FIG Commission 8
- Spatial planning and development
Term 2011-2014
Highlights
Commission Chair
2011-2014
The activities of Commission 8 in the years 2011–2014
have involved all levels of physical planning, which enable
environmentally sustainable development to occur. There have
been four Working Groups:
WG 8.1 – Planning Strategy for Urban Development
and Regeneration
WG 8.2 – Informal Settlements Issues in Spatial Development
Planning and Governance;
WG 8.3 – Re-engineering of Mega Cities
WG 8.4 – Land Policies; Land Use Planning Control and
Implementation.
Regarding Spatial Planning, Commission 8 continued to assist in
building the capacity of knowledge and skills via case studies,
workshops, collaboration and consultation; Contributing to
environmentally sustainable development; and Humans Living conditions in
a changing globalised world. At the FIG Congress 2014 in Kuala Lumpur
the commission was involved in 19 technical sessions and 100 papers.
Emerging issues for the commission are Rural Urban Migration and the
Impact on Rural Economy and Urban economy; Rapid Urbanization where
urban policies are needed; Infrastructure is overwhelmed – Water,
Sewers, waste water, solid waste, liquid waste, energy, food security in
both urban and rural, conflict over resources; and the role of PPP in
meeting these pressing needs.
Work Plan
Terms of reference
Regional and local structure planning
Urban and rural land use planning and control
Planning policies and environmental improvement
Land use planning and implementation and control
Public-private partnerships
Informal settlement issues in spatial development,
Spatial planning and good governance
Re-engineering mega cities
Strategy for environmentally sustainable development
Disaster risk management and land use planning
Inter-relationship between Commissions
Mission statement
The activities of Commission 8 in the years 2011–2014 will involve all levels
of physical planning, which enable environmentally sustainable development to
occur.
Spatial Planning
Spatial Planning is all about governments (federal, central, state and local)
using a series of techniques to influence optimum distribution of people and
activities in spaces of various scales. It encompasses all levels of land
policies formulation, land use planning including urban planning, regional
planning, environmental planning, national spatial plans and, in Africa and in
the EU, international levels. In Africa the COMESA, IGAD, EAC nations are coming
together to design, develop and implement cross-border corridors of
infrastructure (roads, railways, oil pipelines, fibre-optic cabling) all running
beyond nations and beyond regions.
Regional/xpatial planning gives geographical expression to the economic,
social, cultural and ecological policies of society. It is at the same time a
scientific discipline, an administrative technique and a policy developed as an
interdisciplinary and comprehensive approach directed towards a balanced
regional development and the physical organization of space according to an
overall strategy.
Physical planning establishes the ‘ground rules’ for environmentally
sustainable development at all planning levels, including all actors
(government, private sector and public/private partnerships). Traditionally the
surveyors? role is most visible in implementation of plans and therefore
Commission 8 will have more focus on issues that are closely related to the core
disciplines of the profession.
Commission 8 will continue to assist in building the capacity of knowledge
and skills via case studies, workshops, collaboration and consultation thus
contributing, in a positive way, to environmentally sustainable development and
living conditions of humans in a changing globalised world.
The challenge this presents is to protect our national heritage while
permitting appropriate growth. This is sometimes referred to as ?smart growth,’
carefully planned growth to preserve the past for future generations. Yet, it
seems, one person?s notion of ?smart growth’ may be, to another person,
restraint of trade.
Throughout the world small communities are facing challenges from developers
– both builders and land owners looking to make an honest profit – who seek to
create commercial, industrial, and residential projects on water masses, former
farms, pastureland, and forests.
Urban Development
The process of improving raw land to support construction or other
improvement. It may include planning, acquisition of government permits,
subdivision, construction of access roads, installation of utilities,
landscaping, and drainage or the process of improving a large tract of land;
includes clearing, grading, and the installation of sewers and utilities such as
water, gas, telecommunications and electricity. .
Surveyors have a key professional role in the application and implementation of
planning and development for optimum community living. The strategy today
incorporates the importance of the environment and the requirement for
environmentally sustainable developments (ESD) to be foundations of the habitat
for future generations. This planning strategy for urban and rural
transformation provides opportunities for surveyors.
The re-engineering of mega cities as places for people and the provision and
location of infrastructure services involves all levels of Government and
Private Sector to collaborate and deliver desired public policy outcomes.
The challenges of containing and eventually eliminating informal settlements
ought to benefit from surveyors’ input in the aspects of planning and good
governance.
In the period of 2011–2014 the focus of Commission 8 will be:
On all parties involved in environmentally sustainable planning and
implementation;
To develop guidelines, methods, governances and good practice at the
global level;
To reflect holistic skills in planning and development of the built
environment, including informal settlements wherever they are to be found;
To emphasise that we, as surveyors and built environment experts have a
leadership role in the collective responsibility for well-functioning mega
cities; including integrated disaster risk management as a discipline
The Commission recognises the three pillars of ESD, i.e. balancing the
competing development demands associated with economic, social and
environmental aspirations.
Further, the integrating activities of FIG allow for adoption of a holistic
approach to problem solving in the built environment be it rural, peri-urban or
urban; – Focussing on surveyors’ role in the implementation of plans and the
interaction between planning and real estate economics. Analyze success stories
like Sao Paulo’s, Buenos Aires’s, New York City’s tackling of informal
settlements and Norway’s prevention of the same.
Working Group 8.1 - Planning Strategy for Urban Development and
Regeneration
Policy Issues
Planning urban development and renewal and their economic and social
impacts
The role of partnerships and urbanization process is a role for
surveyors in moving towards sustainability in urban development/community
living for people and places.
Chair
Frank Friesecke,
GERMANY,
e-mail: frank.friesecke[at]steg.de
Working Group 8.2 - Informal Settlements Issues in Spatial
Development Planning and Governance
Policy Issues
Commission 8 contributions to the attainment of Millennium Development
Goals, all of which have been set to be substantially realized by 2015.
Evaluate progress thus far and suggest ways to improve the policies, laws,
systems and procedures for their execution
to investigate initiatives that deliver land for housing and associated
financial mechanisms that enable peoples’ settlements upgrading through
participatory approaches to planning and development.
Provisional Terms of Reference
Build negotiation mechanisms with Traditional Leaders to enable the
expansion of urban areas onto customary owned land by identifying ways in
which Customary ownership could be realistically converted to release land
for formalised housing, (in collaboration with Commission 7).
Explore rapid, new approaches to forward planning and upgrading
initiatives that provide places for the poor by partnering with sister
organisations of like minds.
Deliver environmental sustainable house plots by working with
partnership forums to find ways to upgrade infrastructure achieving this by
addressing both physical and financial mechanisms.
To provide opportunities for surveyors to play a key role in solving
problems and implementing infrastructure in environmentally sustainable
projects/developments in mega cities (large sprawling habitats with two
distinct types being economically wealthy and dramatically poor).
Chair
Enrico Rispoli,
ITALY,
Email: e.rispoli[at]cng.it
Working Group 8.4 - Land Policies; Land Use Planning Control and
Implementation
Policy Issues
To increase Surveyors‘ contribution to formulation and implementation of land
policies in the world in general and in Africa in particular; land use
planning and better integrate surveyors expertise in implementation of these
policies, plans, implementation processes and agreements and real estate
management
To increase surveyors’ and planners’ awareness on sustainable planning and
implementation of plans based on modern knowledge, technical solutions,
rules and legislation, traditions, equity and development and implementation
processes in different countries.
Chair
Mr. Ibrahim Mwathane,
KENYA,
Email: mwathane[at]landsca.co.ke
