Thirty-two per cent of Indonesia’s poor now live in urban areas. To attract investment by improving infrastructure and providing conducive business environments, local governments are formulating new town planning policies. Many of these impact negatively upon workers in the informal economy, prompting calls to reduce the ‘anti-poor bias’ in urban management. This study will be a comparative analysis of approaches to reconciling the often conflicting demands of assisting the urban poor whilst simultaneously developing well-functioning towns and cities.