IT MUST be a profound nuisance for planners, administrators and developers to have all those NIMBYs, conservationists and do-gooders out there trying to wreck the best laid plans of mice and men.
When will they learn what is good for them?
This week the Todd report came down. Robert Todd, a former member of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, conducted an inquiry into a redevelopment project in Braddon. He found some major faults with the planning process and made some fairly pertinent observations.
He thought that if the affected residences had been called to a meeting very early on, much of the aggravation would have been taken out of the process.
Canberra is faced with some difficult changes. For a start, over the past five years, federal governments of both complexions have awakened from the Menzies dream. Indeed, they have found the Menzies dream of a significant capital a yawn, or at best something achieved, so of no further great moment. So they have made the ACT pay its own way, just as the other states do.
This has had a profound effect on the people of Canberra and those charged with the responsibility of administering the city. The strife over the Braddon development is only one manifestation of that. No doubt there will be more to come.
Some people in the ACT Administration would see the development of Canberra as the history of enlightened developers overcoming the forces of NIMBYism (Not In My Back Yard) to make a great city. And others in residents’ groups would see the development of the city as a constant battle to ensure the preservation of good planning and conservation principles to ensure decent living conditions against the rapacious, selfish, profit-driven motives of developers and now the ACT Government.
The Todd report comes at a [TH]significant time for Canberra. The city faces a change from federal benevolence to federal determination to make the city responsible for itself, financially and legally. It is a bit like parents wondering when their adult children will ever leave the comfort of the parental home to fend for themselves.
At the same time, the city is grappling for the first time with redevelopment.
Development in greenfields in one matter. Canberra is experienced at that: roads, lights, houses, shops, schools, buses, gardens, establishment. We have done it large-scale since the 1960s.
The new challenge is to ensure the redevelopment of old areas close to the city are done well. You do get a second chance if you mess it up. The only trouble is that the second chance is 50 years away.
The new elements are the [TH]amenity of existing residents and how to ensure that the increased value in inner-area land through rezoning to medium density is properly recouped as a public asset and not directed to developers’ pockets. Developers, properly, should be able to get profits from redevelopment, but only through efficient and imaginative building, not through increases in unimproved land values brought about through what amounts to rezoning.
The Todd report did not tell us much that we did not already know: there are severe deficiencies in present planning law.
That said, some credit must be given to the ACT Legislative Assembly’s Planning, Development and Infrastructure Committee.
It has overturned some of the more pernicious elements of the former Territory Plan. It will permit third-party appeal rights, for a start. It has also reserved more areas close to existing residences for public use.
The essential lessons from the Braddon episode are severalfold. Redevelopment from single-to medium-density is important to make a more efficient city, but the amenity of existing residents must be respected.
The redevelopment process must give the chance to imaginative developers to make a reasonable profit, but that profit must be made through building and marketing, not through raw increases in land value created by what amounts to rezoning.
Redevelopment must not repeat mistakes of the past where cheap buildings to make a fast buck result in unpleasant, energy-inefficient dwellings that cause cost and social problems in the future.
Vigorous debate will continue. And that is a good thing. It can only result in better development.
There are encouraging signs that the ACT politicians, the ACT Administration, and developers are learning some lessons. And it does not hurt them to have residents, community groups and others incessantly propounding and urging better practice.
Canberra is a marvellous city. It is so because it is planned and because residents have taken an active interest in its development. If the sociologists want to give that the label “”creative friction”; let’s have more creative friction.