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By Jago Dodson, RMIT University.

Electric vehicles have been touted as the dream technology to solve our suburban transport challenges and rescue us from oil dependence and environmental threats. Yet technology use occurs in a social context. Almost no discussion of electric vehicles has addressed the uneven suburban social patterns among which electric vehicles might be adopted.

The <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1745-5871.12001/abstract">evidence</a> that my colleagues Neil Sipe, Terry Li and I have assembled suggests the socio-economic structure of Australian suburbia, in combination with the distribution of public transport infrastructure, constitutes a major barrier to the widespread adoption of electric vehicles, especially among the most car-dependent households.

Relying on electric vehicles as a solution to energy and environmental problems may perpetuate suburban social disadvantage in a period of economic and resource insecurity.

Australia’s five largest cities are the most car-dependent national set outside the United States. Our previous studies (Dodson and Sipe <a href="http://usj.sagepub.com/content/44/1/37.short">2007</a>; <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02673030802015619">2008</a> have shown that outer suburban residents, especially those with lower socio-economic capacity, are among those most exposed to the pressures of higher transport fuel prices.

Future transport fuel costs are likely to be even higher (currently oil is approximately US$100 per barrel). Unconventional oil sources such as shale or tar sands may be abundant, but they have much higher production costs than conventional light crude. Their current production boom is underpinned by expectations that global oil prices will remain high or increase further over the long term.

Higher oil prices and the need to constrain carbon emissions will likely lead to much higher transport fuel costs than have prevailed in the past decade.

Electric vehicles are often presented as the most likely way to resolve this transport conundrum. Australia’s 2012 <a href="https://theconversation.com/oils-well-in-the-white-papers-version-of-future-transport-10740">Energy White Paper</a> alludes to a transition to electric vehicles as the economy of conventional fuels wanes.

Much of the Energy White Paper and the rhetoric around electric vehicles assumes an unproblematic transition - consumers will change their behaviour in response to price pressures. There is little discussion of potential barriers and impediments to this comforting, convenient narrative.

It makes sense that households who are most car dependent and least able to afford higher fuel prices would be the most eager to switch to an electric car. But, it turns out, the social structure of Australian suburbia means these groups are poorly placed to lead such a transition.

In our study of Brisbane we created datasets linking vehicle fuel efficiency with household socio-economic status. <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1745-5871.12001/abstract">In our analysis</a>, high vehicle fuel efficiency, including hybrids, serves as a proxy for future electric vehicles. We linked motor vehicle registration data with the <a href="http://www.greenvehicleguide.gov.au/GVGPublicUI/home.aspx">Green Vehicle dataset</a> on fuel efficiency, plus travel and socio-economic data from the ABS Census.

Our analysis builds a rich picture of how the spatial distribution of vehicle efficiency intersects with suburban socio-spatial patterns, using Brisbane and Sydney as case studies.

We found that the average commuting distance increases with distance from the CBD while average fuel efficiency of vehicles declines. So outer suburban residents travel further, in less efficient vehicles, than more centrally situated households. Outer suburban residents are also likely to be on relatively lower incomes than those closer in.

The result is those living in the outer suburbs have relatively weaker socio-economic status but are paying more for transport. For example, one-third of the most disadvantaged suburbs in greater Brisbane also have the most energy-intensive motor vehicle use.

A socially equitable transition to highly fuel efficient or electric vehicles ought to favour those with the highest current exposure to high fuel prices. Yet our research finds it’s not likely to happen.

Outer suburban groups also own the oldest vehicles in the fleet - they can’t afford newer ones - and this also contributes to poor fuel efficiency and big transport bills. The newest most fuel efficient vehicles are more commonly purchased by wealthier inner-urban households. They can afford the car, but have less need of the efficiency because they don’t travel as far. If such patterns are applied to electric vehicles, their high cost and novelty status means they’re likely to also be taken up by this more advantaged group. Any subsidies offered to spur their uptake will be largely captured by the wealthy.

The implication of our analysis is that the intersection of new fuel and vehicle technology costs with the social and travel patterns in Australian cities mean that suburban households face continued socio-economic stress even as these new vehicles become more widely adopted in Australian cities.

So if new technologies such as electric cars aren’t the solution, how can we secure suburban households against higher fuel prices?

We need a sustained strategy to redress the grossly inequitable supply of public transport to our suburbs. We also need to decentralise our cities, getting jobs and services out into the suburbs and reducing the distances people need to travel by car.

Electric vehicles may be fantastic technology but they risk heading up a cul-de-sac of real suburban vulnerability.<img alt="The Conversation" height="1" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/12389/count.gif" width="1">

Jago Dodson receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility, Logan City Council, Springfield Land Corporation and Lend Lease Communities.

This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> in February 2013. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/electric-vehicles-wont-solve-the-suburbs-transport-woes-12389">original article</a>.

Lead image credit: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car" target="_blank">wikipedia</a> CC BY-SA 2.0
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theconversation

Electric vehicles won't solve the suburbs' transport woes

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By Chris Hale, University of Melbourne.

Public transport has a problem with money. Campaigners often argue that mass transit is a public good in its own right, and hence should be very cheap or even free.

Mainstream media and even many self-proclaimed supporters of public transport run <a href="http://www.news.com.au/finance/money/outrage-over-brisbane-transport-fare-hike/story-e6frfmd9-1226234890104">emotional stories</a> about fare increases, while governments offer “giveaway” fare policies that severely restrict transport revenue.

Trains and buses are widely derided as “lower-class” forms of transport, despite being one of society’s most important enablers for economic development and social engagement.

Together, these lines of thinking add up to a severe lack of funding for transport in Australian cities – both in terms of infrastructure investment and operating revenues.

Spending on public transport is routinely delayed, while <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/billions-spent-on-roads-in-8220hideously-inefficient8221-way-20140722-zvqcg">urban roads are given priority</a>. Meanwhile, the fluster over fares means that operators aren’t receiving the funds they need to deliver a good service.

Until we face up to these issues, the struggle to provide better public transport will be an uphill battle.

<h2>Learn from the successes</h2>

What do the world’s best mass transit networks have in common? They have fare structures that let them recover <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/http://www.worldtransitresearch.info/research/4353">a large proportion</a> (typically 75% or more) of their operating costs.

Designing a smart transport policy means accepting that there are limits to what governments can provide. So it’s best to use any available subsidy wisely. We should increasingly look to passengers to cover much of the cost of the transit services that benefit them directly.

We tend to think about fares in an illogical way. Australian <a href="http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/translink-fare-hike-to-make-brisbane-australias-most-expensive-20140103-30910">media reports bemoaning expensive fares</a> routinely cite the cost per trip, when they should quote the cost per kilometre.

For example, the much-maligned trip from the Gold Coast to Brisbane covers up to 80 km and costs A$14. Contrast that with the UK, where travelling the 71 km from London to Milton Keynes will cost you at least £18.50 (A$33.50).

I would suggest that Britain’s fares demonstrate a more realistic understanding of the limited resources available for funding rail travel.

<h2>Huge subsidies</h2>

In Australia, residents of outer suburban areas receive large subsidies for trips that would be rightly regarded as regional journeys overseas. Meanwhile, most passengers in Sydney, Brisbane or Melbourne who travel short hops of just a few kilometres get little or no subsidy.

This unbalanced approach distorts our ability to provide better services. There is little relationship between the price of tickets and the cost per kilometre of transporting those passengers.

At this point the argument becomes tangled. Self-proclaimed supporters of transit bang the table and shout that outer suburban travellers need to be given perks to stop them defecting to their cars.

But why should someone living in Broadmeadows, 16 km north of central Melbourne, receive less subsidy than someone from Frankston, 41 km southeast of the CBD? Distance from the CBD is not a proxy for disadvantage, nor for deservedness of subsidy.

Disadvantage should primarily be addressed through concession fare offerings and workable transit access, not by a crude system of frittering public resources on cheaper fares for long distances.

<h2>The real picture</h2>

It would be much better to attempt to devise a fare structure based on equality of subsidy, which reflects the reality of how much it costs to provide these services.

These are complex questions. Successful transport networks overseas treat them as such, but our state politicians continue to play <a href="http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/queensland-budget-2014-bus-train-and-ferry-fares-to-increase-less-than-expected-20140603-zrwlj">immature games with ticket prices</a>.

Recent examples include the move towards <a href="http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/melbourne-commuters-to-see-public-transport-fares-slashed-under-napthine-plan/story-fni0fit3-1226864736211">“free” CBD travel in Melbourne</a>, where it is far from clear that a majority of users want free travel anyway.

The Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal has <a href="http://www.ipart.nsw.gov.au/Home/Industries/Transport/Reviews/CityRail/Review_of_fares_for_CityRail_services_from_January_2013/23_Apr_2012_-_Released_Issues_Paper/Issues_Paper_-_Review_of_fares_for_CityRail_services_from_January_2013">recommended</a> that Sydney’s train network should be paid for by passengers – largely white-collar workers who want good service rather than cheaper fares – instead of by <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/minister-says-no-rail-fare-rise-without-upgrades-20120423-1xhh1">the wider public</a>.

But still the policy discussion focuses exclusively on “affordability”, while state governments bemoan their inability to fund transport upgrades. This shows a pretty poor grasp of basic infrastructure economics.

