A post about sustainable living by Sheelagh Storey in the People United Facebook Page page this morning jogged me to remember how, in the shortness of time, it’s easy to get drawn into following the quick superficial grabs of commercial newsmedia. The quality of content on sites like The Conversation AU and ABC News is far superior.
Sheelagh shared this article about sustainable cities which is particularly pertinent to mayoral candidate Mona Hecke 2020‘s goals for our Gold Coast.
It’s commonly assumed that Gold Coast City’s approach to urban planning is laissez-faire. But this is not historically accurate. Former Mayor Dennis O’Connell at the City Plan community forum in Labrador this week, reminded the crowd about the progressive Planning Schemes that he presided over in 1973 and 1982. The 1982 scheme in particular, introduced the first ‘strategic plan’, and it facilitated and controlled the highrise development which our city became famous for. I was a town planner when the 1994 Gold Coast Planning Scheme came into effect. That scheme set a clear vision for the city. It was regarded as the rule book that developers large and small complied with - unless they wanted to do something contrary to the strategic plan, in which case a process that involved wider community input was triggered. I don’t recall the levels of angst around town planning that exist today. After amalgamation with Albert Shire in 1995, and into the 2000s, Gold Coast City Council did a lot of visionary thinking. The 2003 Gold Coast Planning Scheme focused on the premise of ‘Building Sustainable Communities’. It was underpinned by big strategies that were developed through lengthy, difficult, but ultimately rewarding, community consultation processes, and which required longterm commitment.
As one of the hundreds, perhaps thousands of dedicated urban planning and design professionals who contributed to these visionary strategies, I have been dismayed to witness regression of our city planning and development over the last two council terms. The silent and incremental withdrawal of commitment to longterm strategies for sustainability, in favour of quick development profits and inferior urban outcomes, is truly regrettable.
I am sad that the 1997 Gold Coast Urban Heritage and Character Study is long forgotten and little care and attention is given to the qualities that make our city special. There was also a Nature Conservation Strategy, produced and adopted at the same time but I can’t trace that online anymore.
I lament that the 2003 Guragunbah Local Area Plan to turn our biggest floodplain into a greenheart for the city is now all but forgotten. The council has not only failed to progress the greenspace planning and development. They have been approving new development to creep further and further into the floodplain.
I regret that the 1998 Northern Wastewater Strategy which was a 50-year plan for treatment of water through creation of wetlands as a transitional alternative for the sugar cane fields has been abandoned. This was to deter the need for massive engineering projects like the $300m pipes under the Broadwater to pump wastewater to the ocean, it was also a means to create longterm cost savings and to retain greenspace and regain nature in the city so that the entire SEQ region does not become an endless housing metropolis.
I resent that the 2011 Rapid Transit Corridor Study which had integrity as an urban transformation strategy got hi-jacked as a property speculation opportunity without the good quality design required to achieve great urban places.
These are just four of the many reasons why I am volunteering my time, night and day until the council election next March, to support Mona Hecke’s campaign to be our next Mayor.
I like Mona’s approach, and her ideas for making our city better. They are not radical or anti-development. They are pro-sustainable development. They paint a picture of the kind of city that I want to live in.
If you like Mona’s goals too and feel inclined to support her campaign, please subscribe and/or sign up to volunteer on her website. We all need to do a little bit, if we want change for good.
