Page 4246 - Week 15 - Tuesday, 20 November 1990
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
those areas, there have been a number of social problems. I think it is not Peter Harrison,s Y plan that has caused the problem, as some may suggest, but how that plan was implemented.
Mr Speaker, I would like to seek to offer my condolences to Peter and his family, and all the friends and others that knew him over the years. Mr Moore did speak to me about a certain suggestion which I did raise with the Chief Minister. I am sure that at some stage or other that will come up for consideration and I will certainly say my two bob,s worth. In closing, I would like to hope that all members of this Assembly will accept the debt of gratitude we owe to Peter Harrison as Chief Planner in the ACT.
MS FOLLETT (Leader of the Opposition) (3.36): I would like to associate the Labor members of the Assembly with this motion of condolence on the death of Mr Peter Harrison and to say, as other speakers have said, that Mr Harrison had a personal responsibility for many of the key features of Canberra as we know it today. He, in fact, led the team which developed the plan for separate towns and for the intervening open spaces - the Y plan, as it is usually known. It was his planners who were responsible for the town centres concept and the neighbourhood centres which provide community facilities close to the people who use them. Mr Moore has spoken of Mr Harrison,s perception of the ordinary people in the suburbs as having priority in planning and I think that priority is very much reflected in the work that he did.
Mr Harrison was also involved in developing the hierarchy of roads which we enjoy in the ACT and which in fact has made our roads the safest in the nation. So we certainly do owe him an enormous debt. Those of us who love Canberra must owe an enormous debt to Mr Harrison's work.
He was the Chief Planner for the NCDC from its establishment in 1958 until he moved to the Australian National University in 1967. Apart from his involvement in the planning of Canberra, Mr Harrison was also influential in developing the policies implemented by Labor's Department of Urban and Regional Development during the Whitlam years. Those of you who can remember back that far will remember what a ground-breaking exercise that was, and it was Mr Harrison,s views and opinions that led to much of that ground-breaking.
There is no doubt that the fact that we have here in Canberra a modern city with simple and human characteristics is a tribute to Peter Harrison,s expertise and his foresight as a planner. He was in fact a very fine example of what a public servant ought to be, and that is a true servant of the people.
Mr Speaker, when Mr Harrison retired from the NCDC the then Associate Commissioner, Mr Bob Lansdown, wrote on his retirement card a comment which I believe is a real tribute
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .