Originally published as an editorial under a joint by-line with Tim Westcott and Gilda Di Vincenzo in Planning News 35, no. 8 (September 2009): 4.
Have we allowed sustainability to become a boring topic? Is it increasingly tempting to flick past the articles in Planning News and elsewhere that stress the urgency of action on climate change with nothing more than a quick “yep, know that” shrug?
If you can relate to this guilty impulse, we have a problem. Sustainability ought to be our core business as planners. The primary rationale for having a planning profession is surely because in some situations the market, left to its own devices, can lead to bad outcomes: is there a better example of this than environmental degradation? (Indeed it is, quite literally, the textbook example: remember the “tragedy of the commons?”) There surely can’t be a bigger challenge for this and the next generation of planners than ensuring more sustainable communities. Anecdotally, an urge to help plan a more ecologically sound built environment is central to the reasons many of our keen young planners enter the profession.
Amongst the more jaded professionals, however, it seems some fatigue may be setting in about the topic. At a community-wide level, there have been great strides forward: climate change is currently central to the national political debate, and denialists are increasingly reduced to their proper place in public discourse (i.e., talking amongst themselves in the comments section of Andrew Bolt’s blog). Yet for planners, sustainability risks becoming something we talk about a lot but never actually do. It is the gulf between talk and action that causes the occasional cynicism about the issues, and the indifference amongst planners who skim publications such as this looking for things that will actually impact their day-to-day practice.
This isn’t meant as a dig at the many planners (and developers, and architects, and other professionals) out there doing good work, in various ways, on sustainability issues. On the contrary: they are to be applauded. But they are working within – or fighting – a system that too often sees the proper place for sustainability as within broad statements of principles, rather than embedded in the nuts and bolts of implementation measures. In this model, sustainability becomes like a magical incantation, evoked at the start of a document as if to ward off evil spirits. Worse, it can become a branding exercise, as with the expansion of the UGB being packaged as Delivering Melbourne’s Newest Sustainable Communities. (A move that recalled Sir Humphrey’s advice from Yes Minister: “Always dispose of the difficult bit in the title. It does less harm there than in the text.”)
In February 2009 we wrote an editorial pondering the distinct lack of sustainability measures in planning schemes, entitled “Sustainability versus Status Quo?” Eighteen months on and the answer is definitely “status quo.” The planning profession is still struggling to shrug off the legacy of the attitude that sustainability is purely a building issue. It is true that the broader base of building controls – in that they apply to all buildings, not just those needing planning permission – means they are potentially more powerful than planning controls in achieving sustainability outcomes. Planning can complement that advantage, however, by influencing projects at an earlier stage, where smart layout and design can “build in” permanent sustainability advantages.
Yet concrete planning provisions to achieve such outcomes – beyond general policy statements – remain thin on the ground. The Councils pursuing the STEPS project (www.morelandsteps.com.au) have developed tools that are well beyond those provided by the planning system; yet they must operate in the absence of any formal recognition in planning schemes, with negative implications for both their efficacy and the transparency of their application. And at a macro scale, the expansion of the UGB is a reminder that we haven’t really demonstrated our ability to deliver a more sustainable settlement pattern across the Melbourne metropolitan area, either. Somewhat shockingly, the broad statements of principle in clause 12 of the SPFF just aren’t getting the job done.
The irony of all this was highlighted by the recent establishment of the Coastal Change Climate Change Advisory Committee, which has been charged with investigating how land use planning policy can assist in managing the impacts of climate change. The appointment of this committee flows from the Governments’ work on the Victorian Coastal Strategy, and the findings will presumably provide welcome guidance in how Councils should deal with VCAT’s findings in the Grip Road decision and Ministerial Direction No. – 13 Managing Coastal Hazards and the Coastal Impacts of Climate Change. It’s much-needed work. Yet there’s something depressing about the sense of inevitability built into the terms of reference, which are purely related to the role for planning in managing the impacts of climate change. That’s in the nature of the project, but where is the similarly progressed enquiry into planning’s contribution to avoiding those impacts?
This month’s cover stories explore the discussion around the discussion of the “tram corridor” study, which outlines one possible model for pushing us towards getting us to higher densities and more transit-oriented development patterns. It is timely and fascinating work, and we hope that this issue helps to broaden and continue the debate prompted by PIA’s previous seminar on the project. One thing is for sure, however: whether we pursue higher densities along transit corridors, around activity centres, or a bit of both, it won’t just happen because we draw a few blobs on some maps in Councils’ MSSs.
If we are to get ret real about fulfilling planning’s role in averting climate change, we need to get hands-on. That means state-backed sustainability tools that can be used for planning assessments. It means getting real about prescribing minimum densities for new suburban expansion. And it means genuinely facilitative planning controls in areas where we want to direct new development. If planning can do those things, sustainability will be exciting again.