Back To the Future – North Arm Cove Initiative - implementing Circular Economy principles in creating sustainable, resilient, innovative precincts

There are two main areas of our research – past and future. Investigating one of the forgotten pearls of Australia’s planning past and conceptualizing its sustainable, regenerative future. This paper describes the ongoing project of “recycling” the plans prepared by Walter Burley Griffin a century ago, and creating an innovative precinct, based on Circular Economy (CE), through innovative, collaborative ways of doing urban planning. The paper presents the current state of the project and the results as of April 2022. Identification and analysis phases were conducted through the PESTEL analysis. Proof of concept phase was completed in collaboration with university/research institutions as well as various industry entities through the North Arm Cove Initiative.

Thus far, our research includes a proposed framework for achieving sustainable goals:

- sustainable, regenerative precinct for a resilient, smart community
- meaningful community participation in planning and governance
- circular supply chain for an urban community
- measurable performance and controlled impact of the community on the environment
- opportunities for implementing research in real life – innovation precinct

Key aspects of future planning and delivery of the precinct should be collaborative, comprising inclusive planning and governance, in line with a transition to Circular Economy. The new framework proposes continuous collaboration between research, industry, and community through the Sustainability Research Centre hub, that would define and govern the delivery of measurable outcomes on three bottom lines – social, environmental and economic – but also innovation/technology and aesthetics. The project is developed by the DESIM-R&D team for the community of landowners of North Arm Cove (NAC), heritage “paper subdivision” in New South Wales (NSW), Australia.