Joben, what you're talking about is urban design... a kind-of professional nether region that draws from both the architecture and (physical) planning disciplines.

Master's degrees with a focus in urban design are available at places like Harvard, Columbia and the University of Washington, among others. In essence, a master's in urban design accomplishes in two or three years what you're considering in five with the dual degrees. The hitch is that the two-year degree will require an earlier degree in architecture.

Architects (as you'll see above and elsewhere) routinely dismiss planning degrees, but for someone interested in urban design, the larger understanding of urban forces (policy, economics, sociology, etc) a planning background should provide will be missing from an architecture program. On the flip side, the technical skillset required for urban design almost always comes from architecture training.

What I'd suggest, given your scenario:

1. take whatever courses you can in physical design
2. start talking to architects and urban designers, see what they do, tell them your interests, and listen for advice.

Good luck!

I was planning on attending Albany university to pursue land use/environmental planning but also in hopes of taking a few architecture courses at the renssalears polytechnic institute and see if I could beef up some of my knowledge in that area. I was also planning on taking like an art class or 2 to work on my artistic skills, just in case I wanted to start a portfolio if I wanted to go to architecture school after. Does this sound like a legitimate plan or just a waste of time and money? How do I just start talking to architects? I dont know any architects

I would focus on architecture/design courses, less on art, since your time is limited.

Find out the people in your city that do what you think you might like to do, i.e., urban design and planning. Do this by looking in the phone book, online, the local AIA and APA websites, etcetera. Write the principles of the firms and agencies a nice letter saying you're a new student in planning with an interest in urban design, and you wonder if they'd have a half hour to meet with you and show you around their office. Some will be too busy; others would love to meet with you.

yeah, don't look at them as artistic courses...technically, what you want to develop are the "graphic communication" skills to express the ideas that you have...in other words, learning how to draw/model/sculpt to say specfic things, and in a visual language that other designers will understand...

if you have these skills, then just having a planning background isn't so bad..otherwise, i would say do architecture over planning also...

go find, and attend public talks and events where you can go listen to other designers...ask questions, meet other people at these events...you'll always learn a little something from everyone you meet, and then the odd one will pay off big time...

i know that the university of pennsylvania offers a joint degree program in planning and architecture... this would allow you to kill two birds with one stone in less time than it would take to do them separately... you should look into this and other joint degree programs...