That’s Life – Try not to laugh, or cry

Urban planning, by definition, is supposed to involve sensible things like predicting population growth, zoning wisely, mapping like a cartography ninja, figuring out where the parks, pipes, poo and people should all go, and ensuring we don’t all end up living on a sewage floodplain with no infrastructure. So, when you put the words “urban planning” and “Warkworth” in the same sentence, you’ve got yourself the textbook meaning of an oxymoron. Let’s unpack the local highlights.

Population growth: We’ve ticked that box … sort of. As Auckland prices soar into the stratosphere, people look northward for sanity and semi-affordable housing. The result? Houses springing up everywhere. The infrastructure to support them? Still waiting for a plan for that.

Zoning: Imagine assembling IKEA furniture blindfolded, in a dark room, with instructions in Swedish. That’s our zoning process. Constantly changing, randomly reversed, and an application process that makes the Da Vinci Code look like a pamphlet.

Water and wastewater: This one’s a doozy. The plan seems to be to build heaps of houses and worry about the poop problem later. The fix? Dig up part of the main street, throttle the local retailers and cue Watercare’s new slogan: “We’ll fix it – eventually. Maybe. Somehow. Good luck.”

Transport planning: Ah yes, the pièce de résistance. Whoever designed the Pak’nSave, Hudson Road, showgrounds, Z station, State Highway traffic tango deserves a medal, or should that be a court-martial? It’s like a bad reality show – trucks trying to escape the Z station, cars entering and exiting the supermarket at warp speed, and cars turning right at the lights. I have spent many an amusing minute standing with the dog on my walk to the showgrounds watching an articulated truck trying to turn out of the fuel station while cars of all shapes and sizes try to get into and out of the supermarket, as a stream of cars, which have just turned either left or right at the lights, try to get up Hudson Road.

Now, Kiwis like to think we’re innovative – and we are. But planning? Well, let’s just say we’re great at talking about being forward-thinking. Actual forward thinking? That’s a bit murkier.

Just ask the ghosts of the Auckland Harbour Bridge planning committee – the same legends who decided four lanes would be plenty and laughed off putting in rail because, obviously, “no one wants to live over there”. Fast-forward 70 years and we’re still stuck in traffic wondering how it all went so wrong.

So, next time someone says, “urban planning” try not to laugh and let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Next time you’re caught in traffic behind a livestock truck that can’t exit the petrol station, thanks to a road cone that’s moved in for the week – just smile, it could be worse; you could be trying to exit a supermarket onto a congested thoroughfare that’s gridlocked near a set of traffic lights. You’re not in a transport crisis. You’re just in Warkworth.