Catherine Carter |
Tuesday, 15 December 2009 12:01 AM |
Add Comment
This month's COAG meeting agreed that all states and territories would by 2012 have capital city strategic plans that meet national criteria.
These criteria include planned, evidence-based land release to improve housing affordability, better transport planning to tackle urban congestion, and new urban development to be better linked to transport, jobs and services.
These plans will be for the next 30 years and include infrastructure and land use plans. Work is to start next year, and from 2012, Commonwealth infrastructure funding will be allocated according to whether they meet the agreed criteria. And the Prime Minister is already on the record with some fairly unequivocal statements about infrastructure funding which essentially mean ‘no plans, no money’.
To do this the plans will have to be integrated, across functions (such as land-use, transport planning, and environmental assessment) and the different government agencies. And although they to cover a 30-year, long-term time span, they will have to incorporate shorter-term goals or milestones, every few years as well as immediate infrastructure priorities.
The plans will also need to address nationally significant policy issues including population growth and demographic change, climate change, productivity, efficient development and use of existing and new infrastructure, housing affordability, social inclusion and the development of major urban corridors.
According to the COAG announcement, the plans would be assessed by the COAG Reform Council, because: "Capital city strategic plans are needed to lift economic productivity, respond to climate change and ensure the nation is geared up for 35 million people by 2049."
The announcement has important implications for Canberra. It is vital for the ACT, as home to Australia's national capital as well as home to its citizens, to produce a timely and effective 30 year plan.
The Property Council has been advocating such an integrated and strategic plan for some time now, and the COAG announcement replaces a generally haphazard and ad hoc approach across Australia with a more rigorous and disciplined model which should allow the Territory to anticipate issues, deal with them in a timely manner and even, in the right circumstances, prevent them from arising.
Catherine Carter |
Tuesday, 15 December 2009 12:01 AM |
Add Comment
