Thinking creatively about public open space

There's many ways to provide and manage public open space in the inner city.

New York seems to have thought up several different ways.  Have a look at this article, which talks about how the city has reclaimed an abandoned, above ground railway line (Like Chicago's Elevated Line) for public parkland.
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/19/high-lines-next-phase-less-glitz-more-intimacy/

I was also impressed with Bryant Park, which is in behind the New York Library [http://www.bryantpark.org].  The management structure for the park is unusual.  The Park is owned by New York City, but is run by a not-for-profit, private management company, which seems to mostly comprise local enighbours.  This gives management flexibility in the types of uses allowed on-site, but presumably should prevent over-commercialisation to the point that residential amenity is impacted.  The park includes everything from open lawn to a free library, where anyone (including children) can sit down and read a book for a while.  What a great idea!  It's also an exemplar of active private philanthropy.  I hope I get the opportunity to visit again.

Front and Centre - Planning for Community Hubs

This article was published in the December edition of the Victorian Planning News

One of the key events held in the 2010 Planning Week was “Front and Centre – Planning for Community Hubs”. This one-day Forum was organised by the Social Planning Chapter. Participants heard inspiring stories of successful community hubs, discussions on lessons learnt in planning for various types of hubs, and some thought-provoking discussion on their role in community development.

The Victorian P&E Act says that the purpose of planning is:

(a) to provide for the fair, orderly, economic and sustainable use, and development of land;

(c) to secure a pleasant, efficient and safe working, living and recreational environment for all Victorians and visitors to Victoria

  

Many planners (and most developers) take this to mean that we should wring the maximum amount of dollars out of land that we can, with everything potentially conflicting separated as much as possible. I think this is wrong. We should instead aim to wring the maximum social value out of land that we can. This means planning our communities in a way that encourages community resilience, social justice, diversity, harmony and vibrancy.

One way to achieve this aim is to plan the location of community services and facilities to promote place-making, community development and coordinated delivery of social services. In other words, to develop community hubs. I’m not talking about old-fashioned, 1960s-style community services, where every service had its own building, which was often empty most of the time. Community hubs mix everything in together, so that people can go to the one place for everything they need, effectively from the cradle to the grave. Governments around the world now recognise the importance of well-planned and integrated service hubs in community building for regional, inner urban and fringe locations.

Community hubs challenge the traditional model of service delivery, which funds everything separately and keeps everybody separated. But the rewards of taking that next step are significant.

Some of the key lessons to come out of the Forum are:

• There are resources available to help plan Community Hubs. Lily D’Ambrosio, Minister for Community Development, launched the new guidelines Developing Community Infrastructure, which were developed by the DPCD and the GAA to support organisations to develop high quality, integrated community facilities in Victoria.
• Don’t assume that Community Hubs are just expanded libraries or schools. Cam Rose, CEO of the Western Bulldogs, gave a fascinating account of how Whitten Oval is being transformed into a focus of community development in the West. His belief is that the Club and the Region are inextricably linked, and that the key to long-term sustainability for the Bulldogs is building the capability and enhancing the self-image of the Western Region. 
• Community Hubs should be planned holistically. Denise Francisco from the DPCD spoke about her work on the Footscray Renewal Community Infrastructure Plan. This project started from first principles to determine actual community need, rather than just imposing services based on existing building capacity.
• The spatial dimension is important. Carmel Boyce from AECOM reminded us that most social planning objectives have spatial implications, and that the spatial dimension can either cause social problems (e.g. childhood obesity) or enhance health and social integration (e.g. walkable neighbourhoods). Social equity, community sustainability, accessibility and walkability are all important considerations in planning community Hubs.
• Social investment has economic benefits. Andrea Skraba from SGS Economics and Planning discussed her work in evaluating the economic benefits of social infrastructure. These can include higher property values in neighbouring areas, more efficient land use outcomes, better service delivery efficiency for social service providers (including synergies between providers), economies of scale in operating community infrastructure, increased patronage and the potential to leverage funding from other partners. They also include better access to employment and life opportunities for their visitors, which are the most important benefits of improving the delivery of community services.

 Examples of successful provision of community Hubs were presented, including:

• The Clayton Community Centre – City of Monash

• The Inverloch Community Hub – Bass Coast Shire

• The Hume Global Learning Centre – City of Hume

• International examples reviewed by Rod Duncan of the DPCD.

These case studies showed that Community Hubs can be developed at any scale, and turned to almost any purpose, including community arts, business incubation, employment generation, adult education and social services.

The Forum concluded with a Panel discussion looking at planning Community Hubs from the perspective of a consultant, a developer, the community, DPCD and a social planner. David Brown, the Director Community Infrastructure from Delphin Lend Lease, provided a quote which sums up the purpose of planning for community hubs beautifully:

“If we believe in the benefits that flow from being part of the life of a functioning community, the challenge is simply to find more ways of bringing people back together again.

