All destinations visited had established strong governance structures and policies in areas such as community design, quality assurance, building codes and urban management systems. This strong governance feature - in both public and private sector projects - underpinned the generally high quality outcomes over time.

If you would like to see what happens when strong governance structures and policies are NOT employed, the development of Perisher Valley is an ideal case study compared to the Thredbo Valley development.

At Perisher, there are no statutory controls or guidelines. The valley is within a National Park and as such is not covered by development controls as with most development in Australia. There are no LEPs, REPs, SEPs, DCPs or development policies.

Development is driven by developers, and approved by the National Parks and Wildlife Authority whose primary concern is for the Park and Wildlife rather than the quality of property development. The result of over 20 years of loose governance is anarchistic and disjointed development. Development values are relatively low, and community satisfaction in respect to the facilities within Perisher is also low.

This can be compared with Thredbo village which is managed by an independent entity that imposes strict development controls. This village is far more visually attractive than Perisher and development and social values are far higher.

What is interesting is that typically developers seek flexibility in design but even they are seeking the introduction of a master planning activity for Perisher so that it can catch up with Thredbo. It seems that although developers yearn for flexibility, they too need order and responsible governance to protect their investment from themselves and their fellow developers.

Flexibility within structure/order seems to be the lessons from Kosciusko.


Byron Patching