If we took a better approach to transport funding, we could deliver new projects much faster and more affordably. Analysis shows that asking the beneficiaries to pay for new services (“value capture”, to use the policy jargon) can cover <a href="http://www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/BuildingandPlanning/FutureGrowth/ExternalProjects/Pages/MetroProjectRailLink.aspx">25-50% of project costs</a>

Rather than throw A$9-11 billion at a single rail project in Melbourne, why not use value capture to deliver an entire suite of generational rail upgrades?

This approach has worked in mega-suites such as London’s <a href="http://www.crossrail.co.uk">Crossrail</a>. In Los Angeles' <a href="http://media.metro.net/projects_studies/30-10_highway/images/10-2085_ntc_3010_initiative_map.pdf">“30-10” initiative</a>, what was previously seen as 30 years' worth of transport infrastructure will be delivered in around a decade.

Melbourne could do a “30-12” and deliver <a href="http://ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/PTV/PTV%20docs/Melbourne-Metro/MM1-Patronage-Business-Case-Dec-2010.pdf">Metro One</a>, the <a href="http://ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/PTV/PTV%20docs/Melbourne-Airport/Melbourne-Airport-Rail-Link-Study-Overview.pdf">airport link</a>, and the <a href="http://ptv.vic.gov.au/projects/rail-projects/rowville-rail-feasibility-study">Rowville</a> and <a href="http://www.doncasterrailstudy.com">Doncaster</a> rail projects in a 10-12 year program, from that same A$10 billion consolidated revenue base - with the help of alternative funding approaches.

But this can only happen if we adopt the attitude to funding seen in many places overseas, and crucially, only if there is a genuine interest to see these rails programs realised.

This is where the real difficulty starts. As a specialist observer of transit projects and their funding, I believe that institutional roadblocks are our biggest problem in Australia.

If our leaders among government, the public service, and the transport industry didn’t actually want better mass transit, then fudging around on fare structures and capital funding options would be a really effective way to delay progress.

Conversely, if better transit is the biggest game in town, it’s time we got serious about it. To fix and expand our rail systems we need to get fares right and we need to diversify the funding mix - because there’s just no other way to get where we want to go.<img alt="The Conversation" height="1" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/27745/count.gif" width="1">

Chris Hale operates his own consulting business and this article is his last as an academic at the University of Melbourne. He has recently contracted to Melbourne City Council on the issue of transit funding, and in years past also contracted to the Cross River Rail and Sydney Metro projects on the same topic. He currently receives no research funding on this topic, but between 2009 and 2011 was the recipient of grants for research into mass transit funding from the Australian CRC for Rail Innovation. Chris has been the recipient of substantial in-kind support (such as access to data and availability of senior staff time) over many years on this topic from MTR of Hong Kong. 

This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/public-transport-has-been-let-down-by-our-reluctance-to-pay-for-it-27745">original article</a>.

Lead image credit: <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/https://www.flickr.com/photos/rykneethling/4542422773" target="_blank">Flickr</a> CC BY-SA 2.0
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Public transport has been let down by our reluctance to pay for it

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By <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/corinne-mulley-106">Corinne Mulley</a>, University of Sydney.

News of a new bus route will most likely be greeted with indifferent silence, but lobbying for a new train line can keep thousands of potential commuters busy for years on end. It seems that everyone loves rail!

In Australian cities, the answer to the question “how do we improve public transport?” is almost invariably, “with a rail project”. But why? Because, say supporters, rail will make it easier for commuters to get into the city to get to work.

This focus is misdirected for a number of reasons. First, it doesn’t make sense to decide on a mode of transport without having a serious discussion about how many people travel and where to.

We need separate figures on how many people want to make these trips now and how many are likely to want to make these trips in the future. Then we can think about mode.

Second, to focus on the CBD does not make sense. Increasingly, jobs are being decentralized because most governments have a land use policy which is building a hierarchy of centres within cities.

Third, a focus on the CBD when the CBD accounts for only a small proportion of jobs overall does not seem to be for the greater good.

In Sydney and Melbourne, approximately 10% of metropolitan employment is in the CBD; it’s over 20% in Paris and over 15% in Singapore.

Moreover, public transport has to do more than get people to jobs (although commuting is very important) - these other trips are not necessarily to or from the CBD.

In systems predicated on travel to the CBD it is often difficult to get from one side of town to the other.

In Sydney, for example, even where the best transport links exist it is difficult to go by public transport from the Inner West to the Eastern suburbs without changing and without it taking a long time.

In fact, these type of journeys often compete badly with the private car on travel time and on cost - public transport fares (especially when there is no integrated fare system) being much more than the running costs of a car.

To improve this situation, the first step is to consider where services now go, where people go, and where they would like to go.

If public transport links the places people want to go - where they go to work, shop, go to the doctor or take the kids to child care - public transport investment can start to shape urban growth as we build along transport routes.

Improvements which make it easier for more people to get where they want to go on public transport are the projects which we need to implement. These projects improve the lives of existing passengers as well as helping to get people out of their cars.

So how do you choose the right mode to get this job done? Public transport passengers want frequent, reliable and quick journeys. Rail services are perceived to do well on each of these characteristics because rail services usually have their own right of way, separated from other traffic.

Passengers think that modes that share the road with cars and freight - modes like trams and buses - will be delayed and slowed by other traffic, so they prefer trains.

But to prefer trains on this principle does not make sense: road-based buses can be given their own right of way, protected from other traffic.

They can be as fast or faster than commuter based rail - as demonstrated by the implementation of Bus Rapid Transit systems around the world of which the TransMilenio in Bogota is an excellent example.

A second argument is that the rail can carry more passengers than buses. This is not true.

In an urban context, light rail on its own right of way can have a service capacity of between 5,000 and just over 20,000 passengers per hour in one direction.

Brisbane’s South East Busway carries 15,000 passengers per hour, Bogata’s TransMelenio’s Bus Rapid Transit carries 45,000 passengers per hour.

No-one talks about how much cheaper road-based systems are. US evidence points to infrastructure cost for dedicated buses being approximately one third of light rail costs.

This means that for a fixed amount of money, you can have three times as much bus dedicated road space as rail. For many cities this could lead to transformational change. And in terms of running costs, rail might be cheaper in some cases but it is important to compare like with like.

As for emission costs, it all depends on the type of propulsion in use. Electric rail vehicles are cleaner than diesel buses but not significantly cleaner than electric buses. And no electric propulsion is clean if the electricity production is ‘dirty’.

Rail is often seen as being more permanent and leading to economic development benefits.

If permanence is what increases land value and provides greater economic development, then fixed infrastructure road-based bus systems, such as BRT, can provide this too (and the academic literature is beginning to show this is true).

So when might rail be sensible over a bus based system? If the existing network is wholly rail then building new connections to this system might be justified, rather than starting with a new technology for a link. But this is rare.

Most of the arguments in favour of rail stem from cultural differences.

Passengers often perceive buses are for poorer people and this influences how the community feels about buses. More time and money spent solving the cultural differences would be an effective way of ensuring that our public transport systems are improved with value for money enhancements and not by rail links imagined to be what the customer wants.

All this might come over as a lobby for the bus. It is not. It is a plea to consider carefully what the problem is and the most appropriate, cost effective solution.

There is little point to building a new rail link unless it significantly adds to travel opportunities or satisfies the travelling needs of passengers now or in the future.<img alt="The Conversation" height="1" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/45/count.gif" width="1">

Corinne Mulley does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has no relevant affiliations.

This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> in April 2011. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/getting-public-transport-right-means-less-emphasis-on-rail-45">original article</a>.
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Getting public transport right means less emphasis on rail

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By <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/robert-nelson-5122">Robert Nelson</a>, Monash University.

With technology changing the landscape of higher education, The Conversation is running a series “Re-imagining the Campus” on the future of campus learning. Here, Robert Nelson suggests university campus designs are not conducive to conversation and outdoor academic socialising.

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Universities are committed to gardening. Students and academics throughout the English-speaking world concur: we want more green and less wall, more grassy space and less concrete. The desire is reflected in what we see: lots of porosity in leafy beds and lawn, balanced by secluded bowers and intimate nooks.

Since the 19th century, universities in the English-speaking world have been designed without a street or piazza in mind. The idea was for each building to sit on its own grounds, irrespective of how little land was available, in imitation of a palace or monastery surrounded by fields and garden. The university was to be a world apart – a cerebral haven – without the throng of a city but rather an otherworldly calm.

This withdrawal from a surrounding community was facilitated during the expansion of universities in the second half of the 20th century. Land in the outer suburbs was cheap. The tradition of university as park was honoured and crowned with its logical extension: car parks, which discreetly surround the campus behind visual barriers of shrub.

<figure class="align-centre zoomable"><a href="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/39602/area14mp/zg29rbx7-1390350266.jpg"><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/39602/width668/zg29rbx7-1390350266.jpg"></a>

<figcaption>Monash University in Clayton has a extensive amount of flora and fauna around its large campus. Monash University</figcaption></figure><h2>What’s wrong with lots of green?</h2>

While there’s nothing wrong with nature as such, the pressure on open spaces to become “green” is difficult to manage and to reconcile with the throng of conversational bodies. Each corner of our campuses seems determined to become a garden, to the point that the contemporary campus is mostly a set of discrete buildings surrounded by garden and connected by paths.

