02/02/2010 - Here Cometh the PSPs
PIA Planning News Volume 35 No.10 November 2009, Design In (the Planning World)
Craig Czarny FPIA CPP RLA, hansen partnership
With the recent release of the Growth Area Authority's 'Precinct Structure Planning (PSP) Guidelines' and the long list of PSPs to be completed in the coming months and years, we are sure to be hearing a lot about the shape and look of new neighbourhoods in metropolitan growth areas. Many will already be aware of the draft PSP guidelines and the general principles that underpin them. The release of the final guidelines last month as a consloidated document is a welcome step and one that makes the 'process' of planning for new neighbourhoods clearer for both government and stakeholders.
The guidelines promote a (now state endorsed) methodology for neighbourhood design firmly groundded in the traditional practice of city design and place making. What is impressive about this approach is that it does not rely simply on a list of aims and objectives (as some other state guidelines do). These guidelines set out a logical process by which new neighbourhood design can in effect be 'deduced'. While this is by no means foolproof, it is a reliable approach that has not as yet been available to those conceiving new neighbourhoods on the metropolitan fringe.
The guidelines set out a plain and clearly understood serier of steps. These are:
1. Setting the scene; including understanding the place and embarking upon early visioning,
2. Creating a structure; including defining the primary skeletal layout of a precinct,
3. Making the place; includeing advancing an understanding of what occurs within a precinct, and
4. Checking the plan; including referencing with pre-defined ambitions and ensuring delivery.
While these are processes that planners and designers adopt in one sequence or another in any masterplanning project, the confirmation of this broad methodology for all precinct planning projects has merit in ensuring that all are conceived in an equitable way. Furthermore, and to the benefit of many, Part 1 of the Gguidelines provides a helpful outline of the distinction between the deliverables of Growth Area Framework Plans, Precinct Structure Plans and Permit Applications. Hopefully the days of debate about an 'appropriate' degree of detail in any such Plans is behind us.
While it is true that any new place needs tobe 'tailored' in design terms to its context, Part 2 of the guidelines promo9te a series of useful standards that ansure base consistency in terms of neighbourhood setout and components. These are applicable at a macro level in formulation of a new urban structure, such as setting of a typical 1.6km arterial road grid and co-location of community and commercial facilities. Pertinently, they are also applied at the micro level in 'making the place', with clear standards seeking to define housing density, lot relationships, open space povisions and typology, sustainability measures and the like. In this light, the document is both comprehensive and overarching in its address of almost every aspect of neighbourhood design.
While PSP Guideline critics will no doubt claim that cretaivity will be stymied by such formulaic models of neighbourhood design, I have little doubt that the package provides sound direction, if not in terms of strategioc design immovation, for its commitment to drawing together the many varied codes, standards and controls relating to neighbourhood design across the government spectrum.
02/02/2010 - Here Cometh the PSPs
PIA Planning News Volume 35 No.10 November 2009, Design In (the Planning World)
Craig Czarny FPIA CPP RLA, hansen partnership
With the recent release of the Growth Area Authority's 'Precinct Structure Planning (PSP) Guidelines' and the long list of PSPs to be completed in the coming months and years, we are sure to be hearing a lot about the shape and look of new neighbourhoods in metropolitan growth areas. Many will already be aware of the draft PSP guidelines and the general principles that underpin them. The release of the final guidelines last month as a consloidated document is a welcome step and one that makes the 'process' of planning for new neighbourhoods clearer for both government and stakeholders.
The guidelines promote a (now state endorsed) methodology for neighbourhood design firmly groundded in the traditional practice of city design and place making. What is impressive about this approach is that it does not rely simply on a list of aims and objectives (as some other state guidelines do). These guidelines set out a logical process by which new neighbourhood design can in effect be 'deduced'. While this is by no means foolproof, it is a reliable approach that has not as yet been available to those conceiving new neighbourhoods on the metropolitan fringe.
The guidelines set out a plain and clearly understood serier of steps. These are:
1. Setting the scene; including understanding the place and embarking upon early visioning,
2. Creating a structure; including defining the primary skeletal layout of a precinct,
3. Making the place; includeing advancing an understanding of what occurs within a precinct, and
4. Checking the plan; including referencing with pre-defined ambitions and ensuring delivery.
While these are processes that planners and designers adopt in one sequence or another in any masterplanning project, the confirmation of this broad methodology for all precinct planning projects has merit in ensuring that all are conceived in an equitable way. Furthermore, and to the benefit of many, Part 1 of the Gguidelines provides a helpful outline of the distinction between the deliverables of Growth Area Framework Plans, Precinct Structure Plans and Permit Applications. Hopefully the days of debate about an 'appropriate' degree of detail in any such Plans is behind us.
While it is true that any new place needs tobe 'tailored' in design terms to its context, Part 2 of the guidelines promo9te a series of useful standards that ansure base consistency in terms of neighbourhood setout and components. These are applicable at a macro level in formulation of a new urban structure, such as setting of a typical 1.6km arterial road grid and co-location of community and commercial facilities. Pertinently, they are also applied at the micro level in 'making the place', with clear standards seeking to define housing density, lot relationships, open space povisions and typology, sustainability measures and the like. In this light, the document is both comprehensive and overarching in its address of almost every aspect of neighbourhood design.
While PSP Guideline critics will no doubt claim that cretaivity will be stymied by such formulaic models of neighbourhood design, I have little doubt that the package provides sound direction, if not in terms of strategioc design immovation, for its commitment to drawing together the many varied codes, standards and controls relating to neighbourhood design across the government spectrum.
