Improving the adaptive capacity of NSW land use planning

Australian communities are increasingly threatened by climate change. Land use planning as a system that anticipates and manages local spatial change is widely recognised as a climate adaptation solution. Climate problems will affect whole communities so effective adaptive responses will require pla...

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Main Author: Ian McNicol
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier 2025-06-01
Series:Science Talks
Subjects:
Online Access:http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2772569325000441
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author Ian McNicol
author_facet Ian McNicol
author_sort Ian McNicol
collection DOAJ
description Australian communities are increasingly threatened by climate change. Land use planning as a system that anticipates and manages local spatial change is widely recognised as a climate adaptation solution. Climate problems will affect whole communities so effective adaptive responses will require planning that is both spatial and social in scope.The planning system of NSW is used as a case study to establish how the planning system can guide local community adaptation. The problem of increasing local adaptive capacity draws in theories of planning, organisational learning, systems, adaptation, and adaptive and anticipatory governance. The emergent conceptual solution is a planning institution that enables recursive and adaptive learning. Transformative change is required to make the NSW planning system adaptive. Transformative changes would restructure planning as a self-learning system at all administrative levels which raises practical administration and maladaptation issues. Rather than focus adaptive change on land use planning, an optimal solution may be that NSW as an administrative and institutional system becomes an adaptation pathway.
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spelling doaj-art-e55babedbdf4453d9b7448a91cd99d3d2025-08-20T03:26:39ZengElsevierScience Talks2772-56932025-06-011410046210.1016/j.sctalk.2025.100462Improving the adaptive capacity of NSW land use planningIan McNicol0Griffith University, AustraliaAustralian communities are increasingly threatened by climate change. Land use planning as a system that anticipates and manages local spatial change is widely recognised as a climate adaptation solution. Climate problems will affect whole communities so effective adaptive responses will require planning that is both spatial and social in scope.The planning system of NSW is used as a case study to establish how the planning system can guide local community adaptation. The problem of increasing local adaptive capacity draws in theories of planning, organisational learning, systems, adaptation, and adaptive and anticipatory governance. The emergent conceptual solution is a planning institution that enables recursive and adaptive learning. Transformative change is required to make the NSW planning system adaptive. Transformative changes would restructure planning as a self-learning system at all administrative levels which raises practical administration and maladaptation issues. Rather than focus adaptive change on land use planning, an optimal solution may be that NSW as an administrative and institutional system becomes an adaptation pathway.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2772569325000441Land use planningSpatial planning systemsCommunity adaptationClimate adaptation pathwaysAdaptive governanceNew South Wales Australia
spellingShingle Ian McNicol
Improving the adaptive capacity of NSW land use planning
Science Talks
Land use planning
Spatial planning systems
Community adaptation
Climate adaptation pathways
Adaptive governance
New South Wales Australia
title Improving the adaptive capacity of NSW land use planning
title_full Improving the adaptive capacity of NSW land use planning
title_fullStr Improving the adaptive capacity of NSW land use planning
title_full_unstemmed Improving the adaptive capacity of NSW land use planning
title_short Improving the adaptive capacity of NSW land use planning
title_sort improving the adaptive capacity of nsw land use planning
topic Land use planning
Spatial planning systems
Community adaptation
Climate adaptation pathways
Adaptive governance
New South Wales Australia
url http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2772569325000441
work_keys_str_mv AT ianmcnicol improvingtheadaptivecapacityofnswlanduseplanning