The tragedy of this trend, which has enjoyed unquestioned growth for a century, is that the resulting spaces have no power to symbolise a community coming together for conversation. Internationally, the progressive gardenisation of academic space has denied the presence of a concourse or piazza and has weakened the relationship between architecture and surrounding space. <a href="http://youtu.be/INS316tgCoM">Examples</a> can be found on any campus near you, where visual and pedestrian access to buildings is restricted, and so, too, is the amount of space suitable for walking on. It is almost as if a building is so disgraceful that it has to be hidden; and people potentially milling around have to be moved along. Even when spaces were originally designed in sympathy with human assembly, they are often reinterpreted with gardens to lessen the likelihood.

Because contemporary campus design discourages human assembly, it discourages conversation, which is the soul of socialised learning. We can learn anywhere: in a lounge-room chair, in the local library or on the kitchen table. If there’s any point in having a physical campus it is to socialise one’s developing knowledge, which is <a href="https://www.aacu.org/liberaleducation/le-sp01/le-sp01bennett.cfm">learning through conversation</a>. Outdoor space can be a powerful symbol of gathering for such purposes, but the opportunity is largely passed up in favour of gardening.

<h2>Campus design should reflect universities' aims</h2>

The trend in contemporary education is to unburden classes of content, which could be transmitted online, and to open up the university experience to more conversation, where students develop and practise their learning with peers and tutors. While the academic trend is toward conversation, campus design turns its back on conversation.

The qualities that symbolise community and facilitate conversation have been cultivated in towns for hundreds of years. They are, above all, the concourse and the courtyard, two features that are either unrecognised by architects or annihilated by landscape architects. Some, although few, universities have courtyards but the way that they’ve been interpreted kills their purpose. They’ve been gardenised into social passivity.

Central to this unsociable layout is a major aesthetic institution, long hallowed in English-speaking countries, the lawn or campus green. Irrespective of size, lawns fail to express a sense of community and seldom facilitate the congress of people. The aesthetic usually takes precedence over its possible use as an area of congregation. Often little strings and fences, elevated beds and changes of level and other features are contrived to keep people off the grass.

The truly community-friendly vegetation is the tree. Compatible with foot traffic and pavement, sight lines, gatherings and processional space, the welcome shady tree also has genuinely eco-friendly properties, because it simultaneously produces oxygen and archives carbon. However, trees are seldom exploited for their urbanistic sympathies but are planted scenographically as a simulacrum of nature, as if part of the bush or park rather than pavement.

As the university campus increasingly shuns urbanism, the consequence is a downgrading of outdoor verbal exchange, because people move busily along paths rather than hang out in courtyards.

For misguided aesthetic reasons larded with weak ecological sentimentality, contemporary university landscaping demotes conversation, which is the reason many people come to campus in the first place. Following <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/http://www.planning.org.au/documents/item/3512">structurally misanthropic</a> trends in architecture and town planning, university design displaces people from its conversational heart.

Robert Nelson receives funding from the OLT.

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Read other articles in this series <a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/reimagining-the-campus">here.</a><img alt="The Conversation" height="1" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/21514/count.gif" width="1">

This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/gardening-against-learning-how-campus-design-kills-conversation-21514">original article</a>.

Lead image credit: <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/https://www.flickr.com/photos/linghansnow/4608305540" target="_blank">flickr</a>, CC BY-SA.
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Gardening against learning: how campus design kills conversation

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By <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/carolyn-whitzman-9944">Carolyn Whitzman</a>, University of Melbourne.

Three shocking incidents, in which three children and one adult died, have dominated the news in Melbourne earlier this year. On Easter Sunday, Indiana and Savannah Mihayo were murdered in their grandparents' home in Watsonia. In April, Fiona Warzywoda was murdered on a busy Sunshine shopping street in front of her son. And in February, Luke Batty was murdered on a cricket field in Mornington.

These tragedies have three things in common. First, the alleged murderers appear to be men who were intimate partners or fathers of the victims. Second, the killings grabbed public attention at least in part because two of the incidents happened in public, instead of the “privacy” of someone’s home, and all involved children. Third, the families lived in outer suburban “struggle towns”.

These murders have once again thrust the often hidden issue of domestic violence to the fore. In Australia, intimate partner violence is the <a href="http://www.vichealth.vic.gov.au/Programs-and-Projects/Freedom-from-violence/Intimate-Partner-Violence.aspx">biggest health risk to women aged 15 to 44</a>. In the first national survey of violence against women in Australia, <a href="http://www.adfvc.unsw.edu.au/PDF%20files/Statistics_final.pdf">almost one in four women</a> who had ever been married or in a de facto relationship experienced violence at some time in that relationship. Of women who had experienced partner violence since the age of 15, 36% per cent <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/BN/2011-2012/DVAustralia#_Toc309798379">reported violence during pregnancy</a>; 18% experienced domestic violence for the first time while pregnant.

If strangers committed this violence, the public and politicians would probably be demanding tougher sentencing, tighter parole, more police, more CCTV. But it would be far too costly to “lock up and throw away the key” every man who has ever threatened his wife and children – that would be hundreds of thousands of men across Australia. It would also be unrealistic to deny every father with a history of violence any access to their children.

<h2>Risks rise in outer areas</h2>

Unlike the stereotype of criminal violence being concentrated in the big bad central city, rural areas and outer suburbs have <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/BN/2011-2012/DVAustralia#_Toc309798384">higher rates of domestic violence</a> in every Australian state. Luke Batty was murdered in an urban fringe area with <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/rural-families-at-greater-risk-of-domestic-violence/2006/05/21/1148150124452?page=2">one of the highest police-reported rates of domestic violence</a> in Victoria. Other <a href="http://www.whittleseacommunityfutures.org.au/media/FV%20Fact%20Sheet%201%20-%20Taking%20Action%20on%20Family%20Violence%20FINAL.pdf">urban fringe areas such as Whittlesea</a> in Melbourne’s northern suburbs record much higher rates than other parts of the city.

<figure class="align-right"><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/46792/width237/xg8pmwgy-1398141300.jpg"><figcaption>Many outer suburbs lack refuges for victims of domestic violence.
Tony Phillips/AAP</figcaption></figure>Outer suburbs concentrate three types of risk. Women who are pregnant or have young children are most at risk from male partners and often find it most difficult to escape violence. While housing stress is no excuse for violence, it does exacerbate family tensions and lack of affordable housing makes it more difficult for women to get away from abusers.

And outer suburbs are critically <a href="http://www.pilch.org.au/Assets/Files/Dividing%20Walls.pdf">lacking in the kinds of social support services</a> – health, legal, emergency shelters, family counselling – that might make a life-and-death difference.

Yet, according to several recent reports, federal funding for these services – housing in particular – <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-30/kevin-andrews-homeless-funding-extended-115m/5354654">has been cut</a>. Federal funding under a homelessness prevention initiative (most homeless women are victims of violence) <a href="http://whwest.org.au/west-womens-services-risk-without-funds/">was due to run out in June</a>.

A recent report on unmet needs of women who are homeless as a result of domestic violence identified <a href="http://www.pilch.org.au/Assets/Files/Dividing%20Walls.pdf">legal aid shortages in many places</a>, including Mornington. Funding for <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/domestic-violence-victoria-calls-for-funds-20140417-36uw8">risk assessment panels</a>, which might help identify the most concerning cases of men committing domestic violence, is also uncertain.

<h2>Good urban planning saves lives</h2>

According to <a href="http://www.nwph.net/nwpho/Publications/Protecting%20People%20Promoting%20Health%20Web.pdf">international research</a>, wrap-around services for women and children at risk of violence from the men in their lives, and for men seeking help for their violence problems, can save lives.

If local schools and health services identify violence and risks of further violence; if legal aid, specialised court services and counselling (including the capacity for supervised visits with children) can be provided conveniently and compassionately; if emergency housing and housing assistance allow women who have pressed charges to stay at home with additional security or move to a secure location without overly disrupting their children’s lives, then there is a better chance that domestic violence will not lead to further tragedy.

At present, we are allowing very high rates of growth in outer suburbs, without the critical infrastructure people need to live healthy and safe lives. Schools, health and social services, and emergency housing need to be provided, just as much as water, sewers, roads and rubbish collection.

In residential areas that are already service-rich, more affordable housing needs to be provided so that poorly serviced outer suburbs are not the only choice for young families. Co-ordination of service planning with land use and transport planning has never been more necessary.

While these measures are not “quick-fix” solutions to a complex and deep-set health and social problem, they are needed in the long term to prevent unnecessary death and suffering.<img alt="The Conversation" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/25811/count.gif" style="height:1px; width:1px">

Carolyn Whitzman has received funding from the Australian Research Council on preventing violence through integrated local planning.

This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/better-urban-planning-can-reduce-the-tragedies-of-domestic-violence-25811">original article</a>.

Lead image credit: <a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Berwick,_Victoria#mediaviewer/File:Berwick_August_2007.JPG" target="_blank">Wikipedia</a>
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Better urban planning can reduce the tragedies of domestic violence

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By <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/peter-newman-1858">Peter Newman</a>, Curtin University; <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/garry-glazebrook-14190">Garry Glazebrook</a>, University of Technology, Sydney, and <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/jeff-kenworthy-15708">Jeff Kenworthy</a>, Curtin University

There is a major rail revival around the world, including light rail, metro rail, heavy rail, and high speed rail. At the same time car use has peaked and is in decline in most cities. However transport planning, especially in major Australian cities, continues to plan for expansion of road capacity and cannot understand this rail fetish. Why is there a reversal in the historic transport patterns?

