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The physical and social landscapes of tourist cities like the Gold Coast are subject to continual transformation. The Gold Coast is Queensland’s fastest growing City with the over 65 cohort predicted to be the City’s largest single population grouping by 2016 (GCCC 2005). The aging of the population coupled with current and predicted growth rates suggest continued buoyancy in real estate markets. However, the economic base and social capital of the Gold Coast City are vulnerable to climate change. The areas of the city most affected by climate change, and in particular sea level rise, are where some of the key real estate and tourism landscapes are located. In addition, an apparent shortage of land suitable for development, coupled with high population growth and climate change has significant impacts for the Gold Coast City Council and the State and Federal Governments. Together these factors highlight the urgent need to understand the social, ecological and economical issues attached to housing landscapes on the Gold Coast.
To address the concerns relating to climate change Dr Caryl Bosman, of the Urban Research Program, Griffith University, aims to map past flood events on the Gold Coast to explore related changes to patterns of residential development. This research is a pilot study with the view to extend the project to other ’sea change’ locations in Australia. The objectives of Bosman’s research are:
1. To establish how past (1960-2005) flood events affected local community values, structures and concepts of place;
Q. How have place values and meanings been established, articulated and empowered or disempowered as a result of floods?
2. To examine how past (1960-2005) flood events impacted on planning policy and practice;
Q. How were/are the effects of the flood events reflected in planning policy?
3. To determine whether past (1960-2005) flood events can be used as an indicator for future planning and community responses in relation to current climate change forecasts.
Q. How can the flood events be used as indicators of community response to climate change events?
The significance of this research is to better understand relationships between climate change, affected communities and the creation of residential places. Most of the literature on climate change and housing is empirical and quantitative and does not take into account cultural and community values and qualitative experiences and ways of knowing. Bosman’s research project is innovative as it links socio-cultural understandings of community and place, in relation residential landscapes, to discourse on climate change. The objective here is to enlarge the scope of how climate change might be understood in Australian urban studies. To this end the project examines the links between residential landscapes and climate change/adaptation and theoretical developments around concepts of place and community.
Crouch (2000) argues for deeper understandings of the ‘lay geographies of place’ as a means of a more ‘human and individual’ approach to managing place. Lay geographies of place are generated through, for example, literature, local folklore, stories, media, and community organisations. Coaffee and Healey (2003) argue that places are created through episodes of collective action, the on-going work of governments (e.g. structures, processes, routines) and in the assumptions, habits, ideas and behaviours of people in relation to space. Drawing from these authors, Bosman’s data collection focuses on investigating residential place and community values and meanings through:
1. Examining episodes of collective action including the work of government. Episodes of collective action and the place values that galvanised in the case study are examined. Semi-structured interviews conducted with community pressure groups, peak industry groups and government agencies identify how place values and meanings have been established, articulated and empowered or disempowered as a result of floods. In addition to interviews, data is collected from archival material, maps, photographs, art exhibition catalogues, promotional material form development firms, media clippings, ministerial statements, policies and council documents.
2. Assumptions, habits, ideas and behaviours of people. Oral histories with long term residents/visitors within/associated with the case study areas are undertaken and analysed to ascertain:
a. the values and meanings people attach to the place
b. how the flood events affect local communities
c. how the flood event impact local residential development patterns
In cities based on tourism, such as the Gold Coast, local place making techniques and practices are often marginalised and subverted to support and secure neoliberal agendas. Drawing on Wekerle (2005), Bosman suggests ways to challenge neoliberal urbanisation and global, corporate, tourist production of place. She does this through arguing for a domestication of place that heightens images of localness; alternative processes of place making that can be realised through Local Agenda/Action 21 (LA21) strategies. LA21 is well suited as conceptual framework for Bosman’s project as it allows local and global processes and practices to be reconciled. The ICLEI (2002) state that ‘Local Action 21 strengthens the Local Agenda 21 movement of local governments to create sustainable communities and cities while protecting global common goods’ (italics added). LA21 is concerned with grassroots sustainable place making practices which are initiated by local government. Local government is commissioned to develop and implement policies in consultation with all local communities. The aims of this communicative planning process are twofold: to ‘create sustainable communities’ through education and regulation; and to achieve ecological sustainable development (ICLEI 2002).
