Oh what tangled webs we weave When with old policies we ourselves deceive.
And with an acknowledgement to the author of the original verse, that could be the lament of the Planning Department as it struggles to come up with a new zoning plan for our increasingly derelict industrial districts.
The latest proposal is 'clean industrial' in which suitable industrial land would be available for office and commercial uses as well. It is not at heart a bad idea. Our economy has made a transition from manufacturing to services and our land use should reflect this as well. With very little dedicated office space being built at the moment why not convert some of the industrial land to office use? But again the idea has begun to founder on difficulties led by that all-encompassing one that we regulate land use more by lease conditions than by zoning and charge people lease conversion premiums when we allow them more lucrative uses for their land.
What premiums will we charge industrial land owners if we upgrade the uses to which we allow them to put their land? Will it be worth their while to make the change? Will entrepreneurs who still have viable industrial operations want to? They are apparently not sure about it yet, although, of course, they generally like the idea of being given more latitude. But they have many other questions and the answer to them so far is that more studies and surveys must be undertaken. Let your correspondent suggest an alternative as a pilot project.
Our system of land premiums is an archaic one with fundamental flaws that have inflicted some of the world's highest property prices on us while still leaving us short of the space we require.
As just one example of it in the non-residential uses now in issue, the chart shows you that in 1982 we were issuing building approvals for 15 times as much floor space on an annual basis as we are now doing relative to the size of our economy.
Let's choose an old industrial area we want upgraded to something new and abandon the lease premium system there. We shall regulate it loosely by zoning, tightly by planning permission for individual buildings and compensate the public purse for use of public land by an annual land tax rather than by lease premium.