<h2>The global rail revival</h2>

In Europe, 65 cities built new or expanded light rail systems between 1980 and 2007; 160 European cities have light rail. Metro rail systems have also been added or are under construction in many of the larger European cities. Europe has also rapidly expanded its network of high speed intercity rail lines.

In Asia, with little rail tradition, the trend is even more obvious. Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Manila, Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Seoul and others have added rail, including metros, monorails and light rail systems. India is building metros in 14 cities; China in 82. China has also built the world’s largest high speed rail network in the last 15 years.

Perhaps the biggest surprise has been the growth of rail in the Middle East where cheap oil meant the car was king. Doha is building extensive rail. In Saudi Arabia, bidding is underway for Riyadh’s metro network. In Dubai, a 108 km metro with 39 stations and an integrated light rail and bus system is largely completed. A metro is planned for Kuwait.

The trend is also very obvious in the US, Canada and Australia where car-dependent cities, once only considered suitable for suburban bus transit, are now <a href="/news">seeing a rail-based future</a>.

The number of light rail systems in the US has grown from 15 in 1995 to 29 currently. Light rail is emerging as the mass-transit core in medium size but relatively low density cities such as Portland (Oregon, USA) Edmonton (Alberta, Canada) and the Gold Coast (Queensland, Australia). In larger and higher density cities such as San Francisco, Toronto or Sydney, light rail is emerging as a secondary system to support heavy rail and metro.

<figure><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/17438/width668/vn94bqgj-1352420365.jpg"><figcaption>Rail is spreading all across Asia and the Middle East. Nadir Hashmi</figcaption></figure>Light rail is emerging in small cities - there are now 118 cities with less than 150,000 people who have adopted light rail.

<h2>Out of cars, on to transit</h2>

Transit patronage in the US is now 23% higher than in 1993, and growing faster than car usage. The growth has been particularly strong since about 2003, and has continued since 2008.

All of the growth in patronage since 1993 has been on rail-based modes. Rail modes have increased their shares of total patronage, particularly heavy rail (from about 25% to 35% of the total); bus share has significantly declined from 65% to 50%. The patronage on light rail has increase rapidly from a relatively small base of 168 million to 481 million over the same period.

Public transport patronage is <a href="http://www.eco-logica.co.uk/pdf/wtpp17.2.pdf">growing faster than car usage</a> in virtually every major city in Australia, and car usage per capita is now falling in many cities.

The highest growth is in the suburban rail systems in Perth, suburban and light rail growth in Melbourne and suburban rail and bus use in Brisbane.

<h2>What is behind these trends in urban rail?</h2>

The 100-year growth of automobile use in cities appears to have <a href="http://www.eco-logica.co.uk/pdf/wtpp18.4.pdf">plateaued and then declined</a> across the world’s developed cities. In the US, in the age group from 16 to 34, <a href="http://www.uspirg.org/reports/usp/transportation-and-new-generation">car use decreased 23%</a> between 2001 and 2009. Transit use went up 100%, walking 37% and biking 122%.

These are remarkable numbers and suggest a much deeper transition is happening than simple supply and demand based on previous elasticities.

<figure><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/17433/width668/5q34wn9d-1352419699.jpg"><figcaption>Perth residents are piling on to rail like never before. Kelvin Tan</figcaption></figure>Car use in developed cities changed in 2004 when oil reached $US80/barrel and dropped significantly when it went to $140 in 2008. Though Australian cities were buffered from much of the GFC, a significant decline in car use per capita has continued from 2004 to the present. Those Australian cities that provided new rail infrastructure grew substantially in transit patronage; those that did not remained static.

Such data suggest that fuel prices and availability of rail are likely to be part of the mix of explanations.

But <a href="/">urban</a> structure, urban culture and urban economy may provide further explanations.

<h2>Urban structural limits</h2>

After years of traffic speeds increasing, all the world’s cities have now plateaued or declined.

European cities have calmed traffic, built cycle-ways and transit and backed away from large freeways. Average traffic speeds have stopped growing. The cities of Asia and the Middle East have also hit the wall on their average traffic speeds.

Most projections of car use suggest that major global growth in car use will occur in the emerging cities of China and India and the Middle East, though data is hard to obtain. But the urban fabric of dense Asian cities is such that little space for car use exists. The remarkable growth in urban rail in China and India suggests that these cities may have hit the wall much sooner than occurred in European cities and certainly far sooner than American cities.

The cities of America and Australia grew mostly in the era when cities were built for automobiles; they are about five times less dense than European cities. Space for car use is much more available. Car ownership and car use grew to a much higher level but is now plateauing and declining. They have reached a limit on the growth of freeways and other urban space (such as parking) for cars, so average traffic speeds have plateaued or reduced.

The urban structure or fabric of the city has prevented any further growth in car use. The only way forward seems to be with alternative transport, especially urban rail.

<figure><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/17435/width668/wsdxg24h-1352420022.jpg"><figcaption>Younger people want to live in places where they can walk and cycle, not drive. Frans de Wit</figcaption></figure><h2>Urban cultural and economic change</h2>

As car-use declined, the biggest change in the economy has been the digital transformation and the consequent knowledge/service economy. It has been a concentrating force in terms of city structure and fabric. The knowledge economy and digital jobs are focused in city centres where creative synergies between people occur. Old CBDs have been transformed back into functional walking cities. Those that do it best have <a href="http://www.publish.csiro.au/pid/6370.htm">attracted the most capital and young talent</a>.

Young people want to reduce car use and switch to alternative transport. On transit or walking, young people are already connected by their smart technology phones and tablets; these are illegal to use while driving. The mobile phone is a <a href="http://www.uspirg.org/reports/usp/transportation-and-new-generation">far more important device than a car</a> for younger people. Baby-boomers gained freedom and connection with a car. Gen Ys don’t need one.

Younger people are also moving to the parts of cities where walking or transit dominate, because these have the kind of urban experience and culture <a href="http://www.creativeclass.com/rfcgdb/articles/new%20urban%20news.pdf">they aspire to</a>. They feed the market that enables the rail revival and city centre renewal to continue.

Urban structural limits and cultural and economic change feed the move to rail. If a city doesn’t provide rail infrastructure, it can easily miss out on this important social and economic change. The biggest threat is if car dependent cities do not recognise that the golden age of the car is over.<img alt="The Conversation" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/10377/count.gif" style="height:1px; width:1px">

Garry Glazebrook is a member of UITP (International Union of Public Transport), Australasian Division.

Jeff Kenworthy does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has no relevant affiliations.

This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> in December 2012. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/all-aboard-the-growth-of-global-rail-and-our-future-cities-10377">original article</a>.

Lead image credit: <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/https://www.flickr.com/photos/s13n1/10416420066" target="_blank">Flickr</a>, CC BY-SA
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All aboard: the growth of global rail and our future cities

