Metropolitan Open Space in Sydney 1 Green Regional Design: Philosophies, policies and products in the evolution of metropolitan open space in Sydney 1948-2008

The aim of this paper is to investigate how and to what extent the provision of major open spaces has been integrated (or not) into the metropolitan planning process in Sydney over the last 60 years. There is a focus on three specific dimensions of this history: roles and influence of various agencies responsible for the implementation of open space; shifting values and concepts which influenced delivery of open space; and comparison of proposals for significant regional greenspaces against the parks and open spaces that eventuated. The analysis is based primarily on a review of statutory metropolitan planning strategies and annual reports of state planning departments and authorities. It is framed across three distinct periods of urban planning in Sydney: 1940s—1960s (a period framed by two robust strategic plans when the foundation of a metropolitan green web was activated); 1960s—1980s (implementation of 1968 strategic corridor thinking through to emergence of sustainability concerns in policy-making), and 1990s to the present (from early concerns for climate change through to the multivalent notion of green infrastructure). Introduction Contemporary concerns for sustainable urban form and the related issues of human and ecological health have renewed advocacy for the adequate and equitable provision of metropolitan open space. These concerns are supported by evidence from ecologists and social scientists demonstrating that connectivity of urban form, particularly open space, provides multiple benefits, including improved biodiversity, community cohesion, and physical health of humans, and reduced reliance on fossil fuels. Large-scale regional open space has long been valued as a quality-of-life resource for metropolitan residents, but different rationales have underpinned its advocacy and progress toward implementation has stuttered between missed opportunities and spectacular successes shaped and constrained by diverse cultural and Metropolitan Open Space in Sydney 3 institutional frameworks. Sydney, for example, was bequeathed major reserves and national parks in the 19 century and thereafter has made faltering advances toward even a notional open space network. This empirical paper is broadly concerned with how provision of major open spaces has been integrated (or not) into the metropolitan planning process in Sydney over the last 60 years. There is a focus on three specific dimensions of this history: Roles and influence of various agencies responsible for the implementation of open space; Shifting values and concepts which influenced the delivery of open space; • Comparison of proposals for significant regional greenspaces against the parks and open spaces that eventuated. The analysis is framed across several distinct periods of urban planning in Sydney: 1940s— 1960s (a period framed by two robust strategic plans when the foundation of a metropolitan green web was activated); 1960s—1980s (implementation of 1968 strategic corridor thinking through to emergence of sustainability concerns in policy-making), and 1990s to the present (from early concerns for climate change through to the multivalent notion of green infrastructure). The significance of decisions taken in the late 1940s and late 1960s for comprehending open space planning in Sydney becomes evident. 1940s-1960s: The County of Cumberland Council Metropolitan Open Space in Sydney 4 The County of Cumberland Council (CCC) was established in 1945 with the aim of preparing the first strategic land-use plan for the Sydney metropolitan region. Both the Council and the plan it produced were innovative; the planning scheme was the first statutory regional land-use plan for Sydney while the Council, comprising representatives of local government electorates, was a new type of authority, situated intermediate between local councils and state government. Its coordinative aspirations at times set the council against state level departments, whilst at times its regional outlook could be difficult to reconcile with the interests of its ultimate constituents. (Neutze,1978). Nonetheless, the CCC proposals for open space were a response to contemporary global and regional, rather than local, concerns. These included a rapidly growing population, a spreading suburban footprint, increased leisure time and access to automobiles, Sydney’s rising role as a destination for national and international tourists, and the knowledge and acceptance of the link between physical recreation and human health (Cumberland County Council, 1948, p.139; Winston, 1957, p. 45). The Planning Scheme for the County of Cumberland (PSCC), prepared by the Council in 1948 and approved in 1951, articulated three aims which reflected its regional outlook (Winston 1957, p. 39): • coordination of land use; • consolidation of development; • conservation of natural and historical assets. Metropolitan Open Space in Sydney 5 Open space was concieved as playing a critical role in achieving these aim and shaping the urban region. Its multiple roles included tempering the pressure of subdivisions, insulating disparate land uses, protecting scenic areas, articulating suburban sub-regions and providing recreational areas. The CCC typology of open space was broad and varied: open space included scenic and recreation parcels, productive land such as forestry reserves, agricultural areas, and institutional campuses, as well as land that separated built-up zones from each other. The five types of open spaces proposed a county green belt, district open spaces, national parks and other major reserves (including foreshore scenic reserves), and rural areas reflect this conceptual breadth, but even more importantly, initiated a comprehensive open space agenda across the Sydney metropolitan region. The green belt The green belt and district open spaces were novel elements for Sydney. The green belt was a central feature of the Planning Scheme, partly due to its projected size—128 square miles (332 km, but also because of its primary role of containing urban sprawl. The CCC described it as ‘a girdle of rural open space encircling the urban districts and penetrating towards the centre between some of the outer districts, ensuring for all time ready access by urban populations to a countryside specially planned and maintained for their benefit’(Cumberland County Council, 1948, p. 