The influence of statutory land use planning on water sensitive urban design practices

ABSTRACT

Regulation, including statutory land use planning law, is seen as an important way to encourage the adoption of water sensitive urban design (WSUD) practices. Despite this, there has been little empirical investigation of how statutory land use planning influences the uptake of WSUD practices, and how planning frameworks could be redesigned, to better support WSUD. The influence of statutory planning on WSUD practices was investigated in four case studies, two from Victoria and two from Western Australia. The case studies considered how statutory planning influenced four discrete components of WSUD practice. In the case studies, statutory planning did encourage the adoption of WSUD practices. The capacity of statutory land use planning to encourage WSUD practices was enhanced when statutory planning included specific quantitative targets and when it encouraged the adoption of these practices at the localised, street scale. The research also found that statutory land use planning interprets the WSUD concept, by encouraging specific practices. These practices, in turn, reinforce our assumptions about what WSUD might be.

KEYWORDS:

• Planning law
• water sensitive urban design
• case studies

Acknowledgments

I would like to acknowledge the support of the Australian government, through the Cooperative Research Centre Programme. I am grateful to expert reviewers for their comments on earlier versions of this paper, which greatly improved it. My PhD supervisors, Professor Graeme Hodge and Dr Colin Campbell, provided essential direction, support and encouragement. I thank my colleagues at the Cooperative Research Centre for Water Sensitive Cities for their encouragement and critical insights.

Additional information

Funding

This paper draws on research from the author’s PhD research, which was supported by the Australian government, through the Cooperative Research Centre Programme.

Notes on contributors

Don Williams

Don Williams is an urban water regulatory and policy specialist. He worked as a public servant for more than 25 years in the fields of environmental management, and urban and rural water policy. During this time, he contributed to the development of national urban water planning principles. Don then returned to Monash University and completed a PhD in the Faculty of Law, which examined how statutory land use planning laws influence the adoption of water sensitive urban design practices. He subsequently returned to the Victorian public service and participated in a review of urban stormwater regulation. Don is particularly interested in how regulatory regimes can be used to achieve public policy outcomes.