graduation there, and there is always something going on.  It has a huge parking lot, as you can imagine.  I was working for the company that prepped and paved that lot.  Despite several expressions of misgivings about the ability of the parking lot ot handle water run-off, the planners assured us that if we just followed their plan, all would be well.  Well...it was...until the first big rain.  Cheyenne Meadows Blvd comes down a pretty good hill, crosses Venetucci, and goes right into the entrance of the World Arena parking lot.  That day all the run-off from all the residential streets up the hill gathered  together and raced across Venetucci at a smart pace.  The southwest section of the parking lot was under almost three feet of water in a matter of minutes.  We had to re-do a lot of the swales to channel the water to where the drains were.
Just an afterthought for ya, Tuesday night we had a real intense cell pass over.  I watched a teenager sliding down the gutter in the flood.  I wondered if he was going to be an engineer.