Monday, November 25, 2013

Melbourne Planning Debacle

A report released by the Federal Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics underlines just how inadequate and incompetent Melbourne’s recent planning has been.

The report analysed population growth, jobs growth and commuter flows in Australia’s four largest cities. It found:

1)    Melbourne was the only city in which jobs growth in the outer suburbs had failed to keep pace with the population boom. Parts of outer Melbourne now have less than one job for every three working people, forcing residents to commute further for employment.

2)    Eighty-four per cent of outer Melbournians drive to work, the highest level among Australia’s biggest cities, and just 9% use public transport.

Monash University Professor of Public Transport Graham Currie said any city growing in population without expanding public transport was planning for decline. He said “the future cupboard of public transport projects is looking bare” and that “If population grows by 25% but services remain essentially static, we have a per capita decline of 25 per cent in service levels. We are not responding to growth. Rather we are going backwards”.

This report reveals as a fraud the idea that Melbourne’s rapid population growth is okay. Jobs are far removed from homes, and workers are not using public transport, leading to traffic congestion, long commutes, and reduced quality of life for everybody – a planning debacle.
 
It’s all very well to say that what is needed is better planning, but expanding the urban growth boundary and high rise and urban consolidation have both given us the outcomes we have today. The better planning never happens, and it won’t as long as Melbourne’s population continues to grow by 200 a day, 1500 a week, 75,000 each year.

2 comments:

  1. Kelvin THANK YOU speaking up against this uncontrolled population explosion which is threatening to swamp Australia (already suffering drought and driving rain that includes large hailstones and strong winds!) and the WORLD.

    Thinking back 50 years, when I first started work, there were enough jobs so that one could leave an unsatisfactory job; by the time my sister, 9 years younger, left school SHE HAD TROUBLE GETTING A JOB! Now? Overcrowding, long waiting lists, unemployed, poverty, mental and physical illnesses, road rage, violence which sounds very much like the 'rats in a bottle syndrome'; there are too many for the resources and the liveable space - we are smothering the Earth!

    ReplyDelete
  2. It's not just Melbourne, it's everywhere I've lived. (3 countries and far too many towns and cities.) As far as I can tell, urban planners mainly plan to push population growth. The last time I had correspondence with an urban planner I was told to squeeze into a smaller space (increase density).

    Bah! If there is one thing I really really resent, it's paying property tax to hire these clowns.

    ReplyDelete