The LA21 framework Bosman proposes is premised on a postcapitalist (Gibson-Graham 2006) production of place achievable through practices of minor architecture/planning practices/place making (Bloomer 1992a, 1992b, 1993). Minor architecture makes use of detail to create a symbolic system that is local, inclusive, complex and non hierarchal. It is free from the patriarchal patterns which segregate public and private spaces according to gender; instead it might be a synthesis of work, play, intellect, feeling, action, compassion. Drawing on John Law (2004) Bosman’s research design incorporates symbols and mythology. Minor architecture does not compartmentalise feeling, thinking and doing but is a dynamic process, one which cannot be objectified and where meaning is not prescribed. Following Eran Ben-Joseph (2005: 167) minor architecture/planning practices/place making adopts flexible sets of practices and rules that allow ‘subdivision and construction to respond to the particulars of place and environment.’
By adopting LA21 Bosman argues that the production of new residential landscapes—ones that satisfy global agendas—can be encouraged alongside processes and practices of minor architecture—ways that respond to local, everyday place values, meanings and climates. In short, LA21 is ‘an approach through which a local community defines a sustainable development strategy and an action programme to be implemented’ (Vourc’h and Denman 2003: 8).
The significance of Bosman’s project lies in understanding the social and cultural relationships that manifest at different scales, between climate change consequences, affected communities and the creation of residential places. Moreover, the implications of this research extend beyond planning and can inform: image and place creation activities associated with destination marketing and branding, urban design, local economic development, environmental and social justice, transport planning and community and cultural planning. Bosman’s research will also improve knowledge of place making and management in the planning and development professions; as well as facilitate different ways of thinking and acting to achieve different, more equitable, sustainable and democratic planning and residential place management outcomes.
references
Ben-Joseph, Eran (2005) The Code of the City: Standards and the Hidden Language of Place Making. London: MIT Press.
Bloomer, Jennifer (1992a) ‘Abodes of Theory and Flesh: Tabbles of Bower’, Assemblage, 17(April): 6-29.
Bloomer, Jennifer (1992b) ‘”D’or”‘. In Colomina, Beatriz (ed) Sexuality & Space. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 163-183.
Bloomer, Jennifer (1993) Architecture and the Text: The (S)Crypts of Joyce and Piranesi. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Coaffee, J. & P. Healey (2003) ‘My voice: My place: Tracking transformations in urban governance’, Urban Studies, 40 (10): 1979-99.
Crouch, D. (2000) ‘Places around us: embodies lay geographies in leisure and tourism’, Leisure Studies, 19: 63-76.
Fraser, Jim and Weninger, Csilla (2008) ‘Modes of engagement for urban research: enacting a politics of possibility’, Environment and Planning A, online publication 03 April.
Gold Coast City Council, (2005) ‘Our living City report 2004-05′, Gold Coast City Council.
Gibson-Graham, J.K. (2006) Postcapitalist Politics. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
ICLEI (2002) ‘Local Action 21: From Agenda to Action’, Retrieved 09 May 2007, from http://www.localaction21.org
Law, John (2004) After method: Mess in Social Science Research, Abingdon: Routledge.
Vourc’h, A. and Denman, R. (2003) Tourism and Local Agenda 21: The role of local authorities in sustainable tourism. The International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives, United Nations.
Wekerle, Gerda R. (2005) ‘Domesticating the Neoliberal City: Invisible Genders and the Politics of Place’. In Harcourt, Wendy and Escabar, Arturo (eds.) Women and the Politics of Place. Bloomfield: Kumarian Press, 86-99.
