Leading the charge? The role of the private sector in achieving wellbeing outcomes
Earlier articles in the Planalytics wellbeing series have explored how the Resource Management Act (RMA) and the Building Act guide or provide for wellbeing outcomes. Today we shift our attention to the role of the private sector in achieving positive wellbeing outcomes in our urban environments. We were keen to understand what recent, large-scale residential developments tell us about challenges for the private sector in delivering wellbeing outcomes. And what impact ‘shocks’ such as COVID-19 have had on our attitudes towards, and need for, developing with wellbeing in mind. We discuss these issues, and more, in this instalment of our series on New Zealand’s wellbeing framework.
Hobsonville Point residential development, Auckland. Source: https://hobsonvillepoint.co.nz/about/precincts/
A number of high-level policy levers exist to promote and achieve wellbeing in Aotearoa through both the RMA and the Building Act. In terms of resource management, the recent National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management 2020, and the draft NPS for indigenous biodiversity both establish a national direction that emphasises (and in some cases prioritises) the wellbeing of the natural resources they are designed to manage. Within the Building Act framework, these include tools to characterise and measure wellbeing in ‘physical capital’, such as the Living Standards Framework (LSF) and Indicators Aotearoa, as well as industry initiatives such as the Construction Sector Accord (‘the Accord’).
However, regardless of these levers, recent media coverage suggests that delivering wellbeing at any significant scale in the built environment is, to a certain extent, dependent on individual developers having the courage and tenacity to envision and deliver residential and mixed-use environments that incorporate wellbeing and social connectedness.
Auckland’s Hobsonville Point, a medium-density development which, when completed in 2024 will include over 4,500 homes, was designed to achieve just such wellbeing outcomes. It is considered by some to successfully combine both density and high-quality urban design to achieve attractive, socially-connected neighbourhoods. Yet, as David Gibbs, director of architectural firm Construckt and chief designer of Hobsonville Point, points out, whilst the development has shown urban designers, architects, and council planners what can be achieved, it has not ‘spawned many imitators’. Media coverage indicates that common practices that work against social connectedness, and consequently social wellbeing, continue to persist as standard. These include cul-de-sacs in suburban subdivisions which deter physical connection and walkability, and individual properties cut off from the street frontage with high walls and fences.
Is this a factor of developers playing it safe? Of district planning documents failing to articulate, and therefore encourage, good urban design outcomes? In our opinion, it’s probably a bit of both. When it comes to guiding land use, district plans have a critical role in delivering wellbeing outcomes in the built environment. But, as Lucy mentioned in a previous article on wellbeing and the Resource Management Act, you could forgive any planner (or developer) who fails to make the connection between a side yard setback calculator and achieving long-lasting wellbeing. With respect to the economic risks to developers of providing for wellbeing outcomes, the Ministry for the Environment has spent some considerable effort trying to quantify the costs and benefits of urban design, and who bears them, in its 2005 document, The Value of Urban Design. The answer to the question posed in this report, can urban design be profitable, was a (somewhat) lukewarm ‘yes’:
Value to developers and investors is often the hardest to demonstrate. But the evidence shows that good urban design can be profitable. MFE, 2005
This report found that not only could well-designed urban projects generate higher returns to developers, especially where they take a longer-term view, they could deliver a whole range of benefits including better public health, greater social equity, enhanced land values, a more vibrant local economy, reduced vehicle emissions, and more sustainable use of non-renewable resources. However, for many residents of, and neighbours to, new development in Aotearoa, good wellbeing outcomes in the built environments in which we live, work, and play continue to be hard to come by.
The COVID Effect
COVID-19 has highlighted the huge impact that our housing and urban environments have on our lives and wellbeing. Lockdown Levels 3 and 4 resulted in us being isolated at home for long periods of time. Many had to juggle working from home with educating the kids. Cabin fever was real, and access to public and private outdoor space - for exercise, for a change of scene, and for our mental health - became a national preoccupation. The experience had its challenges for us all, but, as media reports and overseas research indicate, the strains of lockdown life were probably more sharply felt by those living in high-density, highly urban environments:
Those sharing shoe-boxed sized dwellings with others trying to home-work, or alongside children trying to complete their schoolwork, face multiple problems of interruption and noise disturbance, and have to compete with others to secure a suitable workstation. Social media accounts in the last few weeks have revealed some of London’s workers resorting to working on fire-escapes or in hallways just to escape from their roommates. Professor Phil Hubbard, 2020.
