There has been a notable shift in the approach to planning from modernist thinking (Le Corbusier and those influenced by his thinking such as Robert Moses) to later approaches such as the Smithsons from Team 10 and today (New Urbanists for example) - the former approached urban interventions from above (a studio set up in a hotel suite thirty floors above the ground), whereas the latter studied the city on the ground and designed for people on the ground. In that sense, urban designers today all partake in some manner a derive of the environment they are commissioned to intervene in (mostly in the form of observation and documentation).
After experiencing a derive on Crown Street, I think it is important that designers do the same in their commissioned environments in order to absorb as much as possible lest they overlook something successful that ought to be kept or ignore something that needs improvement.