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By <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/tan-yigitcanlar-119434">Tan Yigitcanlar</a>, Queensland University of Technology
Bringing together knowledge and innovation has become an increasingly important consideration for urban planners as they grapple with the expansion of a knowledge economy and its implications for economic competitiveness.
Inspired by Silicon Valley, <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2012.11.005">knowledge-based urban development</a> has become a widespread goal since the 1970s. Fostering precincts that concentrate on “<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09654313.2013.814621">knowledge generation and innovation</a>” has become a priority for many cities all across the globe.
Beyond Silicon Valley, other global successful examples of urban knowledge precincts include Silicon Alley in New York, Silicon Roundabout in London, Orestad in Copenhagen, Brainport in Eindhoven, and one-north in Singapore.
In Australia, the Australian Technology Park in Sydney, Parkville Knowledge Precinct in Melbourne, and Kelvin Grove Urban Village in Brisbane are certainly emerging urban knowledge precincts.
<figure class="align-centre"><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/48819/width668/hnwryr8h-1400466498.jpg"><figcaption>Sydney’s Australian Technology Park is spread across 14 hectares. Threthny/Flickr, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/" rel="nofollow">CC BY-NC-SA</a> </figcaption></figure>Some Australian cities <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eswa.2014.03.032">perform well compared to global knowledge cities</a>. Where Sydney and Melbourne enjoy the top-tier position with Boston, San Francisco, Helsinki, Toronto, and Vancouver, Brisbane follows them behind in the second-tier group with Birmingham and Manchester.
Nonetheless, even Sydney as a “global city”, <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2008.01.001">Melbourne as a “knowledge city”</a>, and <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02690940802197358">Brisbane as an emerging “world city”</a> have not yet fully utilised their potential to build successful urban knowledge precincts.
And besides <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09654313.2010.512163">Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane</a>, there is limited knowledge-based urban development practice in other Australian cities.
<figure class="align-centre"><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/48831/width668/4qmtz74p-1400470629.jpg"><figcaption>The Orestad precinct in Copenhagen includes housing. Wojtek Gurak/Flickr, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/" rel="nofollow">CC BY-NC</a> </figcaption></figure><h2>
	Why confine innovation to a precinct?</h2>
<a href="http://search.informit.com.au/documentSummary;dn=356227700529143;res=IELHSS">A recent study</a> that explores overseas and Australian urban knowledge precincts argues knowledge generated from these centres of excellence or islands of innovation should diffuse to the rest of the city.
<figure class="align-centre"><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/48820/width668/9pyxfvph-1400466562.jpg"><figcaption>Precincts like London’s Silicon Roundabout bring people together in multiple venues. Alper Cugan/Flickr, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/" rel="nofollow">CC BY</a> </figcaption></figure>Cafes, restaurants, cultural, sports and entertainment venues, and outdoor activities also bring together like-minded knowledge workers and provide an opportunity for exchange of their tacit knowledge.
In other words, the proximity of knowledge industries to each other means they don’t act only in isolation, but are at the centre of the whole network of innovation that runs through the city.
“<a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/13673270810902902">Urban knowledge precincts</a>” often have two general objectives. The first is to play an incubator role nurturing the development and growth of new, small, high-technology firms, facilitating the transfer of university know-how to tenant companies, encouraging faculty-based spin-offs, and stimulating innovative products and processes.
The second objective is to act as a catalyst for regional economic development that promotes economic growth and contributes to the development of the city as a “<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eswa.2014.02.005">knowledge city</a>”.
<figure class="align-right"><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/48822/width237/7rgnwq5t-1400466648.jpg"><figcaption>Singapore’s one-north is a 200 hectare research and business park. We_like_it/Flickr, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/" rel="nofollow">CC BY-NC-ND</a> </figcaption></figure>While world-class infrastructure and networks provide the pull factor for investment, urban vibrancy does the same for talent. These precincts are formed either organically like Silicon Valley or planned such as <a href="http://www.edb.gov.sg/content/edb/en/why-singapore/ready-to-invest/setting-up/business-location/one-north">Singapore One-North</a>.
In either case, the most successful precincts generate a spill over effect to the rest of the city or region. A good example for this is the<a href="http://www.22barcelona.com/index.php?lang=en">22@Barcelona</a> precinct, which brought together the rich cultural heritage of Barcelona and local and international talent and investment to form a knowledge generation atmosphere at the redeveloped old industrial area located adjacent to the Olympic Village.
<h2>
	More work required</h2>
<figure class="align-left"><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/48824/width237/fyhp267b-1400467231.jpg"><figcaption>22@Barcelona is one of Europe’s largest urban regeneration projects. kodakhrome/Flickr, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/" rel="nofollow">CC BY-NC-ND</a> </figcaption></figure>For over three decades, Australian governments have been half-hearted in attempts to diversify the economy by aiming for a move towards knowledge economy. Partnerships that bring together public, private and academic sectors are required.
<a href="http://www.kgurbanvillage.com.au">Kelvin Grove Urban Village</a> is one such partnership involving the Queensland University of Technology, Queensland Department of Housing, and Creative Enterprise Australia. The idea is to have a vibrant village atmosphere where living, working, playing and learning are integrated, with “creativity” at the centre.
Although these three-way partnerships are an ideal method for developing knowledge precincts, in most cases public sector leadership and initiatives are needed to encourage the private sector.
Policymakers need to consider the increasing competition from other cities to attract investment and talent. A sustainable competitive strategy will require the private sector, academia and public to work together.<img alt="The Conversation" height="1" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/24290/count.gif" width="1">
Tan Yigitcanlar does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has no relevant affiliations.
This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/valleys-alleys-and-roundabouts-innovating-beyond-a-precinct-24290">original article</a>.
Lead image credit: Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0
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Valleys, alleys and roundabouts: innovating beyond a precinct

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By <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/scott-mcquire-125252">Scott McQuire</a>, University of Melbourne.

If you’re in Melbourne or Sydney over the next couple of weeks, you can enjoy the nightly transformation of some familiar urban landmarks. How should we understand this growing global enthusiasm for spectacular urban illumination?

Tonight in Sydney, the Opera House will again become an urban canvas for <a href="http://www.vividsydney.com/events/lighting-of-the-sails/">Lighting The Sails</a>, now an established part of the annual <a href="http://www.vividsydney.com/">Vivid</a> festival (May 23-June 1). Instead of reflecting the harbour’s ambient light, the sails will be shrink-wrapped with a large-scale video projection created by <a href="http://59productions.co.uk/">59 Productions</a>, the team responsible for the video design of the London 2012 Olympic <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4As0e4de-rI">Opening Ceremony</a>.

<figure><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/photo-11_2.jpg" rel="gallery-all" title="Flinders Street Station at White Night Melbourne 2014 - image © Michael Smith"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-580px" height="368" src="/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_580px/public/pictures/article-images/photo-11_2.jpg?itok=w467FTrx" title="Flinders Street Station at White Night Melbourne 2014 - image © Michael Smith" width="580"></a>

<figcaption>White Night Melbourne, February 2014.Michael Smith</figcaption></figure>In Melbourne in June, a new interactive light-based installation <a href="http://www.fedsquare.com/events/radiant-lines-by-asif-khan/">Radiant Lines</a> by renowned London-based light artist <a href="http://www.asif-khan.com/">Asif Khan</a> will open in Federation Square as part of its long-running <a href="http://www.fedsquare.com/events/the-light-in-winter/program/">Light in Winter</a> festival.

Radiant Lines is a sculpture comprising 40 rings of raw aluminium suspended in space and illuminated by hundreds of LED lights pulsing in a rhythm that mimics bioluminescence. As visitors approach, they are able to trigger new patterns that immerse them.

Urban illumination projects of this kind are increasingly popular, not only for festivals such as Vivid, Light in Winter, <a href="http://enlightencanberra.com.au/">Enlighten</a> in Canberra and various “<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Night_festivals">White Nights</a>” around the world, but for all kinds of transformations of urban space — both temporary and permanent.

New forms of public and commercial lighting, large-scale projection, urban screens and media facades have profoundly transformed the look and ambiance of cities around the world. In Hong Kong, the city’s skyscrapers even perform <a href="http://www.tourism.gov.hk/symphony/english/details/details">a nightly choreography of light</a>.

<figure><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/hk_light_show_anita_ritenour_flickr_cc_by_sa_20.jpg" rel="gallery-all" title="Hong Kong Light Show, image source Flickr."><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-580px" height="381" src="/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_580px/public/pictures/article-images/hk_light_show_anita_ritenour_flickr_cc_by_sa_20.jpg?itok=fRu24hLb" title="Hong Kong Light Show, image source Flickr." width="580"></a>

<figcaption>Symphony of Lights, Hong Kong. Flickr, Anita Ritenour</figcaption></figure><h2>A short history of lighting cities</h2>

While much urban lighting has a functional dimension, there is a long history of lighting cities for spectacle and pleasure. Gas-lit Paris was proclaimed the world’s first “city of light” in the 1820s. From the 1870s, World’s Fairs regularly showcased new developments in electric lighting, paving the way for the twentieth century “electropolis”, as cities such as Chicago, Berlin and New York came to be defined by the intensity of their illumination.

The “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eHfWwSIjuI">bright lights, big city</a>” of which Jimmy Reed sang in the 1950s became a dominant image of the modern city, establishing a new rhetoric of urban space in which lighting for productivity and security was overtaken by lighting for spectacle, mood and advertising.

<figure><a class="colorbox" href="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/49198/area14mp/4dvvfwyw-1400722612.jpg" rel="gallery-all" title="Source: Curtis Perry"><img alt="" src="https://62e528761d0685343e1c-f3d1b99a743ffa4142d9d7f1978d9686.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/files/49198/width668/4dvvfwyw-1400722612.jpg"></a>

<figcaption>Curtis Perry</figcaption></figure>For a century, urban lighting depended on incandescent bulbs and various fluorescent tubes, such as the neon tube that became synonymous with advertising from the 1920s.

The current explosion of urban illumination projects has been sparked by a range of new technologies, including the maturation of digital projection systems, light-emitting diode (LED) video screens and LED lighting from the mid-90s.

The capacity to computer program LED lights down to the individual pixel means that lighting designers can create complex sequences and rhythms, such as the light narrative designed by Bruce Ramus, former lighting designer for rock luminaries U2, that plays on the LED skin wrapping Melbourne’s AAMI Park stadium.

Bringing computer-aided design together with high-precision large-scale digital projection has also created the distinctive new art form of projection mapping. Projection mapping enables real structures, such as the curvaceous Sydney Opera House, to be transformed into a screen on which images can play without distortion.

<figure><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="343" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/o5ZvCv7yUKk?wmode=transparent&amp;start=0" width="100%"></iframe>

<figcaption>URBANSCREEN lighting the Sydney Opera House, 2012.</figcaption></figure>Precise integration of mutable light with material structures can result in astonishing contemporary retakes on the old son et lumière show, as solid buildings seem to come alive through virtuoso combinations of light and shadow. For Lighting the Sails in 2012, German company <a href="http://www.urbanscreen.com/">URBANSCREEN</a> took the sails metaphor of Utzon’s famous structure literally, using projection mapping to make them appear to undulate and ripple.

<h2>Public space debate</h2>

New lighting technologies inevitably raise new questions about access and control over public space. The complexity and cost of large-scale projection mapping means it requires the deep pockets of large festivals. But it is also becoming an increasingly common promotional tool for high profile commercial events.

