The Greater Cities Commission excelled at the excuses used to abolish it – so what’s about to happen now?

Last week we saw the repeal of the Greater Cities Commission Act and the Greater Cities Commission (formerly the Greater Sydney Commission) will no longer exist, to be dissolved back into the NSW Department of Planning and Environment.

Media reports suggests that the government axed the GCC as it was underwhelmed by the proposed housing targets for parts of Greater Sydney, although the official reasons given by the Minister for Planning Paul Scully include to: “remove red-tape”, “improve strategic planning and coordination across the State”, “directly consult with stakeholders”, “improve the consistency of decision-making and integrated planning outcomes; improve the capacity of the state to facilitate the delivery of housing and infrastructure in both metropolitan and regional areas more efficiently”.

These reasons are pure doublethink – anyone that has worked in strategic planning in NSW in the past decade would know that the GCC excelled at those very excuses to abolish it.

Why did we need the GCC?

Before the GCC, metropolitan land use planning was often done in isolation from infrastructure demands, with government agencies working in silos. The metropolitan strategy was prepared by a line agency such as the Department of Planning. This silo-ised responsibility of the planning agency didn’t rule out the prospect for good strategies, but it did tend to limit prospects for bold, long-term thinking and convincing related infrastructure integration.

For the first time Greater Sydney had a long-term land use plan and a long-term transport plan that were integrated and released at the same time

The creation of the GCC transformed prospects for long-term strategic planning for the Greater Sydney area. Its powers under the GCC Act allowed it to bring all the agencies to the table and meant that transport and other essential infrastructure (such as schools and hospitals) were better coordinated with land use and in particular housing growth in established and new urban areas.

For the first time Greater Sydney had a long-term land use plan and a long-term transport plan that were integrated and released at the same time. This holy grail of integrated land use and transport planning was a monumental but under-appreciated achievement.

Importantly, the structure of the GCC with independent commissioners, and being at arms-length from government, meant that it could be bold, long-term and visionary in its thinking, allowing a shift from the “predict and provide” tendencies of former metropolitan strategies to “vision and validate”.

The City Commissioner for the Lower Hunter and Greater Newcastle said that “its independence allowed it to say things many other government agencies shy away from.”

The three city vision emerged – aiming to spread economic opportunities and infrastructure across Greater Sydney. The GCC also identified the importance of retaining inner city industrial areas that provide essential urban services and city functionality, as well as the prospect of affordable housing contributions for upzoned areas identified in Council’s mandated Local Housing Strategies.

Before the GCC, while metropolitan strategies could contain worthy aims and concepts, they contained little detail in terms of implementation, particularly at the local council level.

To this extent past metropolitan strategies lost their way, leaving a strategic gap in understanding. The GCC introduced a strategic line-of-sight to strengthen the strategic plan-led approach to planning across Greater Sydney.

The District Plans were introduced to give effect to the Region Plan and councils were required to develop a Local Strategic Planning Statement (LSPS) and Local Housing Strategy (LHS) that gave effect to the District Plan; which would then filter down to the statutory land use planning in the Local Environmental Plan.

Moreover, the GCC ensured follow-through on its plans with all LSPS’ and LHS’ required to be endorsed by the state government. We should celebrate that we actually have a good strategic planning hierarchy developed by the Greater Cities Commission – from the Greater Sydney Region Plans through to the District Plans, LSPS, LHSs LEPs and DCPs.

Collaboration and coordination were GCC strengths

The GCC was designed to address deficiencies in metropolitan plan governance and coordination in Sydney. Former models of regional governance, like the Cumberland County Council lacked influence over state government agencies and faced hostility from local councils.

The GCC was designed to integrate planning decisions vertically between state government and councils, and horizontally between government departments and agencies with a responsibility for land use decision-making and planning in Sydney. The Place Infrastructure Compacts, such as the one for Greater Parramatta and Olympic Park , were an example of this. 

The GCC treated local councils like a genuine partner, given the knowledge councils have of their communities.

During the debate of the GCC Repeal Bill, there was cynicism on whether council engagement would continue in the same way, with suggestions that “the government runs the risk of alienating the very communities it seeks to serve”.

Those misgivings are well-founded. Councils are often treated as a subordinate by other NSW government agencies at best and at worst as a barrier to be overcome, as reflected by the DPE Planning Secretary who won’t “pussyfoot around with councils”.

Lies, damned lines and housing targets…

In introducing the repeal of the GCC Bill, the Minister for Planning made it clear that one of the key outcomes of the abolition of the GCC would be that “the publication of housing targets before a strategic district plan has been prepared and published can occur”.

This demonstrates that strategic planning, and its importance in balancing essential trade-offs and the long-term coordination task has been forgotten. Planning is now wrongly viewed almost solely as simply a lever for short-term housing delivery.

Recently announced planning reforms in NSW gift new apartment development significant and arbitrary bonuses that undermine the strategic plan-led approach to housing delivery, where councils’ local housing strategies and infrastructure contributions regimes work in concert to deliver the required housing capacity and place outcomes.

How are councils and NSW government agencies expected to coordinate infrastructure based on this new approach? How many have a contributions scheme in place? How many of these areas have mandated affordable housing targets? And who will be charged with planning for long-term housing and infrastructure coordination over the next 20 years?
More to the point, housing and employment targets emerged as a policy lever (back in the 2005 City of Cities plan) to demonstrate where and how much growth could be accommodated and to stimulate councils’ review of their strategic plans and planning controls to ensure they had sufficient capacity to accommodate the identified future growth.

