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Section 7(c) provides for the “...maintenance and
enhancement of amenity values” in a general sense,
and does not specifically provide for the recognition
of a particular category of landscape (e.g., amenity, or
visual amenity landscape) in the way that section 6(b)
refers to outstanding natural landscapes.
The identification of amenity landscapes has been
one response to section 7(c), but the maintenance of
amenity is a much broader issue and can be addressed
by a range of planning techniques, including zoning
and design guidelines (e.g., QLDC’s Gibbston Character Zone). An implication of the last question is the
suggestion that amenity landscapes, as we understand
them, are neither healthy nor resilient.
But how do we understand ‘health’ and ‘resilience’ in
the context an amenity landscape anyway?
Health and resilience may be the antithesis of some
amenity landscapes. Some sustainable landscapes (if
that is what we are to understand by healthy and resilient) are not tidy landscapes. Our ideas of amenity as
applied to landscapes may well have to change if health
and resilience are our goal. We may make better progress towards protecting what we value if we examine
our assumptions and define our concepts and objectives more clearly: what image of the countryside - and
what concept of amenity - do we have in mind when
we plan or design for health and resilience?
4. What is the role of rural character in an assessment and evaluation of natural character values – is it
relevant and if so, to what extent?
Two issues arise from this question: (1) the relationship between landscape character, rural character and
natural character, and (2) the language we apply in
discussing these concepts.
I shall address the second issue first: character - any
type of character - is a term requiring a descriptive
rather than an evaluative response. Values are sets
of beliefs and ideas that inform assessments (evaluations) of worthiness, and as such they exist in our
minds, and not the environment. Natural character is
a descriptive attribute of the landscape – an aspect
of the broader concept of landscape character - independent of whether or not it is valued by particular
communities of interest or society generally. The assessment of natural character involves rating degrees
of natural character (with reference to a scale) but not
evaluating the worthiness of whatever level of natural
character is assessed. A consideration of values does
not enter into assessments of natural character, and
any suggestion that it does arises from the uncritical
- careless, even - use of the term ‘natural character
values’.
Turning to the question of the role of rural character in natural character assessment, it is more correct to understand natural character as a descriptive
aspect (or dimension) of rural character, or landscape
character generally, than the other way around. In
landscape assessment it is more relevant to consider
how natural a rural landscape might be, than
Mackenzie Basin