<figure><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/vivid_sydney_flickr_pavel_cc_by_sa_20.jpg" rel="gallery-all" title="Sydney Opera House at Vivid Sydney 2011 - image source Flickr"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-580px" height="387" src="/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_580px/public/pictures/article-images/vivid_sydney_flickr_pavel_cc_by_sa_20.jpg?itok=uCsLyaQi" title="Sydney Opera House at Vivid Sydney 2011 - image source Flickr" width="580"></a>

<figcaption>Sydney Opera house at Vivid Sydney 2011 <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/https://www.flickr.com/photos/blueriotriver/5794841347" target="_blank">Flickr, Pavel</a></figcaption></figure>Lighting the modern city has always had a strong commercial bias, and has been a key factor in tilting the contemporary city towards becoming a “brandscape”, a spectacle that is consumed rather than inhabited in other ways. However, new technologies can carry other possibilities for public communication.

<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" scrolling="no" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/6E8V_Re8UyU" width="100%"></iframe>

The Helix Tree installation (video above) that <a href="http://www.ramus.com.au/">Bruce Ramus</a> designed for Light in Winter in 2013 lit up in response to people singing. Light became a medium for congregation and collective public participation.

There are also myriad examples of “unauthorised” illumination projects around the world, variously termed digital graffiti, photon bombing and mobile guerrilla projection.

During the Occupy Wall Street phenomenon in 2011 artists projected “99%” and “Occupy Together” right across the front of buildings such as City Hall. And predating Lighting the Sails was the memorable guerrilla projection in 2006 of the “We are all boat people” logo on to the Opera House sails.

More than ever before, lighting has become integral to debate over public space.<img alt="The Conversation" height="1" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/26449/count.gif" width="1">

Scott McQuire was part of an ARC linkage project, Large-screens and the transnational public sphere 2009-2013, in which Fed Square P/L was one of three industry partners.

This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/let-there-be-light-behind-the-trend-of-illuminating-cities-for-art-26449">original article</a>.
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Let there be light: behind the trend of illuminating cities for art

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By <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/brendan-gleeson-9823" target="_blank">Brendan Gleeson</a>, University of Melbourne.
The old German saying <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadtluft_macht_frei">Stadt Luft Macht Frei</a> (“urban air makes you free”) is the defining injunction of modernity. Modern western cities were launched as the vessels of liberation from a human era darkened by power and enchantment.
The link between the urban and the urge for emancipation goes back to much earlier times. And to other parts of the globe, what we know today as the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent. In its primordial, post-Neolithic forms the city was the expression of that most basic freedom, from natural necessity, from subsistence and endless toil. City walls protected, and thus freed, their populations from wilder human compulsions, for acquisition, dominance – for war.
Later, in Classical Antiquity (the ancient Greek and Roman eras), the city expressed a deepening political imagination and a strengthening instinct for collective expression and development, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Res_publica">res publica</a>. New cultural flows followed the courses of urbanisation. In <a href="https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm">Marx and Engels'</a> memorable words, cities “rescued a considerable part of the population from the idiocy of rural life".
The city was the escape raft from a life of servitude and grubbing. Modernisation has, however, failed miserably on many accounts and in many quarters.
For the German sociologist <a href="http://www.ulrichbeck.net-build.net/">Ulrich Beck</a> and his colleague <a href="http://www.gsi.uni-muenchen.de/personen/professoren/grande/">Edgar Grande</a>, globalised modernity hums with <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/9780470670590.wbeog113/abstract">urban disenchantment</a>, especially amongst “those for whom cosmopolitanism is not a lifestyle choice, but the tragic involuntary condition of the refugee or otherwise dispossessed”.
The “wild impulses” of market expansion, political ambition, and cultural aspiration have driven an ever urbanised modernity towards the precipices of risk, uncertainty and self-doubt. Second modernity is nothing less than “a historically new, entangled Modernity which threatens its own foundations.”
<h2>
	Disasters show cities are vulnerable</h2>
The city, a powerful beacon of hope and opportunity through modernisation, is now indissolubly linked to natural risk and human endangerment. Urban sustainability researchers Mike Hodson and Simon Marvin of the University of Salford <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/http://www.mcgraw-hill.co.uk/html/0335237304">highlight</a> the “dual and ambivalent role of the city, as both a victim and cause of global ecological change."
A series of natural and human catastrophes in recent years have underlined the vulnerability of cities to sudden endangerment. The sources of urban crisis are both endogenous and exogenous – a tsunami or flood being an instance of the former; a resource system failure (water, power) representing the latter.
The 2011 tsunami that devastated Japan’s highly urbanised coast exemplified how endangerment can unfold in a series of catalysing exogenous (tsunami inundation) and endogenous (nuclear plant failure) shocks that drive human threats to precarious scales – especially when potentially lethal technological systems are disrupted. Global warming will vastly increase the tempo and power of these natural furies.
Following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, New Orleans, mythically loved city in the world’s richest nation, descended into anarchy — no less than a time of civic terror. The internal fragility of western modernity is tested further by enemies that wage their war from within. Second modernity is countered by Islamist (and other) counter-modernities that use cities as terrifying stages to attack Western assertion.
<h2>
	Cities in the Anthropocene</h2>
The urban age defines what some scientists now call the <a href="https://theconversation.com/human-global-domination-began-with-fire-not-factories-or-farms-20317">Anthropocene</a> – an epoch dominated in its latter stages by modern <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prometheism">Prometheanism</a>.
The Slovenian cultural critic <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/jun/26/slavoj-zizek-living-end-times">Slavoj Žižek</a> rejects the naturalism inherent in many scientific renderings of the Anthropocene; viz., the idea that “because humans constitute a particular kind of species they can, in the process of dominating other species, acquire the status of a geologic force."
He counters that “this shift from Pleistocene to Anthropocene is entirely due to the explosive development of capitalism and its impact.“ It is the universal threat to existence that now binds humanity for the first time as a "species”, not the potency that generated the crisis.
Beck and Grande offer: “When a world order collapses, that’s the moment when self-reflection should begin.” Reflexivity is taken as birth cry of the second modernity. And yet, this compelling injunction of the time echoes wordlessly in a post-political age. No common cause, or new dispensation, has emerged to arrest epochal decline or to assay global threat.
It seems evident that rapid, epochal global change is not conducive to human deliberation about “common dangers”. At least not to now. Where are the stirrings of the “natality” that the influential political theorist <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannah_Arendt">Hannah Arendt</a> has <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Human_Condition_(book">promised us</a>? What stands against the tide of endangerment? It is surely collective will that must arrest the slide to disaster. In the face of power and its many arrogations, the human right to a good destiny must be reasserted.
<h2>
	But cities our only hope</h2>
The city, the new human heartland, is where this battle for human renewal must be joined. It can and must be won. The consequences of loss are unthinkable, indeed as yet unknowable. The city air must once again nurture the cause of human realisation. To restore human prospect, Homo urbanis must dismantle its own work, the material and ideological apparatuses of Promethean modernity.
They must be held to account through critical scientific interrogation and brought to heel by politics. Where to begin? So much of contemporary modernity seems like dangerously flailing pieces of machinery, uncoupled to wild play by a disintegrating industrialism.
The collapsing natural order surely points to first priority, a political economy that is hard wired for growth. It is a death machine that endangers Homo urbanis and all that depends upon us.
This article is an adapted extract from <a href="http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415816120/">The Urban Condition</a> by Brendan Gleeson.<img alt="The Conversation" height="1" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/26292/count.gif" width="1">
Brendan Gleeson receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/cities-are-failing-to-cope-with-global-challenges-26292">original article</a>.
Lead image credit: <a href="http://chrisriedy.me/" target="_blank">chrisriedy.me</a>
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Cities are failing to cope with global challenges

