Appendix 1: Research Methodology
Research team
Graeme McIndoe - Architect and Urban Designer, Victoria University of Wellington, Centre for Building Performance Research
Dr Ralph Chapman - Maarama Consulting, Wellington
Chris McDonald - Victoria University of Wellington, Centre for Building Performance Research
Professor Gordon Holden - Victoria University of Wellington, Centre for Building Performance Research
Associate Professor Philippa Howden-Chapman - Otago University, Wellington School of Medicine and Health Sciences
Anna Bray Sharpin - Victoria University of Wellington, Centre for Building Performance Research
Methodology
Before beginning their literature review, the researchers first identified the claims for urban design value set out in three recent Ministry for the Environment publications:
- People + Places + Spaces: A design guide for urban New Zealand
- Creating Great Places to Live + Work + Play: Livable Urban Environments: process, strategy, action
- New Zealand Urban Design Protocol
- Urban Design Case Studies.
Taking these claims as a provisional starting point, an extensive body of overseas and (where possible) New Zealand literature was examined. The aim was to establish what sort of evidence the literature provided to support or disprove these claims. Literature reviewers looked specifically for links between urban design and economic, social/cultural and environmental outcomes, and gave priority to empirical evidence provided by robust scientific studies. While the published views and judgments of recognised urban design experts were taken into account, anecdotal evidence was discounted. A significant challenge was interpreting and judging the quality of the findings - for example, judging the combined impact of a group of mutually supportive findings. Evidence was ranked as conclusive, strong or suggestive (these categories are explained more fully in Table 1).
Defining the value of urban design also proved a complex task. Economic, environmental, social and cultural forms of value were considered. So too was the nature of value - whether direct or indirect, accruing to the developer or investor and/or to the community. It became clear that much of the evidence is qualitative, and does not lend itself to easy reduction to statistics, dollars or cents. It was also apparent that those involved in urban design - the public agencies that commission or evaluate it, the private sector interests who initiate and execute it, the communities who experience and judge it - all have their own perspective on the value of urban design. All these factors were considered collectively in the research study.
The researchers' report could not reflect every aspect of urban design that is currently being studied. For reasons of time, they had to be selective, focusing only on key issues of common and current interest. They found that several interesting elements - such as heritage - have not been widely researched, but are well worth further investigation. Their concentration on areas of common and current interest was also reflected in the amount of evidence they found about links between urban design and public health and safety, a particularly popular area of inquiry at the moment.
They also found that there has been relatively little systematic research into the New Zealand experience of urban design. For that reason, this report focuses largely on international research, although some illustrative New Zealand case studies are included. Conclusions that can be drawn about the value of urban design in larger and more dense cities overseas may not always be applicable to New Zealand. There is a need for more New Zealand-specific research to confirm how the same benefits can be realised here.
