Geoscience Reference
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activities on places where development is proposed should be combined
with broader consideration of waste management, water resource man-
agement, pollution control, and energy and resource consumption
is a common theme in the literature on environmental planning.
83
Assessment of ecological impacts should also extend to the effects of
associated development that new infrastructure may require including,
for example, the construction of electricity transmission lines to convey
energy generated by offshore installations or from the remote areas that
are often most suitable for onshore wind farms.
84
Finally, an ecological planning system should be spatially comprehen-
sive. The creation through local and regional planning processes of a
national consciousness of available resources and of concentrations of
activities is necessary if the state is to ful
l its coordinating role, and
thereby to secure ecologically progressive outcomes of planning pro-
cesses. This would also assist with identifying an equitable distribution of
the impacts, including those resulting from the construction of new
infrastructure, that would be associated with an ecological transition.
The need for a spatial overview to overcome the limitations of local and
regional planning and to support compliance with objectives and with
promoting the equitable distribution of development is widely cited as a
reason for developing a national planning capacity.
85
Wong argues that
the
'
'
differential spatial contours
created by the movement of invest-
ment, pollutants, traf
c and people give rise to inter-regional issues and
that these pose
the need to examine inter-sectoral linkages over a
broader spatial framework at national or even supranational levels
'
.
86
Surprisingly little is said in the literature concerning a national spatial
planning framework on the form that this should take. Wong suggests
that this could be established through an overarching planning policy
statement of the type provided by the European Spatial Development
Perspective.
87
Sheprefersthistothemoredirectionalapproachof
establishing a clear hierarchy of plan-making in law with the state at
'
83
Blowers,
'
TheTimeforChange
'
,p.15;Evans,
'
From Town Planning
'
,pp.5
-
6; The Royal
Commission on Environmental Pollution,
'
Environmental Planning
'
, p. 146, paras 10.17
and 10.18; Wheeler,
'
Planning for Sustainability
'
,pp.36
-
8.
84
The Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution,
'
Environmental Planning
'
,p.145,
para 10.8.
85
Alden,
'
Scenarios for the Future
'
,397;SteadandNadin,
'
Environmental Resources
'
,
359
-
60; Stallworthy,
'
Sustainability, Land Use
'
,p.106;Wong,
'
Is There a Need?
'
, 279,
281; Baker and Wong,
'
The Delusion of Strategic Spatial Planning
'
,94
-
7.
86
Wong,
87
'
Is There a Need?
'
, 283.
Ibid
., 297.