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By <a href="http://theconversation.com/profiles/andrew-lynch-7000">Andrew Lynch</a>.
The Commission of Audit has not flinched from making a <a href="http://www.ncoa.gov.au/">tranche of bold recommendations</a> to the Abbott government, but nothing in its report trumps the call for the Commonwealth to withdraw from areas that were once essentially state responsibilities, including education and health.
This would be nothing less than a major recalibration of Australia’s federal system, reversing decades of steady centralisation. The attractions of such a course are obvious, with the costs and inefficiencies of government duplication and overlap having long been well documented.
But we have seen the dawn of a “new federalism” fail to rise several times before. There are two reasons to be sceptical about the Commonwealth going along with the reforms necessary to realise the Commission of Audit’s vision.
First, there is the matter of money. Australia’s distorted federalism has come about through the Commonwealth gradually expanding its tax base to the diminution of that of the states. The states have become increasingly dependent on Commonwealth funding grants to meet their responsibilities.
The Commission of Audit reports that “around one-quarter of the Commonwealth budget” goes towards funding the states. This amounts to about 40% of state revenue and almost half of the money granted to the States is tied, meaning they come with conditions set by the federal government.
The Commission of Audit recognises that if real power in key policy areas – expensive ones at that – is to devolve back to the states then the Commonwealth needs to free up the states' taxing potential. It recommends the states get a cut of the income tax levied in their respective economies.
Since the Commonwealth takeover of income tax in 1942, Malcolm Fraser has been the only prime minister who offered the states a chance to reclaim some of this ground – although they saw political dangers in the model proposed. When Bob Hawke appeared to get too close to fiscal reform of federalism, it gave Paul Keating the opportunity to topple him as party leader. History suggests the Commonwealth is very comfortable with its financial dominance.
This is largely due to the second factor that prompts scepticism: the contemporary political culture in Canberra. Federal parliamentarians have long ceased to show any regard for the constitutional division of power when they see a potential for gaining some electoral capital.
While Labor has traditionally been no friend of Australia’s federal system, an interventionist approach now pervades the political spectrum. John Howard ended his prime ministership pleading the case of “aspirational nationalism” in order to save a hospital from closure in Tasmania. In his book <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/https://www.mup.com.au/items/120931">Battlelines</a>, Tony Abbott essentially argued for constitutional amendment so that the Commonwealth might overrule State governments on any issue as the wish took it.
There is a greater likelihood of positive reaction to the Commission of Audit’s broad call for a culture of “competitive federalism” among the states themselves. This echoes the stance of the current crop of state premiers, such as Queensland’s Campbell Newman, who have been frustrated by the smothering effects of the Commonwealth agenda dressed up as “co-operation” at the Council of Australian Governments (COAG).
The institutional architecture to ensure that competition will lead to innovation and best practice across the states and to overall national benefit already exists in the form of the COAG Reform Council (the CRC). As a result of the <a href="http://www.federalfinancialrelations.gov.au/content/intergovernmental_agreements.aspx">2008 Intergovernmental Agreement on Federal Financial Relations</a>, the CRC monitors and reports on the performance of states in meeting mutually agreed national targets. The data produced illuminates which states are leading the pack in any “competition” between them.
The commission has, however, highlighted the swift derailing of the aspirations of the 2008 agreement. This was due to the Commonwealth being unable to refrain from policy intrusion into state affairs through the habitual making of new tied grants to the states. The commission’s recommendation that these be reduced in line with opening up income tax revenue to the states makes a great deal of sense.
But, as a consequence, the Commission of Audit calls for the abolition of the CRC, saying the reduced work that would be required after rationalising Commonwealth-state agreements could be performed by the Productivity Commission. It is a shame that the CRC is in the firing line because the Labor government that designed the federal compact of 2008 managed to sabotage its own achievement.
Although the CRC’s agenda is seen as the result of Kevin Rudd’s push for “co-operative federalism”, it is not responsible for the negative consequences of centralisation and administrative complexity. These stemmed from the way the Commonwealth went on to conduct federal relations.
There is a strong argument to retain the CRC with its direct experience in benchmarking state performance. Achieving the reinvigoration of federal-state power-sharing in Australia is an ambitious goal. A body dedicated to evaluating the results of federal reform would seem worth keeping.<img alt="The Conversation" height="1" src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/26176/count.gif" width="1">
Andrew Lynch has received funding from the Australian Research Council for research on constitutional law and federal reform.
This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/will-the-commission-of-audit-lead-to-another-new-federalism-26176">original article</a>.
Lead image credit: <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/https://www.flickr.com/photos/39551170@N02/8215959691" target="_blank">Flickr</a>, CC BY-SA 2.0
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Will the Commission of Audit lead to another 'new federalism'?

The residential transformation of St Kilda Road is set to continue into with more new apartment plans for the sought-after boulevard.

Wing Tai Asia has lodged plans for a major residential tower at 464-466 St Kilda Road, replacing the former VACC House with an 18-storey mixed-use development designed around a retained heritage podium and a sculpted contemporary tower.

The proposal, prepared under Victoria’s Significant Residential Development with Affordable Housing pathway, would deliver 325 apartments and ground-floor retail across the prominent 4,653 sqm boulevard site in Melbourne’s St Kilda Road North Precinct.

The project centres on the adaptive reuse of the site’s heritage-listed VACC Building, an eight-storey office designed by Bernard Evans that has occupied the address for decades. Planning documents state the development would involve “carefully dismantling and conserving off-site the original metal fabric of the podium visible from St Kilda Road,” before reinstating it as the defining frontage of the new scheme.

Above the restored podium, Wing Tai is proposing a curvilinear residential tower. The scheme includes 172 one-bedroom apartments, 63 two-bedroom apartments, 66 three-bedroom apartments, and 24 four-bedroom apartments, alongside two ground-floor food and beverage tenancies fronting St Kilda Road.

The tower has been designed with substantial articulation and variable setbacks to minimise perceived bulk and maintain view corridors along the boulevard. Urbis, which prepared the planning report, said the design “has been significantly articulated through a curvilinear design” with “an interplay with materials, façade expression and depth” to create visual separation and visual interest.

The proposal also includes 254 basement car spaces, landscaped pedestrian links connecting St Kilda Road and Queens Lane, and a biophilic landscape strategy featuring canopy trees, raised planters, cascading greenery and a glass oculus pool overlooking the eastern frontage.

Planning documents confirm the $270.1 million development will contribute 3 per cent of project costs to the Social Housing Growth Fund as part of the application process.

Wing Tai acquired the St Kilda Road property in 2018 alongside Abacus Property Group for $95.38 million, before later consolidating ownership of the site. The property previously served as the Victorian Automobile Chamber of Commerce headquarters for around 60 years.

The transformation of the St Kilda Rd boulevard is already beginning to materialise, with a number of high-profile projects recently completed, launched, or approaching launch as developers continue to back the long-term appeal of the precinct.

Among the most notable recent completions is Louise by Samuel Property Group, just off the strip on Queens Lane, the same pocket Hirsch &amp; Faigen recently launched The Queensbury. Mirvac is too on the same street with The Albertine, which is approaching completion.

Dexus recently secured approval for its slice of St Kilda Road, while Gurner also has approved plans for the precinct.

Joel Robinson

Wing Tai unveils 325-apartment St Kilda Road tower on former VACC House site

Malaysian developer <a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/developers/s-p-setia">SP Setia</a> is the latest to jump into St Leonards booming Transport Oriented Development precinct.

The developer, which has previously delivered Sapphire by the Gardens apartment development in Melbourne, identified the Atchison Street site in 2023. It filed a Scoping Report around 12 months ago, and now has revealed the designs for the new&nbsp;40-storey mixed-use tower.

The State Significant Development Application covers <a href="https://next-portal.urban.com.au/projects/14650/summary">20-22 Atchison Street</a>, a 1,374 sqm site positioned between St Leonards Station and the new Crows Nest Metro station.

Designed by <a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/architects/cox-architecture">COX Architecture</a>, the project would deliver 181 apartments, above a four-storey commercial podium, five basement levels, and new public domain works along Mitchell Street. The apartment mix comprises 35 one-bedroom apartments, 39 one-bedroom-plus-study apartments, 85 two-bedroom apartments, and 22 three-bedroom residences.

The proposal has been lodged as a shop-top housing development under the NSW Government’s TOD planning pathway, which allows increased density around key transport infrastructure. The site sits within the recently rezoned Crows Nest Accelerated TOD Precinct.

<img alt="First look: SP Setia targets St Leonards skyline with 40-storey TOD tower" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="b799673d-48e2-46b0-801a-0e33a9330100" src="https://s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/inline-images/atchinson%20site.png?VersionId=dPh0UfwfaHpbFL1R7H1cbZNbIW0CHbCC" />

SP Setia acquired the Atchison Street site as part of its continued expansion into the Australian apartment market. In comments made to City &amp; Country (The Edge Malaysia) in 2023, SP Setia President and CEO Datuk Choong Kai Wai described the acquisition as “a strategic move” aligned with the group’s post-pandemic market recovery strategy.

“Our target for this exceptional development is local and overseas buyers, including first-home buyers, downsizers and investors,” Choong said.

The tower has been designed as a slender vertical form rising from a mixed-use podium, with COX Architecture positioning the development as a response to the evolving St Leonards and Crows Nest skyline.

“The purpose of the project is to facilitate the delivery of high-quality housing at a strategically located site and deliver a built tower outcome that is consistent with the desired future character of St Leonards and aligns with the TOD controls,” the design report stated.

<img alt="First look: SP Setia targets St Leonards skyline with 40-storey TOD tower" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="b1a85eee-76f7-436c-a6da-73ba827b9b13" src="https://s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/inline-images/atchinson%20entry.png?VersionId=dA9jHGPMcm.dDbwk4QfxqWiY5bfh3UVt" />

The podium would incorporate retail uses fronting Atchison Street, commercial tenancies, landscaped communal areas, and pedestrian improvements along Mitchell Street. Vehicle access and loading would be consolidated via Atchison Lane.

Residents would have access to more than 665 sqm of communal indoor and outdoor spaces, while the development proposes 96 parking spaces across five basement levels.

The proposal also includes a commitment for 10 per cent of residential floor space to be allocated toward affordable housing through a monetary contribution.

COX said the tower form responds directly to the emerging high-density character of the precinct while seeking to maximise solar access, cross ventilation, and outlook from apartments.

<img alt="First look: SP Setia targets St Leonards skyline with 40-storey TOD tower" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="2163f85c-f63b-4be3-aafa-f8763976cec5" src="https://s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/inline-images/Article%20Feature%20Image%20%28Grid%29_5.png?VersionId=WiAmtIKJ6.ZQ41EtYEQ1fol7AeorKBlL" />

“The building is orientated towards north,” the Apartment Design Guide compliance report noted, adding that the tower’s slim form was driven by the constrained inner-urban site dimensions.

