Lessons from Australia: Creating liveability

Australian cities are among the most liveable in the world. As Tim Horton explains, linking design with governance is crucial to the country’s success

In Australia there is renewed national interest in cities, in better planning and infrastructure, after years of neglect.

Arguably the reframing of interest started in 2007 with the release by the Australian treasury of an intergenerational report highlighting the trends in demography and immigration – suggesting the size and age profile of Australia’s population was changing. Rapidly. And with impact. Treasury – the same dour class of boffins known the world over – identified that an ageing population had the potential to slow economic growth.

Not long after, an update of the report kicked-started a national conversation on the rate of growth anticipated, posing questions for our capacity to house, feed and employ a fast growing, diverse population. Australia’s Bureau of Statistics forecast the population to grow from 23 million to around 36 million by 2050. Reports, reviews and audits followed.

One in particular revealed that a business-as-usual approach couldn’t accommodate that number whether we liked it or not. Not when the forecast was for a rising number of households due to a falling household size. The whole housing model needed to change. More smaller, centrally located housing close to shops, public transport and services. Less free standing three bedroom homes remote from support and services. But with a market geared to low density housing models, and a largely analogue planning system with no structural incentives for design or construction innovation we couldn’t build fast enough, green enough or cheap enough.

There’s no firm evidence for it but I like to draw a line from this as the ‘identification of the problem’ to a major milestone in 2009 that represents Australia’s first step back after the ‘years of neglect’.

Government House in Adelaide

SETTING CRITERIA FOR LIVEABLE CITIES
OK so Australia’s a Federation, right? This means we share a state-based model of government which sits between local councils and the national government. Coordinating the priorities of national and state governments occurs at what we call the council of Australian governments (COAG); a regular meeting of all state premiers and the prime minister. In December 2009, COAG agreed a national criteria for future strategic planning of capital cities.

The criteria was impressive and diverse, including:

1. Capital city strategic planning systems should be integrated across government agencies;

2. They should be publicly accessible and be clear in their hierarchy, address nationally-significant policy issues including: population growth and demographic change, productivity and global competitiveness, but also social inclusion, health, liveability, and community wellbeing, housing affordability

3. They should strengthen the networks between capital cities and major regional centres

4. They should provide for planned, sequenced and evidence-based land release including a balance of infill and greenfield development;

5. They should provide an effective framework for private sector investment, innovation and implementation.

6. And for the first time, encourage world-class urban design and architecture.

With this, cities were back on the agenda. Criteria were agreed and states required to develop 30 year strategic plans for their capital cities to determine how infrastructure spending would be allocated.

South Australia’s response to COAG’s criteria was fast out of the blocks, and the most genuinely ambitious of any state. A 30-year plan for Greater Adelaide identified a polycentric urban form framed around 14 transit oriented developments. Renewable energy, environmental, transport, water and social targets were embedded in the plan. The plan is framed around a recurring theme – of a ‘new urban form’ shifting from fringe development, to focus on infill in established and well serviced communities. Over the next 30 years 70% of all development is to be infill, not greenfield. Why? Well, as Mike Rann, former premier of the state of South Australia, puts it; ‘We want the vast majority of new dwellings to be within walking distance of public transport.

‘To achieve this we will collocate medium and high density residential housing, major retail and service outlets and major employers around railway and tram stations and bus interchanges. This approach will revitalise 14 urban areas, maintain village integrity and provide the critical mass of population needed to make the upgrading of infrastructure cost effective over the life of the plan’

Adelaide’s ‘new urban form’ focuses on infill in established communities rather than new development

The government of the time also knew this was not a planning exercise alone but that a symbiotic link existed between design as a means of imagining a more sustainable liveable urban future, and governance as the mechanism to implement it. Here, design is understood as a tool for problem solving and generating solutions for the delivery of public services; the design of process and policies to support great ‘product’; whether it’s regional infrastructure, great public space or the housing we need.

This led to the establishment of Australia’s first state-based independent, multi disciplinary agency intended to draw together players in the built environment, research sector and government agencies, The Integrated Design Commission SA . Since opening its doors in July 2010, the commission has attracted interest from interstate and overseas for the unique ability to bring design-based methods to problem solving.

BUILDING A COLLECTIVE VISION OF PLACE

The 5000+ scheme asks people to imagine their city not as it is, but as it could be

Among a number of initiatives, its flagship project has been the Integrated Design Strategy for Inner Adelaide – Australia’s only capital city strategic planning process conceived as a partnership between the Australian government, key state ministries and local councils. Its chief aim is to develop a new, design-led model for city shaping in Australia. It’s shown how to connect COAG’s nine criteria to state government objectives and local council targets. Not separate and competing, but interdependent and mutually reinforcing. The project is given a working title based on the central city postcode, 5000.

Now 5000+ is prototyping a new way to dynamically engage people in ideas for their communities. We call it ‘intelligent engagement by design’ where the research and ideation of the design process is merged with what is so often separated out as a specific window of ‘consultation’ on policy development. Central to this is design leadership from built environment professionals, researchers and thinkers, creatives and others operating from a published and accessible evidence base. It operates on a principle that our collective vision for a place should be the basis for a new set of rules based on new information, in preference to today’s cities where yesterday’s rules tend to limit the scope and potential for change.

Critically, any success in the 5000+ project can be attributed to the collaborative partnerships it has promoted. Along the way, we’ve engaged with around 1000 experts from sociology, education, climate and environment, design, planning, development, government and more. An almost open-source approach means video and web has led the sharing of research and events resulting in around 32,000 video views. And in just 12 months we’ve seen over 179,000 online interactions.  This along with night time talks to town halls and resident groups, student competitions and work on government work groups.

As Mike Rann puts it, 5000+ is asking people to see their city not as it is but how it could be. Significantly the overwhelming response was that people want more integrated decision making, explained better at the start. Something universally applicable, I suspect.

Australia’s model is far from perfect and there are some signs of weakening resolve just as capital city plans are beginning to form. But any process of change needs multiple drivers to combine in order to create the momentum for sustained energy and impact. Let’s hope we stay the course down under.

• Anyone interested in knowing more about Mike Rann’s own interest in cities should check out his lecture on ‘Revitalising Cities’. A tour de force on the renewed interest in cities.