Productivity Commission seeks 'blue skies' thinking on NZ urban planning

Wednesday 9th December 2015

The Productivity Commission is seeking "blue skies" thinking on New Zealand's urban planning rules, publishing an issues paper that will inform an investigation that government ministers hint could evolve into replacing the 25 year old Resource Management Act with separate environmental and planning laws.

The issues paper operates on the premise that the RMA has failed to produce many of the improvements to planning and environmental law that were envisaged for it.

“This inquiry is an opportunity to take a new approach to the planning process, starting from first principles," said the commission chair, Murray Sherwin. "Our goal is not to review existing laws, but to look beyond the current model to ask how a new model can be best designed to respond to future urban challenges.”

The government sought the investigation after it failed to achieve fundamental reforms to the RMA and as it continues to grapple with a crisis of unaffordable housing in Auckland, where supply continues to fall well behind demand for new, affordable housing, exacerbated by strong inward migration.

“Well-functioning cities matter a great deal to the well-being of New Zealanders and can help raise our productivity. A good planning system needs to reflect the needs of all cities, whether they are growing quickly or slowly, or if their population is shrinking."

The commission is seeking submissions by March 9 for a draft report in July and a final report to the government in November next year. It follows three allied investigations in housing affordability, using land for housing, and local government regulation, all of which have sought answers in the same broad area.

The commission's brief is to examine improvements to New Zealand’s urban planning system, including the processes undertaken through the RMA, the Local Government Act and the Land Transport Management Act. It also includes elements of the Building Act, Reserves Act and Conservation Act that affect the ability to use land in urban areas.

The paper asks such questions as whether the original vision of the RMA is "still valid or achievable".

"The RMA was intended to provide an effects-based approach to regulating externalities against clear, nationally-established environmental bottom lines, beyond which it was envisaged individuals rather than planners would be the driving force in shaping land use," the issues paper says. "The commission is interested in whether this original objective remains valid or achievable after 25 years of the RMA.

"To the extent that planning under the RMA continued to utilise existing regulatory tools and approaches in a way that was not intended by its designers, the commission is interested in what lessons can be learnt about any future transition to a new regulatory approach to urban land use regulation."

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