Investment is the key to the creation of stronger communities and, ultimately, to a stronger nation. But this is not only about dollars.” Hugh Mackay.

Investment in community hubs is investment in stronger communities.

Community Hubs

Today's Age has a good article about community involvement in developing a Community Hub in Callignee in Latrobe.  It's particularly interesting in that the local community were able to negotiate with Counil and the architects to get specific design elements to suit them.
The article is here:
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/hub-set-to-bring-a-town-together-20100718-10g4m.html

Community Engagement in Planning

The PIA Social Planning Chapter and the Women’s Planning network jointly presented a seminar on “Community Engagement in Planning” in early June. Four speakers provided different perspectives on their engagement experiences:

• Jacqueline Robinson, the Director of Community Development at Village Well, spoke from the consultant’s perspective about the challenges of getting local communities and authorities involved in long-term community development projects, especially in getting long-term commitment and resources to intensive planning processes.

• Dr Clare Mouat, of the University of Melbourne, spoke from the academic perspective, and discussed the impact that new technologies are having on engagement practices.

• Brenda Gabe, a Community Advocate, has participated in many community engagement processes. She spoke about the time and effort it took to be involved in being consulted, and the need for the consulters to be transparent and honest about the influence that the community will have over the planning process.

• Kerry O’Neill, Project Director Long Term Planning at the Victorian Bushfire Reconstruction Authority, spoke about engaging with communities that have been impacted by disaster. Kerry noted that in in these circumstances the agencies have to go above and beyond to help traumatised people participate in the process, and that the recovery of the community must be the over-riding concern for the agencies involved.

The aim of this seminar was to talk about examples of good practice and to get the planning profession thinking about what we need to do to improve our record in engaging with communities. All four speakers were eloquent in the need to improve our commitment to public participation in planning and were generous in sharing their stories and experiences.

The PIA Social Planning Chapter aims to improve the understanding and practice of consultation and engagement in planning. They have developed a Draft Public Participation national position statement, which is open for comment until the 30th July. The policy introduction makes this comment:

Opportunities to be consulted and to participate in planning processes are important parts of the broader democratic process. They are also components of due diligence in planning practice and are important safeguards for the planning authority and decision makers. Engagement through participation processes is a governance responsibility.

There are too many examples of planning applications creating a public outcry where local community members claim that they weren’t consulted about a proposal which they feel will negatively affect them; while the developers and planners stand around (hurt expressions on their faces) saying, “But it’s in the plan!”. There seems to be a general lack of understanding, on both sides, of the role that public participation should play in planning, and at what point in those processes that communities have the power to influence planning outcomes.

Community engagement is not just a feel-good thing, nor is a forced tack-on, or a burden on developers. It should be an integral part of the planning process. When done well, it can add considerably to the outcomes, producing plans and developments that align with community aspirations and values. The draft position statement notes that its over-arching principle is:

Public participation is based on the belief that those who are affected by a decision have a right to be involved in the decision-making process.

In other words, anyone who is affected by a planning proposal should have a right to be involved in deciding the outcome. The key question that many planners struggle to answer is when their involvement should occur – at the plan-making stage, the policy development stage, the development application stage, or throughout? The principles of public participation indicate that community participation should occur throughout the planning process.

2010 Planning Week - Planning for Community Hubs Forum - call for Expressions of Interest

2010 Planning Week - Planning for Community Hubs Forum – call for Expressions of Interest

The PIA Social Planning Chapter will convene a one-day forum in Planning Week on the topic of Planning for Community Hubs.

Expressions of interest to participate and suggestions for topics are sought from Chapter members and others. These include suggestions for keynote speakers and case study presentations.

I plan for the forum to include several keynote speakers and two or three break-out sessions where participants can discuss aspects of planning for community hubs in detail.

Please feel free to forward this email to your contact lists.

Expressions of interest should be forwarded to Eula Black [eblack@planning.org.au] at the PIA by the 16th July 2010. These can be in an email, with the proposed title, presenter details and a short (max 250 words) description of the topic.

If you would like to discuss the Forum, please send an email to Eula and she will forward it to me.

The Westgate Bridge

The Westgate Bridge is the major bridge linking western and eastern Melbourne.  As such, it is often seen as symbolic of the divide between the different parts of Melbourne.  I know residents of the eastern suburbs who have literally never driven over that bridge.

I recently had the opportunity to go on a boat tour of the Port of Melbourne precinct, and took some photos of the bridge at angles you normally never see it at, so I thought I'd post them here for anyone who's interested to view.

Many people think of the bridge as being isolated and industrial, but there's actually quite a lot of parkland around the bridge area.  There's even a golf course under the western approaches - you do the first hole on the southern side of the bridge and then the next tee is literally directly under it.

