And the urban planners debated and debated as to what would be the best way for the people to live their lives. And all the while they forget to consider if it was even their question to ask in the first place.

 

My claim is that urban Intensification in Auckland is a serious logistical mistake. It leads to substantial economic and social costs, and in exchange for an almost negligable environmental gain. The following is my argument.

1.

If Auckland sprawled all the way to Hamilton and just as far northward, it would house well over 50 million people. The populations of the developed world are stabilising and may even decline soon. Clearly there is no reasonable argument to preserve farmland, of which there is plenty and is hardly affected by sprawl.

--New Zealand is about 1.5 percent covered over (geographically) in urbanisation.

  

2. Sprawl can be ugly or good-looking - the same can be said for high-density developments. Aesthetics are an issue of design, not development type.

3. Intensification leads to much more traffic congestion than with sprawl. With the ARC's intensification goals, cars will become basically dysfunctional.

Most people want a car and to be able to use it, regardless of the proximity of a train station. In turn, the ARC may be more likely to export as opposed to inhibit sprawl, as chronic intensification seriously interfers with people's chosen lifestyle i.e. accelerated brain drain. [Which is being actualised today]

4.

Due to the effects of greater congestion impeding smooth traffic flow, high-density development does not lead to real increases in transport efficiency. This fact has been demonstrated with existing high-density cities.

Traffic congestion damages economic efficiency and growth. If the gap between New Zealand and Australian living standards slips any further, things could get serious - if they are not already. Respecting the need to have a competitive city, it's questionable whether Auckland can even afford restrictive zoning.

--Population growth produces congestion, not sprawl as such. As jobs progressively move out to the city fringes along with the sprawl, city expansion helps to keep the development of congestion under control as new traffic is largely localised to the fringes.

--Intensification increases public transport demand, but no way near enough to justify the impact that it has on the existing road network. Transit-oriented development is basically an act of forcing an entire city to evolve to meet the needs of a rail system, and at the expense of the operability of cars. Nevermind the fact that most people far prefer their private, cosy and more economical cars, and only option for rail on the strange presumption that everybody else will use it. And nevermind the fact that in any circumstance public transport will never achieve market share above about 20% (in Auckland).

5. Higher traffic densities greatly increase pollution in terms of what people actually inhale. New Zealand has an asthma epidemic. [We also have very dirty cars]

6. Intensification dramatically escalates the cost of land via restrictive zoning, as increases in demand cannot be met with an adequate increase in supply. Restrictive zoning is necessary to force people into high-density developments. This makes life very tough for young couples trying to buy a home to have a family, who are particularily intolerant of high-density living. This in turn reduces fertility at biologically competent ages which in turn increases infantile trauma. Infantile trauma is the most significant component (for most individuals) producing mental sickness and other general health and development problems.

It also forces parents to "outsource" parental duties for their young children, as they must work longer hours to pay for their costly homes. This does nothing for their childs development or happiness, not to mention the parents own well-being.

--Overall this is the worst effect of Intensification. It unfairly concentrates resources away from the people who need them the most, and the negative effects of this can be far-reaching and even inter-generational. In evolutionary terms, this situation is completely backwards.

7. Current house prices in Auckland are inherently insecure, as median house prices are far higher than their actual construction cost/value. When restrictive zoning is removed [and it ultimately will be to keep Auckand competitive] there will be a huge number of devistated people with $500k mortgages on ~$250k houses.

If New Zealand does not independently correct its house prices (via the removal of restrictive zoning) then the global market ultimately will, as people consistantly refuse to invest in Auckland's unattractive housing market and economy. As it stands today, I would [unfortunately] recommend to young New Zealander's to move to Australia, rent and save better money, and then wait for the bubble to burst.

First home buyers are pressured to buy into the market because they need a home and to get on with their lives, that is why this is such a serious issue - we can't just say "It's your own silly fault". There is also the fact that new home buyers often don't realise how risky the market is, because they are young and don't have the time to learn everything about everything, and of course this further compounds the problem.

People who are already rich can afford to play games with their surplus - first home buyers can't. In principle at least, it's extremely important to keep house prices stable and accurate.

To clarify: High demand, lower interest rates (facilitating affordability) and speculative investors have all fuelled the property boom. However, it's restrictive zoning that has allowed this boom to happen in the first place. Quite simply, if people could build new homes at or near construction cost on the outskirts of Auckland they would not touch the established property market as it stands today. This would inevitably lead to a rapid price correction overall.

