Place, identity and community conflict in mixed-use neighbourhoods: The case of Kings Cross, Sydney

Abstract

This thesis examines the role of urban planning processes in managing community conflict. Mitigating community conflict is one of the central arguments for robust planning systems, so shortcomings need to be identified and understood. Using the case study of Kings Cross, Sydney, the research demonstrates how the planning concept of ‘the mixed-use neighbourhood’, and in particular its inherent contradictions, permeate into the construction of the identity of this particular neighbourhood. Through media analysis and a series of stakeholder interviews, these contradictions are shown to prevail beyond planning discourses, and that they are central to community conflicts in the case study. By framing community conflict as the contestation of the neighbourhood’s identity, it is revealed that these conflicts do not always lie between social and economic objectives of planning policy (and so residents and businesses) as is assumed by many stakeholders. Instead, it is argued to lie between the underlying spatial dimensions to the constructed identity: whether the ‘self-contained neighbourhood’ or the ‘well connected neighbourhood’. The thesis concludes that the influence of ambiguous concepts on community conflict stems from fact that pursuing consensus in participatory planning practices comes at the expense of clarity. Importantly, when subsequent planning decisions fail to meet stakeholders’ expectations, community support for planning and urban governance structures are weakened.