The NSW Movement and Place Framework facilitates an iterative and collaborative process for the planning and design of movement systems and successful places. Movement and Place can be useful at all stages in the delivery of a project or program, as well as in the ordinary operation and maintenance of the built environment.
Its practical application changes at different stages, from project inception where it can assist with research and arriving at an appropriate project definition, through to operations and maintenance where it can be used to generate end-of-life and project renewal options.
Starting with this holistic approach, when the strategies and processes that balance movement and place outcomes are implemented at the earliest stages of projects and supported throughout project life cycles, they can engage whole-of-life costs and benefits to assist in reducing inequality, improving everyday life, and providing a sustainable platform for future generations.
Alignment with Policy
Policy context and alignment
The NSW Movement and Place Framework has been developed in the context of an increasing emphasis within State and local government on people-centred outcomes, acknowledging and managing the dynamic tension between movement and place needs. This context includes responding to the broader challenges facing metropolitan and regional areas, such as adapting to a changing climate, changing demographics, population growth, and supporting healthy lifestyles and social interaction.
Movement and Place policies and strategies align with:
- Future Transport Strategy
- Connecting to the future: Our 10 Year Blueprint
- Outcome Budgeting
- State Infrastructure Strategy 2018–2038
- Greater Sydney Region Plan: A Metropolis of Three Cities
- Better Placed: An integrated design policy for the built environment of NSW
- Premier’s Priorities for a Better Environment: Greening our City and Greener Public Spaces.
Good design is NSW Government policy
To meet people’s needs and respond to greater challenges and increasing complexity, the planning and design of our built environment needs to be more thoroughly considered. In NSW, the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 sets a requirement for ‘good design and amenity of the built environment’.
The objects of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 (EP&A Act) include a key phrase – ‘good design’ – which elevates the importance of design in the planning system. Better Placed establishes what the NSW Government expects regarding good design and effective process across all built environment projects in NSW. Good design is both a process and an outcome of a process – a way of making and the result of that making.
Better Placed establishes a set of objectives for the NSW built environment:
- Better fit: contextual, local, and of its place
- Better performance: sustainable, adaptable, and durable
- Better for community: inclusive, connected, and diverse
- Better for people: safe, comfortable, and liveable
- Better working: functional, efficient, and fit for purpose
- Better value: creating and adding value
- Better look and feel: engaging, inviting, and attractive.
This emphasis on how we can achieve these aspirations through ‘design thinking’ outlines the holistic way of identifying and understanding opportunities, integrating possibilities, and designing appropriate responses that serve the public good.
Alignment with existing processes
Evaluation Processes
The figure below shows how the Movement and Place approach supplements existing evaluation processes.