Research from the UK indicates that the COVID-19 experience is leading some to question the efficacy of ‘micro-living’ and high-density developments, as Professor Phil Hubbard points out:
This leads to some major conundrums in the future planning of cities. Dense urban living may be more environmentally-friendly, and energy efficient. But if the price to pay is people living in smaller homes that preclude flexible working and home lives, and also encourage the transmission of COVID-19, or other yet-to-be known viruses, perhaps the answer is not to continue the rush towards vertical living and micro-apartments. Professor Phil Hubbard, 2020.
Alongside questions as to whether our residential spaces are up to the job of providing for our ‘new normal’, Holly Walker’s recent report for the Helen Clarke Foundation, Alone Together, explores whether the broader urban realm is exacerbating loneliness and social disconnection, which can have ‘profound negative consequences for health and wellbeing’. The report finds that communities thrive when people know their neighbours and feel a sense of belonging and connection. But as Walker points out in her discussion on the ‘six planks of an effective policy response’, thriving neighbourhoods don’t happen by accident. They require conscious planning to prioritise characteristics like walkability, social interaction, common space, easy access to parks and green space, and well-integrated links to public transport - all critical components to achieving lasting, positive wellbeing outcomes.
Taken from Holly Walker’s report for the Helen Clarke Foundation, Alone Together
Undoubtedly, as a key player in development, the private sector plays a crucial role in ensuring the design and delivery of thriving neighbourhoods and great wellbeing outcomes. But how will the private sector respond to our new and emerging understanding of what we need as a species to thrive and survive? How will the private sector contribute to thriving, connected, attractive neighbourhoods in a way that meets the needs of the many and not just the few? And how will the private sector navigate these new challenges (and opportunities) against the urgent backdrop of land prices, financial bottom lines, land availability, and infrastructure requirements?
Role models?
Walker identifies Kāinga Ora as being a key agency to help improve the take-up of wellbeing-focused design by the development sector. By using its housing delivery mandate and central government policy, such as the National Policy Statement on Urban Development, Kāinga Ora can model how urban developments should prioritise social wellbeing, and do this at a scale that will be hard to ignore. As this example of iterative design and consultation suggests, Kāinga Ora are also in prime position to model how an awareness of, and sensitivity to, providing for wellbeing at all stages of the development process is critical to achieving lasting wellbeing outcomes in perpetuity.
An eye to the future
The Randerson Report on RMA reform appreciates the importance of wellbeing in an urban context. According to the Randerson Report, urbanisation provides the ‘scale, density, diversity and opportunities for interaction that cities offer enable people to make connections, learn, specialise and improve their social and economic wellbeing’. However, the report is clear that our current way of regulating land use planning is not up to the job of facilitating the type of wellbeing-enhancing urban growth and development that Aotearoa needs. But neither, says the Randerson Report, are ‘market forces’ nor the interests of ‘individual developers’.
So, where does this leave us? Whilst a regional spatial planning approach suggested in the Randerson Report could be some years away from codification into statute, COVID-19 has shown us the need to rethink how we provide for our individual and community wellbeing is urgent.
We also know there are private sector developers that prioritise (and value) community engagement and wellbeing outcomes in their developments. Perhaps in this time of uncertainty, sharing knowledge, best practice examples and case studies (here and abroad), and modelling bold and innovative thinking are the tools that all those involved in the development sector (including planners!) need to utilise.
As we’ll see in next week’s journal article on monitoring wellbeing, methods such as post occupancy surveys and voluntarily monitoring wellbeing outcomes of development are tools available to the private sector that can help enhance our understanding of the impacts of development on wellbeing, and improve the quality of development and urban design over time.
So, for those private sector developers out there committed to securing good, lasting wellbeing outcomes in urban development, show us! We would love to hear your story and share your learnings.