Common Planning Fallacies #5

Tony Cooke has been thinking about more planning fallacies. Here's the fifth installment:

Fallacy #5: "We don’t need to worry about excessive growth because the lack of water will be the controlling factor."

Tony's comment: "This is wishful thinking. Our (temporary) limited water supply might subdue growth for a short while. Engineers and developers are creative and intelligent. Huge cities (like Phoenix) have been built in the middle of barren deserts. Water conservation, increasing our water supply from the mountains, and extracting water from the lake, are comparatively simple things to do. The greatest pressure on the ALR will come because developers will covet the water which agriculture presently uses."

What do you think? It seems like council is embracing the water issue and pushing for more aggressive growth rates than the town has had before. Also see #1, #2, #3 and #4.