A Call To Balance Quantity With Quality For Housing And Urban Development

The Urban Design Forum (UDF) has produced an eight-point list of concerns to factor into resource management reforms related to lifting the bar for future housing outcomes - rather than lowering the bar too far.

“In our submission to the ‘Going for Housing Growth’ consultation we were very focused on seeking to see a positive high-level direction for growth emerge,” says Graeme Scott of the UDF’s Resource Management reform working group.

“One of the concerns we're hearing is that the current direction of the reforms needs to have a stronger sense of what ‘quality’ means for the future of housing outcomes in our communities.

“A common view is that given that the attributes of quality are well-established, well-defined and provide for a measurable long-term return on investment, we should be aspiring to achieving quality as well as quantity. This is a view shared across UDF members and with many other submitters in the built environment community.

“New Zealand can’t afford to make, or repeat, mistakes with our built environment. It’s common knowledge for instance that enabling development without requiring adequate social infrastructure or factoring in future maintenance costs is likely to result in avoidable negative consequences," says Graeme.

“Similarly, we know that designing for connected, vibrant and safe public spaces are cornerstones of successful urban environments. Any new legislation that ignores agreed and well-described principles runs the risk of leading to low quality outcomes that carry unwanted impacts into future decades”.

The UDF’s eight-point list reads as follows.

To enable good housing and urban development outcomes the new system needs to:

• state a positive vision.
• include quality as the inseparable partner to large quantity (intensification).
• include provision for high quality public realm as a key urban element for common good.
• encourage co-ordination and collaboration to facilitate economic efficiencies.
• implement standardisation at the national level with allowance for flexibility for context-specific local applications.
• provide certainty and create confidence through vision and clear spatial plans with indicative timelines.
• require structure planning for greenfield development.
• recognise and include planning and urban design as key tools to achieve positive outcomes for individuals and communities.

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