Next to the golf course is a sports field where football and cricket are played.  Apparently a few stray balls have ended up on the freeway!

The bridge was built so high to enable large container ships to pass under, as some of the key Port docks are upriver.  It's an amazing sight seeing those enormous ships entering and departing the Port and going under the bridge.  At high tide some of them only just squeeze under!

Buses and busy city streets

The following article is about a plan to create a fully-separated busway on 34th Street in New York:
http://www.streetsblog.org/2010/03/02/dot-plans-to-bring-nycs-first-separated-busway-to-34th-street/



We really need to do more of these in Melbourne too! Every time I work on a planning study for a freeway, I hear people saying that we should be investing in public transport instead. However, there's no reason why you can't use roads for public transport, and building one form of infrastructure and using it for all forms of transport (public, individual, freight and commercial) is the most efficient use of public funds.
Imagine something like this on Punt Road/Hoddle Street, Johnston Street and so on ... it would make both traffic and buses move much faster. The New York DoT is predicting that bus speeds will improve by 35%, which will reduce travel time significantly.
At present in Melbourne we are just too tentative about bus lanes. The ones on Springvale Road, for example, appear and disappear all the time, and are ignored more often than they are honoured. The buses are still stopping in traffic much of the time, because many of the bus stops have still not been indented from the road.
I used buses all the time when I was in New York - they were a great way to get around. It was easy to see where they were going and you could watch the city as you were passing by. Buses are clearly a major form of public transport in New York, covering areas where the subway system doesn't go.

There's an opinion piece in today's Age by a Michael James titled "Can sitcoms save us from urban sprawl?"
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/contributors/can-sitcoms-save-us-from-urban-sprawl-20100204-nfk6.html

His central argument is that we in Australia don't do medium to high density well. He points out that many sit-coms set in big cities (especially New York) are actually set in neighbourhoods characterised by medium-rise (eight or so stories), not high rise, apartments, and that this scale of development is more likely to lead to lively and engaged communities.

I find it interesting that a key element of Michael James' article, as with almost every other similar article I have ever read, is the argument that Australian achitecture is inferior to that found in other countries. We have 'soul-less high-rises' and 'ugly six-packs' where other countries have 'human scale' and 'lively'.

What is being taught in Architecture courses at Australian Universities? Why have we developed a culture of lowest-cost construction instead of greatest value construction? Why can't we desgin buildings that enable people to live together comfortably?

What kind of developers do we have, that they are unwilling or incapable of developing high-quality dwellings that contribute more to the social environment than just a roof over someone's head?

Maybe we need to move towards a more cooperative, rather than adversarial planning systems, where everyone works together to enhance our cities instead of just wringing a profit out of them. It would help if we stopped thiking of shelter in terms of dollar value and started thinking of it in terms of social value.

It seems to me that there is a doctoral thesis in the question "What level of density is most likely to produce an engaged and resilient community?" Most of the arguments for different densities are more along the lines of appeals to emotion than arguments based on hard data. We don't really know how the communities in New York, London, Amsterdam etc function. Large parts of New York have been condemned as crime-ridden slums at various times, including areas at the density level of the 'Friends' neighbourhood. If we want to increase the density of Australian cities, that's fine. But let's go and find out what really works in other countries, and why, and figure out how to make it work for us. I don't want urban planning based on holiday nostalgia.

Acronyms Galore

I have been collecting planning related acronyms for a while now. They fascinate me because they say so much about the way the various participants view each other. Anyway, here's a few of them:

Terms for objectors
LULU = Locally Unwanted Land Use
NIMBY = Not In My Back Yard
BANANA = Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything [or anyone]
CAVE people = Citizens Against Virtually Everything
NIMEY = Not in my election year (specific to politicians)
NIMTOO = Not in my term of office (specific to politicians)
NIMFOS = Not in my field of sight
NOPE = Not on planet earth
WIIFM What’s in it for me?

I want to come back to this at some stage because I often find that the LULU response is automatic when people are confronted with something that frightens them. It seems to me that planners make a mistake in arrogantly dismissing the LULU response - it's actually a valid reaction. It's how you deal with the reaction that really matters.

Plannerese
DBTD/DBTN: Two common vaccines used by planners to “fix” a project they don’t like. DBTD is technically Death By a Thousand Days and DBTN is Death By a Thousand Nicks [also known as the BED Principle—“Bleed ‘em Dry”]

Doczilla: Any technical report that should be caged rather than shelved.

DUDE: Developer Under Delusions of Entitlement

PowerPoint Poisoning: Nauseous state of mind and body induced by viewing “professional” presentations.

Sense of Immunity: Mistaken belief that land use regulation does not apply for a particular neighbourhood or site.

SLAPP: Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation

Gagplanistan: A place of massively meaningless planning.

These ones are equal parts cynical about the process and the participants!