The New Zealand Planning Institute’s Back to the Future Conference is on next week in Auckland and our Urban Planning & Environmental Services team are excitedly counting down the days until they can come together with New Zealand’s planning community and share their latest insights and thinking.

As Gold sponsors of the conference, we are looking forward to catching up with delegates at our exhibition stand in the Owens Foyer. We will have some pretty snazzy giveaway items and one lucky delegate will take home a Nikon Coolpix L830 digital SLR camera courtesy of MWH! If you are attending the conference, come and meet the team at our stand and we’ll let you know how easy it is to enter the competition.

In addition to sponsoring the conference MWH also has a number of amazing presenters! Check below for the speakers and times.

PARALLEL SESSION 1: Wednesday 15 April: 1.30-3.15pm

1B The Future of Smarter Cities

• Adapting practice to achieve City 2.0 – how recent graduates are changing the nature of planning and what can be done to accommodate them - Megan Couture, MWH Global

Megan’s presentation will explore the benefits and issues around the use of technology in planning practice, and will explore how planning practice can accommodate the knowledge and skills of the next generation of planners, including the effects of social media and technology on planning.

1F Changing Planning Framework – Planning and Regulatory (supported by Auckland Council)

• The evolution of designations - Andrew Cumberpatch and Chris Scrafton, MWH Global

Andrew and Chris’s presentation will explore the application of the RMA in practice with respect to designations, how it this practice has evolved over time and what the various impacts on a range of stakeholders are.

• Local Government Reform – Development Contributions - Steve Kerr, MWH Global

Steve’s presentation will focus on providing tools and approaches to take into account the Local Government Amendment Act No.3 changes to the development contributions provisions and policy including:
-Improving the performance with respect to the local authority funding of infrastructure through Development Contributions.
-How the issues of housing affordability can be accounted for in the preparation of a development contributions policy.

PARALLEL SESSION 2: Thursday 16th April – 1.30-3.15pm

• Transforming techniques for community engagement - Selwyn McCracken and Emma Monk, MWH Global

Selwyn and Emma’s presentation will explore how web-based tools and open data are transforming how organisations communicate and innovate, providing a fantastic opportunity to improve engagement with broad audiences across varying issues and interests.

We look forward to seeing you at the conference.