<
https://theconversation.com/the-case-for-degrowth-stop-the-endless-expansion-and-work-with-what-our-cities-already-have-187929>
"Australian cities are good at growing – for decades their states have relied
on it. The need to house more people is used to justify expansion out and up,
but it is the rates, taxes and duties that flow from land transfers and
construction that drive the endless development of Melbourne and Sydney in
particular. Property development is the single largest contributor to Victorian
and New South Wales government revenues.
For example, the City of Melbourne’s draft spatial plan proposes new suburbs to
the west and north. It’s continuing on a course mapped out in the
post-recession 1990s, when Australian governments focused on building on or
digging up our great expanses. The plan neither questions the rationale for
growth nor, apparently, the deeper effects of the pandemic.
The city council is understandably anxious to attract people back to the
centre. The city plan presumes a return to Australia’s high population growth
of the 2000s. Expectations of a renewed influx of students, workers and
tourists from overseas are based more on hope, however, than reason.
The drivers of population growth are more uncertain and we can no longer depend
on global mobility at pre-pandemic levels. Birth rates are falling across the
developed world, online international education is improving, and research
suggests pandemics will persist while cities encroach on the habitats of so
many other species.
Meanwhile, the towers thrown up in the heady years of growth are half-empty and
cracking, poorly ventilated, reliant on central air conditioning and not built
for more extreme weather or low energy consumption. Melbourne and Sydney’s
showcase regeneration projects at Docklands and Barangaroo are more dismal and
deserted than ever."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
