What is the future of New Zealand’s built urban environment, and how can we improve on past mistakes? This big question is central to the work of the Urban Design Forum (UDF), which promotes nationwide urban design excellence and keeps these issues at the forefront. Their calls to balance quantity with quality when it comes to housing and urban development come as the Government consults on its Growing for Housing Growth policy.
“New Zealand can’t afford to make, or repeat, mistakes with our built environment,” says Graeme Scott of the UDF’s Resource Management reform working group. “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.
“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”.
UDF says a positive vision for growth means building more while never losing sight of quality. As our towns and cities get denser, new development should make life better, not just bigger. This includes creating attractive, useful public spaces that benefit everyone and are treated as essential parts of urban life.
“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,” Scott says.
At its core, the UDF emphasises the importance of planning and urban design as vital tools to ensure that growth delivers real benefits for individuals and communities alike. Clear spatial plans with timelines help give people confidence in the future, and structural planning should guide all new greenfield areas.
Working together across sectors can make growth more efficient, UDF says, while national standards can provide consistency, with enough flexibility to respond to local needs.
“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 achieve quality as well as quantity.”
“Ultimately, the root cause of our housing crisis – including in social housing – is a planning system that has stymied, not encouraged, housing growth, and a broken infrastructure funding and financing system,” Housing Minister Chris Bishop says.
“The government’s Going for Housing Growth reforms are progressing well, alongside fundamental reform of our planning system. In the long-term, these reforms will drive more affordable housing for all.”
Some developers and property sector advocates argue that putting too much emphasis on design standards and structure planning risks slowing the delivery of much-needed homes.
They say additional layers of process can drive up costs and create uncertainty, which in turn makes housing less affordable for those already struggling to buy or rent. From this perspective, the urgent priority is to boost supply at pace, even if refinements to quality are addressed later.
Others caution that “quality” can become a cover for restrictive planning rules or local opposition to new housing. They argue that imposing too many design requirements could ultimately limit density and reduce housing choices, thereby undermining the very goal of making homes more accessible. While they acknowledge the value of well-designed spaces, they believe the greater danger is failing to build fast enough to meet demand. Finding balance takes time.
“Fixing our housing crisis involves fixing the fundamentals of our housing market – freeing up land for development and removing unnecessary planning barriers, improving infrastructure funding and financing to support urban growth, and providing incentives for communities and councils to support growth,” Bishop said.
