New Tricks with Old Maps: Urban Landscape Change,GIS, and Historic Preservation in the Less Developed World

This article presents a methodology for a more detailed investigation of urban landscape change in rapidly growing cities of the less developed world beyond typical macrolevel approaches. This research is an attempt to bridge the gap between traditional landscape analysis and geographic information science (GIS). The article presents the preliminary results from a pilot project in Zamalek, Egypt, highlighting the benefits and drawbacks of the two techniques. Rarely used to study the less developed world, these techniques are utilized to assess change within a portion of Cairo's urban landscape. Large‐scale historic maps and high‐resolution satellite imagery, combined with field attribute collection, are the major data sources in this applied landscape analysis. A motivating factor in the desire to examine landscape change at such a large scale is the need to create monitoring systems for historic preservation in cities of the less developed world.     

New Tricks with Old Maps: Urban Landscape Change,GIS, and Historic Preservation in the Less Developed World

This article presents a methodology for a more detailed investigation of urban landscape change in rapidly growing cities of the less developed world beyond typical macrolevel approaches. This research is an attempt to bridge the gap between traditional landscape analysis and geographic information science (GIS). The article presents the preliminary results from a pilot project in Zamalek, Egypt, highlighting the benefits and drawbacks of the two techniques. Rarely used to study the less developed world, these techniques are utilized to assess change within a portion of Cairo's urban landscape. Large-scale historic maps and high-resolution satellite imagery, combined with field attribute collection, are the major data sources in this applied landscape analysis. A motivating factor in the desire to examine landscape change at such a large scale is the need to create monitoring systems for historic preservation in cities of the less developed world.     

Revitalising Local Economic Development-New Zealand Policy and Practice

In common with many other advanced capitalist nations, the rolling back of the state in New Zealand has seen a decline in direct state intervention in heal and regional economies. Yet since 2000 the current Labour Coalition Government has sought to promote a renaissance in economic development at local and regional scales. A survey of New Zealand territorial local authorities indicates involvement in heal economic development (LED) is a recent phenomenon involving facilitation of outside agencies which is orientated toward tourist, advisory and promotional activities. The implications of these findings for future research in an environment of ‘revitalised’ policy and practice in the New Zealand context is explored.     

Realistic Sustainability? Urban Transport Planning in Wellington,New Zealand

Urban transport systems have key roles in supporting environmental sustainability. New Zealand's transport planning arrangements are promoted as a model by agencies such as the World Bank. This paper explores the New Zealand transport planning framework using a case study of the Wellington region's strategic balancing of transport modes and projects. The paper argues that despite some positive rhetoric, concerns about the sustainability of transport planning in Wellington remain. The paper concludes by discussing the need to reassess New Zealand's national framework, and identifies some directions for reform.     

The Commodification of Resource Consent in New Zealand1

One outcome of the Resource Management Act 1991, especially the provisions of s.94, is liberalised public notification of resource consent applications. A market for consent has emerged, in which applicants financially compensate local communities as a way of securing public support for development proposals. Consent purchasing, however, raises diliemnas for regulatory planners and social equity concerns for local communities.     

Ethnic Residential Segregation Across an Urban System: The Maori in New Zealand, 1991–2001

In New Zealand there are substantial variations across the urban system in the degree of residential segregation of those claiming Maori ethnicity. Analyses of those variations, using measures particularly relevant to comparative study, show that Maori segregation was greatest in both 1991 and 2001 in larger urban areas and, especially, in those with relatively large Maori populations. A major deviation from this general pattern was in Auckland; further analysis suggests that this was because of considerable sharing of residential space involving Maori and Pacific Islanders. If the total population claiming a Polynesian identity is studied, the relationships between segregation and both size and Polynesian population share are clarified.     

Fragmented Urban Spaces? Ethnic Residential Areas in New Zealand Cities, 1996

Residential segregation of ethnic groups is a major feature of cities in multi‐cultural societies such as New Zealand's. Measuring the degree of segregation has been the focus of much attention over the last half century, but there are difficulties with comparative studies using most of the measures adopted. An alternative procedure which classifies residential areas according to a homogeneity‐heterogeneity continuum is applied here to 1996 census small‐scale data for each of New Zealand's 33 main urban areas, to identify the degree of segregation of various ethnic groups. It reports that most New Zealanders from all ethnic groups (defined by self‐identity) live in mixed rather than exclusive residential areas. The main ethnic enclaves/ghettos are occupied by Maori and Pacific Islanders, and are entirely concentrated in the North Island, especially in urban areas which have substantial Polynesian populations.     

Homelessness in Canada and New Zealand: A Comparative Perspective on Numbers and Policy Responses

This article provides a comparative perspective on homelessness in Canada and New Zealand, with a focus on three urban regions. It seeks to document homeless numbers in the chosen cities, to evaluate the utility of counting the homeless, and to identify common and divergent approaches in homelessness policy. Research involved document analysis, key informant interviews, and participant observation. Literal homelessness is found to be several orders of magnitude higher in the Canadian cities. In one of the Canadian centers, suburban homelessness is emerging as a significant phenomenon. Efforts to count the homeless allow such trends to be tentatively quantified, and inform policymaking. Policy differences between the countries are stark: Canadian cities are seeking to respond to an emergency, which may call for a radical change of approach in the form of "housing first." In New Zealand, a national program of social housing, combined with cultural factors, reduces pressure to act.     

The Resource Management Act 1991 and the Practice of Environmental Governance in New Zealand: The Example of Lake Taupo

On 1 October 1991 the Resource Management Act 1991 came into force. The enactment of this legislation was supposed to herald the start of a brave new world in environmental governance in New Zealand. Since that time the Act has never been far from controversy in the popular press and in the academic literature. The paper briefly reviews the debates in the academic literature about the Act and argues that the debates could benefit from a theoretically informed analysis of the impact of the Act on specific environmental initiatives. This paper draws on the Lake Taupo Water Quality Project to illustrate how this type of analysis may uncover practical, relevant and interesting insights for law reform, policy making and practice hidden by conventional discourses on the Act.