Negotiating strategic planning's transitional spaces: the case of 'guerrilla governance' in infrastructure planning

Strategic planning can begin as a deliberative and inclusive process of plan making, but then transition into a decisive and exclusive process of investment and priority setting at the stage of implementation. Citizens who once participated in the formal plan making process through government-designed engagement events fade into the background in this critical latter part of strategic planning. At this point they must invent avenues to influence investment priorities. In the context of bicycle infrastructure planning and delivery in Sydney, Australia this paper examines how strategic plans that embrace cycling as an important transport mode translate into decisions to commit to some projects over others. The paper explores four ways community groups seek traction in a highly contentious and transitional space of planning through a process we call 'guerrilla governance'. Evoking aspects of advocacy and insurgent planning, guerrilla governance broadens how the term 'governance' is used within urban planning scholarship, by incorporating such 'legitimised' agitation from beyond government

Supporting affordable housing supply: inclusionary planning in new and renewing communities, AHURI Final Report No. 297

This study examined recent Australian and international practice in planning for affordable housing within new and renewing communities, focusing on South Australia’s 15 per cent inclusionary housing target and voluntary incentives for affordable housing in NSW, as well as recent practice in the UK and the US. * Key data sources included policy documents, government reports, and development approval data as well as 23 interviews with planners and affordable housing developers and consultants

Social housing as infrastructure: rationale, prioritisation and investment pathway

Considering social housing as infrastructure may improve investment in the sector, as well as increase transparency and efficiency in project appraisal and funding prioritisation. It explored different methods of calculating the benefits of social housing relative to cost, including the savings that might accrue in other areas of government expenditure. The research also modelled ways to best finance and fund social housing, revealing that a capital investment strategy supplemented by efficient financing is substantially more cost-effective than a commercially financed model reliant on an operating subsidy

Apartment ownership around the world: Focusing on credible outcomes rather than ideal systems

No matter where in the world they live, if a person lives in a city it is increasingly likely that, if they can buy a property, it will be an apartment. Yet the documents a Sydney buyer's lawyer will review will be different to those in New York or Helsinki because there are many different systems of multi-owned property ownership around the world. These differ because of underlying differences in property law, but also because different jurisdictions have dealt with the dual challenges of horizontal subdivision and cooperative management in very different ways. While creating typologies for these different systems is helpful to understand the varied forms they can take, typologies are challenged by the fact each system differs in practice. In this paper, we draw on Ho's (2014) ‘credibility thesis’ to explain why it is so difficult to classify multi-owned property systems across jurisdictions. We demonstrate that similar legal systems of multi-owned property can result in different outcomes for owners in practice, just as different legal systems can result in similar outcomes. This is because the relationship between legal systems of ownership and the experiences of owners is mediated by local social, cultural, economic and political contexts

State Environmental Planning Policy (Affordable Rental Housing) 2009 and affordable housing in Central and Southern Sydney

This report evaluates the dwellings delivered under the State Environmental Planning Policy (Affordable Rental Housing) 2009 (AHSEPP) in Southern and Central Sydney. It was commissioned by the Southern Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils (SSROC). One central aim of the AHSEPP is to facilitate the private development of diverse housing options, and housing with lower rents than the existing market context. Since its introduction, there has been little analysis to understand if the policy has realised this aim, either in the SSROC region or across the New South Wales. Assessing the outcomes of the AHSEPP is contingent on the local context, with considerable variation in housing type, cost and tenure across the SSROC region. Ultimately performance of the AHSEPP needs to be judged relative to the housing context, rather than in aggregate across a metropolitan region. This report’s findings are drawn from analysis of development application data collected by NSW Department of Planning and Environment and provided directly by SSROC councils, rental bond data collected by NSW Fair Trading and Australian Census data available through the ABS

Paying for affordable housing in different market contexts

In this study six recently completed affordable housing developments across Australia are analysed to ascertain how affordable housing project costs, revenues and subsidies interact to produce affordable housing. Using the project data, an interactive modelling tool is developed. The ‘Affordable Housing Assessment Tool’ (AHAT) is designed to calculate the impact of different cost and subsidy parameters on housing affordability for the various types of lower income households in need of affordable housing. The research reveals the diverse and bespoke funding arrangements adopted by providers in the study. This has resulted in affordable housing project outcomes being driven by funding opportunities rather than by defined housing needs. The AHAT uses housing needs to refocus decision-making on what housing outcomes are required and on what subsidy levers can achieve those outcomes

A novel hedonic price modelling approach for estimating the impact of transportation infrastructure on property prices

Hedonic estimations of the effect of transport infrastructure on property prices vary widely. This high variability demonstrates a deficit in in our understanding of these relationships, limits the utility of econometrics for the valuation of urban property markets, and limits the development and implementation of effective and fair market-based policy tools. Several avenues may lead to improved consistency: re-consideration of accessibility, inclusion of urban design characteristics, assessment of spatial dependence and spatial heterogeneity, and consideration of geographic scale. This paper outlines the rationale and opportunities for inclusion of, and presents empirical tests for, these assertions using a case study in western Sydney, Australia. Results show a number of urban design characteristics to be significant determinants of residential property price. Street connectivity and higher density in areas surrounding residences negatively impact price, higher density close to train stations positively impacted price in one model. Park-and-ride stations led to decreases in property values. Smaller study area results indicate a non-linear relationship between distance to train station and property price and a disamenity impact for residences within 400 metres of train stations. Relative accessibility measured as frequency of peak hour trains is a significant and positive determinant of price in the larger study area. Incorporation of a price trend surface and estimation using a spatial error model reduce the extent to which spatial auto-correlation overstates the effect of a train station on prices. These conceptual and empirical improvements further develop our understanding of the effect of transport infrastructure on property values