The design also incorporates landscaped setbacks and communal open space at podium level, intended to soften the interface with surrounding streets and improve pedestrian amenity.

The project adds to a growing wave of redevelopment proposals reshaping St Leonards and Crows Nest following the opening of the Sydney Metro City line and the NSW Government’s push for higher-density housing around major transport nodes.

Last week Stockland filed plans just down the road. They want to build a <a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/new-apartments/601-pacific-highway-st-leonards-nsw-2065">52-storey tower on Pacific Highway</a>.

Read more:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/news/nsw/first-look-stockland-plans-52-storey-538-apartment-st-leonards-tower">First look: Stockland plans 52-storey, 538-apartment St Leonards tower&nbsp;</a>

First look: SP Setia targets St Leonards skyline with 40-storey TOD tower

<a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/developers/urban-property-group">Urban Property Group</a> has revealed plans for a new mixed-use tower at 10 Dangar Street, Wickham, advancing a proposal that would reshape the southern gateway to Newcastle’s city centre with one of the city’s tallest residential buildings.

The State Significant Development proposal, now on exhibition, seeks approval for a <a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/new-apartments/bowline-10-dangar-street-wickham-nsw-2293">43-storey tower</a> immediately adjacent to the Newcastle Interchange. The project would deliver around 200 apartments, including 42 affordable housing dwellings, alongside 99 co-living units, a 171-room hotel, retail space, and new public domain integrated through the site.

The scheme marks a significant escalation of plans previously approved for the site. Urban Property Group took over the prominent 2,904 sqm parcel, where excavation and demolition had already commenced under an earlier consent for a 14-storey mixed-use development.

<img alt="First look: Urban Property Group unveils Newcastle’s next supertower at Wickham interchange" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="58a96dd9-407f-4d20-86b4-94e4bfeef74b" src="https://s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/inline-images/wickham%20podium.png?VersionId=LGlf08pdFGAZDzvx_CXC4XakHNZRuEE0" />

Designed by <a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/architects/sjb-architects">SJB</a>, the tower has been conceived as a landmark transit-oriented development anchored to the Newcastle Interchange precinct. The proposal includes 245 build-to-sell apartments across a mix of one, two, and three-bedroom residences, as well as two penthouses. Fifteen apartments and one operational unit are earmarked for NDIS housing. The co-living component would add a further 99 units, while the podium would accommodate retail uses and hotel facilities.

SJB said the site presents “a valuable opportunity to anchor the precinct by setting the standard for design, active ground planes and character at the key southern gateway.”

The architecture responds directly to the site’s position beside major transport infrastructure and within one of Newcastle’s fastest-evolving urban renewal precincts. The tower form sits above a sculpted podium designed to frame new public spaces, including a through-site pedestrian link connecting Station Street to Hannell Street, landscaped plazas, and activated retail edges.

<img alt="First look: Urban Property Group unveils Newcastle’s next supertower at Wickham interchange" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="a7bd6ff0-f7db-4ce8-a6dc-ea56e72c6149" src="https://s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/inline-images/wickham%20lanne.png?VersionId=xzf39VADyhj7zBQY2I9fx9vI62u2tuSb" />

The design report describes the project as part of the broader transition of Wickham into “a vibrant, high-quality mixed-use urban precinct” that leverages proximity to the station, open space, and regional connectivity.

A detailed public art strategy has also been prepared for the development. The strategy positions the project as “a transit-oriented development of state significance at the gateway to Newcastle’s city centre” and outlines a series of integrated artworks responding to Newcastle’s industrial and transport heritage.

Creative Road’s curatorial framework for the project, titled Unveil, draws on “stratified surfaces, carved volumes, and light-filled apertures” while referencing Newcastle’s transformation from an industrial city into a contemporary education and technology hub.

<img alt="First look: Urban Property Group unveils Newcastle’s next supertower at Wickham interchange" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="77a882bb-14b1-4d28-99ff-9438e39508c0" src="https://s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/inline-images/wickham%20site.png?VersionId=cevgo_vN0eKPK78P8YcEu3mKPLkpFqE7" />

The proposal is being advanced through the NSW Housing Delivery Authority pathway after being declared State Significant Development in June 2025. The accompanying scoping report states the development aims to “maximise the site’s proximity to the Newcastle Interchange by delivering transit-oriented development” while increasing housing supply and affordable housing provision within the Newcastle LGA.

Urban Property Group’s plans align with the long-term strategic vision established under the Wickham Master Plan, which identified the interchange precinct as suitable for substantial uplift in height and density. The current proposal would significantly intensify that vision, positioning the tower among the tallest developments proposed for Newcastle.

The site sits immediately north of the Newcastle Interchange, bounded by Dangar Street, Hannell Street, and Charles Street. It is surrounded by a rapidly growing cluster of residential towers and mixed-use projects that have emerged following the completion of the light rail and transport interchange.

First look: Urban Property Group unveils Newcastle’s latest tower at Wickham interchange

Bottega House has completed settlement of a landmark riverfront site in Macquarie Street, St Lucia, representing its first major Brisbane development.&nbsp;

Positioned on the banks of the Brisbane River, the <a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/new-apartments/180-macquarie-street-st-lucia-qld-4067">premium site at 180 Macquarie Street</a> features uninterrupted river frontage in one of Brisbane’s most tightly held residential precincts.&nbsp;

The proposed development, currently under assessment with Brisbane City Council, has been designed by <a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/architects/plus-studio">Plus Studio</a> with interiors by <a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/interior-designers/mim-design">Mim Design</a> and will deliver a boutique collection of premium residences positioned specifically for owner occupiers and downsizers.&nbsp;

The residences are set to redefine luxury apartment living in the area, with a focus on architectural quality, refined finishes, landscape integration and elevated amenities including curated wellness facilities, resort-style pools and recreation spaces rarely seen in the local market.&nbsp;

Exclusive sales for the project will be led by Keenan &amp; Byrne, ahead of an anticipated launch later this year.&nbsp;

Bottega House Managing Director Nick Malloch said the project reflects the group’s ambition to deliver a highly curated residential offering within one of Brisbane’s most tightly held precincts.&nbsp;

“This is an incredibly rare riverfront opportunity and one we have approached with a long-term perspective,” Malloch said.&nbsp;

“Our vision from the outset was to create a boutique collection of residences that feel more like private homes than traditional apartments, with generous proportions, refined finishes and exceptional amenity throughout."

Malloch says there is a&nbsp;lack of premium owner-occupier stock of this quality in the market, particularly for downsizers wanting space, privacy and a true lifestyle offering without compromise.&nbsp;

"Demand is expected to be strong given the scarcity of premium riverfront opportunities of this nature within Brisbane’s inner-west."&nbsp;

Bottega House secures landmark riverfront site in St Lucia 

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The arrival of the first piling rig officially marks the commencement of construction at SIERA’s new beachside apartment development, Exhale, in Northcliffe.

<a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/new-apartments/exhale-surfers-paradise-8-enderley-avenue-surfers-paradise-qld-4217">Exhale</a>, a glass-encased tower featuring 54 large-scale apartments at 8 Enderley Avenue, is SIERA’s third Gold Coast development. It follows the recently completed PIPIS Bilinga beachfront project, which achieved suburb-record prices, and the soon-to-be-completed Chevron Island development, Tapestry.

[smartcode_project:default project_id=112661 project_image_fid=359603]

<a href="https://www.apartments.com.au/developers/siera">SIERA</a> Founder and Managing Director Brent Thompson said the arrival of the piling rig represented a significant milestone for the development, which is scheduled for completion in late 2028.

Over the next month, around 260 piles are expected to be installed as work progresses on the basement structure. The building is anticipated to rise above ground level early next year, before unveiling its sculptural glass curtain wall, developed in collaboration with specialist façade engineers.

“The façade was designed to maximise panoramic coastal views while creating a distinctive architectural identity,” Thompson said.

[smartcode_project:default project_id=112661 project_image_fid=355935]

Designed by BDA Architecture, Exhale will comprise just 54 two- and three-bedroom residences across 26 levels, a level of low-density living rarely delivered in this beachside pocket between Surfers Paradise and Broadbeach.

The project has been conceived as a resident-only building, with no short-stay accommodation permitted. SIERA says the model is intended to appeal to long-term owner-occupiers rather than transient holiday demand.

[smartcode_project:default project_id=112661 project_image_fid=361052]

Residences have been designed with large-format layouts and expansive glazing, with most apartments featuring more than 30 metres of glass frontage to maximise natural light and ocean views.

The amenity offering spans two levels and centres on wellness and lifestyle, including a heated magnesium pool, sauna, yoga and Pilates studio, gymnasium, private dining facilities, cinema lounge, and dedicated surfcraft storage.

[smartcode_project:default project_id=112661 project_image_fid=359607]

More than half of the apartments have already sold. SIERA has also opened a sales gallery for Exhale at its Chevron Island commercial premises, near its Tapestry tower and the site of its second Chevron Island apartment development, which is slated to launch in early 2027.
</section>
</section>

[smartcode_project_cta:default project_id=112661]

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