Once a council has created capacity in its local controls then it’s met the target requirement. After all councils don’t build houses, they only determine the applications lodged – and over 95 per cent of those are approved.

Unfortunately, the development lobby, with help from the mainstream media, have misconstrued housing targets as delivery targets rather than capacity targets and blame councils for not meeting their targets when the housing market goes into a slump – ignoring that there are more than 100,000 more approvals than completions in NSW since 2016.

Most of the housing that will be delivered in the next five years is within the development applications approved and under assessment. In fact, some developers have delayed approved plans to reapply for recently slated bonuses, ironically slowing housing delivery.

Planning is more than housing targets

The abolition of the GCC without assurances that the long term strategic role can be respected undermines the integrity of the planning system. It signals that immediate residential development is more important than creating and reinforcing a polycentric city structure that promotes long-term environmental sustainability, social equity and economic success. The economic success of Greater Sydney depends on successful cities that can service their social and economic catchments. 

A long-term view grasps the cumulative effect of individual development decisions. A long-term view necessitates a structural lens not a cyclical one. A structural view promotes long-term public city building and associated economic benefits against damage from short-term private financial gains. Short-term residential development imperatives should not be allowed to cloud bigger picture planning visions.

Why do we need a strategic plan-led system?

The planning system must be strategic plan-led because the community, various stakeholders and governments adoption of a strategy is the best expression of the public’s interest in the allocation of rights to the use of land. Spatial strategies enable plans to incorporate trade-offs across multiple balanced issues up front with all factors considered, such as environmental issues.

Whereas ad hoc, blanket rezonings – as typified by recent NSW planning reforms –  are not tied to infrastructure planning and do not enable holistic consideration of trade-offs. This is a key reason they are an inferior public process at reflecting public values.

Strategic land use planning and infrastructure coordination can achieve orderly development and an optimum return on investment in public (and private) infrastructure and services alongside growth. Strategic plans coordinate land use and infrastructure growth to ensure that infrastructure investment is efficient and optimised, particularly transport infrastructure.

A risk with large-scale blanket rezonings and development bonuses, masquerading as strategic planning, is that housing growth may be isolated from infrastructure and services, with underutilised infrastructure in other planned growth fronts – a term economists label coordination failure.

Government agencies and councils need certainty on growth fronts before committing significant (and limited) infrastructure investment in transport, education, health and parklands.

The NSW government agencies used the GCC Region and District Plans to coordinate and prioritise their infrastructure investment. In the absence of the GCC’s Plans and coordination responsibility, who is going to coordinate long-term infrastructure delivery?

Historically, the Department of Planning has made decisions about the location of new housing in isolation from the objectives of other departments and the capacity of councils. The government risks repeating those same mistakes by abolishing the Greater Cities Commission.

History repeats

Over 110 years ago, the need for a planning body to coordinate development in Greater Sydney was identified by a royal commission of inquiry, in response to the Greater Sydney Movement. The royal commission found: 

Sydney is a magnificent site for a city, but the built upon area has many serious defects for want of coordinative town planning and the way to safeguard against similar defects in its future expansion is to have a comprehensive and careful layout of the metropolitan area as soon as possible.  Town planning will make for health, convenience, amenity and economy—its value is incalculable, and its cost comparatively small. Its urgency is a strong reason, both for a Greater Sydney being brought to existence and for the new body giving its immediate and earnest attention.

Similarly, in 1985, a paper simply titled Metropolitan Planning in Sydney noted:

“At the heart of these issues is the question of the economic role of the Sydney-Newcastle- Wollongong conurbation. This conurbation is becoming more physically and economically integrated, and proper consideration of Sydney’s role needs to be set in the context of this wider urban unit, and the State as a whole.”

Vale GCC

In introducing the then GSC Act to Parliament in 2015, the then Planning Minister Rob Stokes, summed up the role of the GCC perfectly:

“Getting planning right is about making people’s lives tangibly better as Sydney inevitably gets bigger. The imperative for growth and our collective desire to make a better city have become disconnected. The city’s scale demands a strategic and region-wide approach to planning, rather than having a disconnected morass of central government agencies working apart, and 41 councils of different sizes and capacities each planning in isolation from neighbouring councils. There are countless examples where a lack of metropolitan governance has resulted in poor decisions that have detracted from our quality of life through congestion, pollution, a loss of heritage and huge opportunity costs.”

Coordination of long-term land use and infrastructure needs is not just a planning problem, but an economic one. Better strategic and place-based planning is critical microeconomic reform – by enabling optimal infrastructure decisions to be sequenced cost effectively and spatially coordinated. But to do this we need an eye on how places should change and a capacity to make the best long term strategic trade-offs – not just a short-term focus on housing delivery in isolation.

The GCC created the blueprint for best-practice metropolitan strategy and governance in its 2018 Region and District Plans. The DPE has big shoes to fill, and I wish it the best in heeding the positive lessons from the GCC as it takes back the reins on metropolitan strategy in Greater Sydney.

Tim Sneesby was seconded to the Greater Cities Commission as senior advisor for one year from January 2021.