Governing the City State - Chief Minister and Treasury Directorate ...

There is no reason why the ACTPS should not apply these principles in “considering allmatters relating to design and the built environment, including planning, infrastructure,transport and energy, urban ecology and landscape, industrial and product design”. 234 Givena large part of the function of the South Australian Commission is to provide StateGovernment leadership and coordination to local government bodies, it might be argued thata formal Commission Structure is ultimately unnecessary in the ACT. That does not,however, diminish the value of the concept to the future planning and development ofCanberra.The Australian Institute of Landscape Architects notes that the intention of Integrated DesignCommissions is to:advocate for the value of design and to advise on processes to achieve design excellence inthe built environment though an intelligent investment approach. Such Commissions shouldconnect the existing strengths of the State, within government, the private sector andprofessional organisations by building on tradition, embracing global and local challenges,and to bring about change.The core role of the Commission should be to use models of collaboration and highlyinclusive and transparent decision-making processes. Constructive engagement throughconsultation with communities to raise public awareness of design will be a major part of theCommission’s work. Domains and range of scales of design and the built environmentinclude: Regions, Landscapes, Cities, Communities, Precincts, Streetscapes, Buildings,Interiors, and Products. 235A concrete example of the implications of this lack of coordination was canvassed in aSubmission to the Review:The most recent example of problems with planning policy development is the release of draftvariations to the Territory Plan - DV301 Estate Development Code and DV303 ResidentialZones Development Codes and Lease Variation General Code. The core problem with thesecodes is that they have been issued ahead of key work which should underpin them, both byACTPLA and other Government agencies including Territory and Municipal Services(TAMS). The consequence is that there are several areas of concern:• There is a lack of integration between agencies responsible for planning roads, transport,landscape, infrastructure and utility services in developing a set of requirements to definepreferred outcomes for the public realm of our city or the resultant codes for estate orindividual block development.• There is an absence of any evidence base for the distribution of development zones or thedefinition of those zones in terms which provide the basis for public consultation on theneed for change to achieve sustainability objectives, economic, social and environmental.234 South Australian Government (2010b)235 Australian Institute of Landscape Architects (2010) The Case for Integrated Design Commissions in all States and Territorieshttp://www.aila.org.au/policies/docs/Integrated-discuss.pdf p.1.Administrative Arrangements Changes: 189