8. New Zealand's current economic growth has been fuelled by the boom in property prices. People have been borrowing (on their houses) with confidence from their new found "wealth", and this has led to an increase in consumer spending. The problem is they're borrowing on wealth that doesn't really exist, and that spells trouble. When the bubble bursts people will find themselves with an uncomfotable debt-to-asset ratio, and they will then focus on paying off debts as opposed to consumer spending. This will inhibit growth and maybe even send us into recession.

--True economic progress should not be defined as an increase in economic activity, but actual increases in the efficiency of the economic machine. New Zealanders are not earning more/hr, they're just borrowing and working more - we have a highly active but inefficient economy. This is not what I call progress, but it's what we have to show for our current restrictive zoning induced economic "growth".

New Zealand's "good times" have led to no real economic progress, and the economy has been riding on a bubble. Sooner or later we will have to answer to our misinvestment and pay off our debts. It will hurt.

9. Money talks: If people didn't care too much for low-density living then the cost of land would not dramatically escalate, as most people would "merrily" move into apartments as soon as suburbia gets a little costly. We can see that it doesn't work that way - people will typically pay almost whatever they have to or can.

By restricting the supply of land we heavily compromise real living standards by making it so much harder for people to obtain their most valued and important asset. Due to the serious fallout effects (which are now demonstrated), restrictive zoning should not be tolerated until a decisive and objective argument for its necessity can be established. That 'decisive' argument has never been established.

10. Intensification leads to "social mixing". Speaking simply this forces people to live amongst the most socially troubled sectors of society, regardless of their personal preference. We can't pretend that most people don't find this scenario depressing and stressful to tolerate.

11. Planners often believe you get better "community" with high density development, and they frequently use this argument to help justify Intensification.

The modern community is not signifcantly geographically defined, and nor does it need to be. Most people prefer to privately choose their company, though of course a good-natured relationship with neighbours is desired. Regardless, it's not the place of councils to socially engineer people's lives - people should have the freedom to live where they want, so long as they are not unreasonably affecting others or the environment.

12. Some people oppose sprawl because it interfers with their physical view.

Any individual that chooses to buy or build their home on the outskirts of Auckland does so with the understanding that their view may be affected by further expansion of the city. In turn they should accept this, especially as they themselves have affected other people's view for the luxury of building/buying on cheap land.

13. There is the idea that building our cities at a higher density is justified for the sake of our children's future. I do not understand this argument as the next generation will probably want low-density living just like the present generation, and low-density living is in fact sustainable.

14. Greater construction and operating costs associated with sprawl (if they exist) should be passed on to those who choose to live in low-density developments. With fair taxation there is no argument for outlawing sprawl on the bases of cost.

--I will point out that the cost of Intensification can be greater than sprawl when it equates to a large amount of desruptive "demolish and re-build", as it frequently does. Intensification is more reasonable where existing infrastructure is operating under capacity.

15. There is the argument that we will need to use mostly trains in the future because we're running out of cheap oil, and therefore we should prepare for this by basing Auckland's development on electric trains.

How about a 500kg composite/aluminium 2-seat 30kw plug-in electric car, with a small 20kw ultra-efficient deisel-electric generator that is only periodically used when the batteries run out (of range)? This affordable and proven technology would cut automotive oil dependance to less than 5% of what car owners use today. Higher priced oil will lead to changes in the type of cars we buy - not our lifestyles.

--The following image shows the electric or petrol Aptera, which should be commercialised late 2008 in California, USA.  It is about 5-10 more efficient than a conventional car, depending on operating conditions.  This is an extreme example (ultra aerodynamic and light) but makes a statement of how far cars can go if makers aggressively invest in efficiency in car design.  Aptera would actually be far more efficient still if it was built as a tandem (narrow, with one seat behind the other).  The only reason why cars are not built more in this direction today is because fuel is still, comparitively, very cheap.

Respecting all the present and emerging transport technologies available to us, transit-oriented development has got to be the most inefficient and impractical alternative. In terms of reducing carbon emissions and oil dependency, transit-oriented development will utilimately prove to be a waste of time - in any circumstance cars will never be compromised in performance and/or economy to a point where public transport could be broadly competitive. As I said, transit-oriented development is neither a necessary nor reasiltic alternative.

--Unless there are more significant advances in battery technology, we can eventually electrify main roads to compensate for the range deficiency of batteries. So even if the use of oil was effectively outlawed, there would be no real problems. Indeed, guideway electrification may come much sooner than needed for no other reason than it is already commercially viable.