65). In reality, the green belt was a strip of open country on the outer fringe of the existing built-up area linking Ku-ring-gai Chase in the north to the (Royal) National Park in the south. Consisting primarily of grassland and scrubby woodland, its width and character varied with the terrain, with the more extensive tracts in open, undulating country with limited agricultural or scenic value (Freestone, 1992; County of Cumberland Council 1948, p.216). Metropolitan Open Space in Sydney 6 Mostly in private ownership, it represented a little under 10% of the metropolitan (County of Cumberland) area. The green belt was to be the antidote for ‘promiscuous urbanisation’ (Cumberland County Council, 1948, p. 129). It was conceived as a permanent barrier to suburban sprawl; that is, a check on the proliferation of premature, low density subdivisions. It would define the physical extent of the metropolis for the relatively modest target population in the PSCC, and was in effect an inner rural zone which would conserve rural land in production and preserve scenic landscapes. The primary basis of planning control in the green belt was a general prohibition against building on sites less than 2 hectares, considered the smallest area from which a livelihood could be obtained from full agricultural development (Freestone, 1992). Many people, particularly developers and small landholders, interpreted the green belt as a government imposed restriction on development rights, and associated economic gains; as a result the green belt became highly contested. In addition, because the belt was adjacent to dynamic urban areas, it was highly vulnerable to growth pressures, and was steadily encroached upon. By 1957 16 km was released for urban expansion; in 1959 the Minister for Local Government released a further 119 km, in effect abandoning the concept (Freestone, 1992). The green web The district open space system or the green web, proposed by the PSCC, was a network of open space within the area bounded by the green belt. The web was given the task of ‘preserving the identity of the urban districts, providing the means for physical recreation of district populations Metropolitan Open Space in Sydney 7 and preserving much of the County’s best natural scenery’ (Cumberland County Council, 1948, p. 65). Comprising 22,000 acres (9 ha), it wove together patches of the existing open spaces lining Sydney’s dendritic river and waterway systems such as Middle Harbour, Lane Cove River, Wolli Creek, Cook’s River, Prospect Creek, Long Cove Creek, Duck River-Haslam’s Creek, and Iron Cove Creek. Unlike the green belt, this proposal responded clearly to landscape conditions, particularly topography, being largely comprised of land considered undevelopable. It also developed at a larger scale the incipient system described in the PSCC as the ‘singular great belt of open space’ extending from Bennelong Point on Port Jackson to Centennial and Moore Parks, and through to Botany Bay (Cumberland County Council, 1948, p. 137). The green web proposal was also underpinned in principle by the normative standard of provision of 10 acres of open space per 1,000 people and a baseline size of 15 ha as an indicator of county significance (Cunneen, 1980, p. 114; Cumberland County Council, 1948, p. 136). A 1951 survey of open space based on these standards confirmed inadequate provision across the metropolitan area, poor distribution of types, and inappropriate siting of uses (Cunneen, 1980; Cumberland County Council, 1948, p. 136). The CCC marshalled this evidence to determine that the projected 30% population increase over the 25 year time frame of the Scheme would require an additional 9.5 square miles (25 km ) of (local and district) open space plus 31 golf courses (Cumberland County Council, 1948, p. 136). Although involving a relatively small amount of land, the district open space plan translated into an ambitious process of acquisition, particularly in the inner suburbs. The total estimated cost of the 1948 open space proposals not including additional scenic spots was £15 million (the Metropolitan Open Space in Sydney 8 equivalent of $612 million in 2001), and assumed financial support from Commonwealth, State and local levels of government. When financial assistance was rejected outright by the Commonwealth, the required expenditure was reduced by two-thirds to £5 million ($204 m) by excising land categorised as built-up from the open space proposals. This left the sole category of lower value ‘vacant land’ and inevitably resulted in a significantly curtailed program of new open space development. It was however the key to state parliamentary approval of the Scheme in 1951, and led to arguably its most enduring outcome: an agreement whereby the cost of acquiring vacant land for open space, roadways and significant historic sites would be split 50:50 between local councils and the NSW State Government (Ashton,1982, pp. 22-23) . This agreement has been the basis of open space acquisition to the present day (Ashton in NSW DEP, 1982, p. 2). Open space acquisition became one of the primary responsibilities of the CCC. By 1964, when it was superseded by the State Planning Authority, the CCC had spent close to £5 million ($92 million in 2001) on open space, approximately 70% of its total acquisition of land. In its 13 year history, the CCC had orchestrated the acquisition of significant parcels along the Georges River, in Bankstown, the Nepean River near Penrith, and large parcels of land in Middle Harbour, Galston Gorge and North Narrabeen. The incremental acquisition and development of recreational facilities along Duck River was hailed by the CCC as assembling the ‘Centennial Park of the west’. The CCC had also worked persistently, albeit opportunistically, to acquire small but significant parcels of harbour foreshore; open space reservations at Blue’s Point, Clifton Gardens, and Mann’s Point are all CCC legacies. From 1959, with the longevity of the Council clearly under threat, the CCC focus on the extension and establishment of even larger Metropolitan Open Space in Sydney 9 green corridors of National Parks along the Nepean, Georges, Lane Cove Rivers, and the upper reaches of Middle Harbour signalled the CCC’s heightened concern for regional open space provision, and the need for continuity of some form of regional level administration. A proposal for Port Jackson National Park, one of the CCC’s most significant proposals, was made in 1963, on the eve of its dissolution.