Jeff Humphreys

Principal, Humphreys Reynolds Perkins Planning Consultants;
Adjunct Professor, University of Queensland

Abstract
As suggested by the organiser’s theme for this conference, planners are often looking beyond the place where they work for models that will assist them to plan and deliver better urban environmental outcomes. In many cases, we are looking at exemplars that are small scale and not dependent upon features of the city setting that are similar. So, for example, planners can go around the world for examples of inner city urban renewal projects, waterfront redevelopment and transit-oriented development. However, cities are complex beasts, and there are often features about different cities that make their planning problems and challenges different from others, and reduce the transferability of solutions that have been developed, to other settings. There is an implication in the choice of the Conference topic, that climate may provide a distinguishing feature, in looking for relevant exemplars for Perth. (So how did Vancouver sneak in?) This paper suggests that in searching for relevant exemplars, it is appropriate to adopt an attitude of latitude about latitude, because there are other factors that are more important. The paper proposes that if searching for relevant exemplars for Perth, there is a particular affinity between Brisbane, Auckland, Vancouver, Portland and Perth, (The BAVPPer cities), that is useful for planners from those places to explore.

Why these five?
• Similar size
• Prosperous New World cities
• British Commonwealth! (Portland was added after a meeting in Vancouver in July 2006 – the essential quality is the underpinning implicit common assumptions about the relationship between the public domain and the private domain)
• High growth rates

The paper presents the BAVPPer Manifesto, first circulated in May 2006, explores the potential value of studying these cities together and proposes initiatives for advancing a collaborative approach to addressing the urban planning opportunities and challenges of these wonderful cities.

‘…planners are drawn to the foreign and novel; hence the number of study trips to the west coast of North America or Europe to study physical forms (and planning policies) that are grounded in completely different climates, cultures, markets and institutional arrangements.’

At least Jeff has tried to identify some real comparisons to Brisbane. I’ve long held the view that most such comparatives are chosen on the basis of superficial similarities or even worse, on the in-bound planning tourist experience, hence we have study trips to Vancouver, Seattle and Portland because they’re ‘nice’ but not to Houston, Phoenix or Durban, even though they might have much more to teach us. I think that Jeff might have underestimated the importance of climate and overestimated the importance of culture / legal arrangements etc. (although I largely agree with his central propositions re this, too).
The US might also provide some useful comparisons (despite the cultural differences), for a few reasons:
1. many ‘suitably sized’ cities in the US have similar climates to Brisbane and Perth and some are more similar to us in some respects (e.g. % social housing, subdivision techniques, ethnicity, density) than some Canadian (or NZ) jurisdictions, although some are very different indeed, particularly with respect to race;
2. the US is merely ‘further along the curve’ with respect to some trends than Australian (or European) cities, rather than being subject to fundamentally different development forces (again, this is not a general observation; it holds true for fewer trends in my view than many Australian developers would acknowledge);
3. because the US is seen as such a strong model by Australian developers (even if this is overstated as noted above) there is an element of ‘self-fulfilling prophesy’ to forecasts about Australia following US trends, however, this does not diminish the impact of such ‘follow the leader’ behaviour. The US-based (and US-centric, though becoming less so) ULI remains the most important source of information to Australian developers about real estate trends;
4. perhaps some of the differences (e.g. in institutional arrangements, culture, etc.) will have as much to teach us as the similarities?
5. Dr Doug McTaggert of QIC often makes reference to the ‘Anglo economies’ for comparisons, because the economic performance of the US, UK, Canada and Australia (he doesn’t include NZ!) are so closely tied together. Given that real estate development and economic conditions generally are also closely related, it might be worth selecting a basket of cities from the Anglo economies (including NZ of course!)
A number of others have pointed out that ‘the Portland planning story’ is largely a marketing phenomenon, so I won’t belabour the point; I will merely suggest that we attempt to identify some useful US comparitors in a systematic fashion?

Re the inclusion of Portland: Portland stands out as a planning mecca in the USA in part because it consciously chose a different path that valued public space, urban consolidation, and public transport. More importantly, it made this choice in the 1970s when almost all USA cities of comparable size were continuing to decentralize and devalue the public realm, as opposed to the 1990s when “new urbanism” became more broadly fashionable.