--With computer-controlled electrically based cars we can also develop exclusive guideway networks that facilitate automotive platooning. This means we can build economical over and/or underpasses that accomodate as much as 10X the traffic/lane, providing the ultimate solution to both congestion and pollution. Our technology base is already well developed to support this [platooning is relatively easy with electrically-based cars], and we should see some demonstration systems coming through in the next 5-10 years or so.

16. People like the idea of public transport investment because it is more energy efficient than cars and therefore more "sustainable".

This is a myth. Worldwide, public transport has about the same real energy efficiency levels as cars. From application to application, you will see variances where sometimes public transport is more efficient relative to cars, likewise sometimes cars are more efficient.

Regardless, there are cars available today that are about twice as energy efficient as a typical public transport system, and they can be made even more efficient than that. In turn if we want to reduce energy consumption, it would be more reasonable to employ an 'eco-tax' on fuel as opposed to over-subsidising public transport.

For the objective of reducing energy consumption, there is no argument for having a bias for public transport.

--By far the most significant immediate thing we can do to reduce transport energy consumption is invest in congestion-charging.

17. Another argument for Intensification is that it supports urban renewal.

This is about as rational as idealising a horse-and-cart renewal. The reason why urban environments are decaying is because people would rather be somewhere else. Urban decay is not a problem, but an expression of consumer demand.

Irrationally forcing people to be where they don't want to be is a problem, and that's often what urban renewal means.

18. In conjunction with the expressed concern for urban renewal is the concern about the health of established retailers, as though we should be taking action to protect those established businesses from the effects of sprawl. This is another false argument. If people prefer to do their shopping at big-box stores and at the expense to traditional retailers, then that is simply economic development.

It makes no sense for a government to protect a given industry from the effects of competition, and if it were to do so then to be fair they would have to provide that protection for all tax-paying industries. Of course that would be foolish because it would freeze economic development.

Conclusion:

Sprawl has been irrationally demonised for decades to a point where people "instinctively" believe it should be stopped, even though the picture presented of "the nightmare" of low-density living is so often grossly off centre to how most people actually find it. If sprawl is so bad and people don't want it, then why do we have to make it illegal to stop it? If people typically want to live in high-density developments, then why do they have to be [basically] forced into them?

It's true that cars have had some negative effects such as pollution, and they have generally had a major impact on killing the otherwise peaceful and aesthetic atmosphere that our residential areas could otherwise provide [in particular where residential areas have been poorly designed]. Car-based cities can also be rather punishing for those who cannot drive. However, transit-orientated development does not make sense in a predominantly car-oriented market. A 'transit city' jam-packed full of cars is still much worse than a low-density city built to more properly accomodate them. Though Intensification does have it's place to a minor degree and in very specific areas, it is not a solution to any of our fundamental urban problems. I believe that large scale Intensification is almost entirely destructive - you get the worst of both worlds.

Note: We should be honest about the fact that though many people do not want development in greenfield areas, public perspective of how environmentally destructive this is has been mostly conditioned through the media. If the anti-sprawl sector of the public read this paper would they still be enthusiastic for Intensification? I am sure that at the least they would be asking questions. I believe that where public opinion is based on poor or "impressionistic" perspective, we should not dogmatically respond to it without at least first providng some unbiased education.

Finally, if Auckland Regional Council must insist on higher density development, then at the very least they should impose this policy on new subdivisions only. They should make the new developments medium-density, composed mostly of terraced housing in short segments, and no higher than 2-stories. This way it will not lead to significantly aggravated congestion, and the medium density developments can be built in an aesthetically co-ordinated way (rather than making a mess of established suburbs).

An Intensification focused growth strategy should be for medium-density fringe development (no green ring), with established areas being essentially left alone. You would still have an over-inflated property market, but to a lesser extent, and providing more attractive alternatives for people that cannot afford detached houses.

By directly regulating the nature of fringe development to provide higher density, you can create higher densities without increasing the cost of land, so it makes far more sense for the social advantage. Naturally, with this type of development the alternative to cars would be buses, not trains, but there is nothing wrong with that in a low density ~1.2m pop city like Auckland. Buses are much more efficient than trains, especially if congestion-charging is employed.

--We should also not ignore that low-density development in itself can be regulated for environmental and maybe lifestyle advantage. We can insist on mostly small-size car usage in new developments, and design circular subdivisions made up of single-lane one-way roads so as to reduce the need for roading. There is also a recently developed transport system called 'Ultra' which can revolutionise low-density property development. My point is Intensification is not the only altermatve to some level of environmental advantage - it is only the most costly.

Regardless, there is no doubt in my mind that the future lies in the development of low-density living in the long-term. Intensification strategies cannot survive because they seriously contradict consumer demand and can be shown to be totally unnecessary and environmentally irrelevant. Our investment should be based on improving sprawl, not inhibiting it.

Real debate:

I believe the real argument with the Intensification issue has been poorly defined. It's been dressed as Intensification versus Sprawl when really it's Forced Intensification versus individual choice.

Realistically, the only honest argument for inhibiting sprawl and therefore individual choice is environmental, as whether or not it's better or worse to live in a high or low density development is a question for the individual to answer - it has nothing to do with anybody else*. This means there is only one essential question we should be debating on: Are the fallout effects of forced Intensification worth the environmental advantage?

The only environmental advantage achieved from Intensification is that you save a very small amount of farmland from roading. Remember Intensificaiton does not lead to real increases in transport efficiency.

By my perspective Intensification achieves scant environmental gain relative to the cost - it does not make sense. Surely we would be better off letting people live where they want and without undue cost, and then from there devote our resources towards more substantial environmental concerns?

--How about a major tree planting programme for soils prone to erosion? If we're concerned about farmland, then environmentally this would be far more significant. Speaking for myself, I would be quite happy to have some of my taxes go towards something like that.

*There has been confusion over the difference between individual and democratic choice. Imagine the government conducted a survey that determined that 80% of the public believed that pink bathrooms were more ideal that blue bathrooms, and in turn outlawed blue bathrooms on the grounds of democratic preference. Obviously that would be ridiculous because bathroom colour in a private home is a concern only for the individual resident - it has nothing to do with anybody else. Of course the same can be said for lifestyle choice.

Interfering with people's decisions of which only concern the individual (on the grounds of apparent public perspective) is not democracy. That's just playing silly games, and wittinging or not an abuse of power.

Sustainability:

An absolutely sustainable society must mean a "closed circuit" society. This means we take nothing more out of the earth and put nothing new into it i.e. a totally recycling society*. Though a degree of sustainble development should be targeted and achieved today, the need for absolute sustainablilty is a very long way off and would probably never be required.

I define an absolutely sustainable society as a totally recycling society, because that is the only form of society that can inarguably go on forever, without ever exhausting its resources of which it is dependant.  Hence, it can therefore be defined as absolutely sustainable. 

Note: Defining our current society as 'unsustainable' is ultimately impossible because our societies are (and always have been) evolutionary, so the character of our resource dependency is always in flux.  This is why sustainabilty projections that go beyond 100-200 year timelines should be considered irrelevant, and why any model of a planned 'sustainable' society should be continuously open to review.  Optimum sustainable forms will constantly evolve in response to ongoing social, industrial and technological advancement. 

Agenda 21:

Agenda 21 is a prominant international planning document [apparently] designed to structure our world into a sustainable form.  It aggressively promotes Smart Growth planning as "an answer". 

Agenda 21 is extremely poor policy.  It completely contradicts the status of our technological infrastructure (especially with respect to transport), the facts about low-density development, and also our ability to adapt low-density developments into an absolutely negligible eco-footprint, even with vast population growth. 

To make a simple picture: Our cities could be built like treehouses, where dense fauna grows under all our low-density buildings of which could be easily and cheaply mounted on 6-foot high stilts (providing interesting and beautiful views, for that matter).  The supporting ULTra transport system can also be put on stilts if you really want to go crazy with this.  Human settlement could be nothing more than a canopy over a bio-diversity "utopia".  In fact we can even increase the biosphere's footprint by also employing roof-top gardens, and by progressively greening our deserts as human settlements might expand into them.  We can also build low-density floating cities which weave out into the oceans, creating major man-made ocean eco-systems in the process, providing all the sushi we could eat.  How far do we want to go?  All these alternatives are far more efficient, humane and ecologically sound than Agenda 21's Smart Growth madness. 

Economic environmentalism:

Effective environmentalism must be economically based. This means we should ask ourselves how much we want to spend (directly and/or indirectly), and then from there prioritise to ensure that we get the maximum environmental profit for our cost.

If we do not insist on this approach then the environmental label becomes open to abuse - we end up with people wildly throwing the term 'sustainability' around as justification for virtually any kind of uneconomic or socially controlling venture. When this happens (and it certainly does) we can see that environmentalism becomes more of an excuse than a respectable purpose.

There is nothing wrong with caring for the environment, of course, but environmentalism minus the cost-benefit analysis leads to waste and at the expense of both the environment and society. Again, evironmentalism must be prioritised to maximise the environmental benefits to costs.

Contact:  atn_atkin@hotmail.com

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