How to Make the First Home Buyer Grant Work

It is clear that the Rudd government has given housing affordability a prominent place in its agenda. The government’s efforts to reduce infrastructure fees on the fringe of Canberra are surely a step in the right direction, since such fees are, along with urban consolidation land rationing, responsible for destroying housing affordability.

In further pursuit of housing affordability, the Rudd government has announced plans to increase the first home owner grant from $7,000 to $21,000 for new houses. The reviews are not nearly so positive, however. Some experts, including ANZ Bank Chief Economist Saul Eslake see a risk that the program will simply increase house prices. This would, of course, simply neutralize the effectiveness of the first home owner grant.

While there is no disputing the good intentions of the government, Eslake and other critics are probably right. Any infusion of money into the housing market is likely to increase prices, simply because the supply of new housing is so strictly and artificially rationed by severely restricting the release of new housing land. If there is one thing that economics makes clear, it is that rationing leads to higher prices. And, there have been few better examples of that principle of economics in action than the stingy land use policies that are in operation in virtually all of the nation’s major urban areas.

State governments, and in some cases local authorities, have fitted a tight noose around existing urbanization, despite the fact that more than 99 percent of the nation remains rural --- not developed. As a result, new homes are not being built at a sufficient rate and those that are being built are far too costly. For example, in recent years, house construction on the fringe of Sydney has been at 1950’s levels. The problem is that Sydney and the nation have far more households to serve than half a century ago but there has not been enough land made available on which houses can be built. Without the normal market supply of inexpensive new housing on the urban fringe, there is no way for house prices to go on the fringe but up, as the larger first home buyer grant leads to higher prices.

The problem of first home buyer affordability needs to be addressed at its root. The Great Australian Dream was made possible by building housing on cheap urban fringe land. The cost of the land on which the houses were built was little more than its agricultural value plus the cost of providing streets and utility connections (most of that included in the developer’s price). If today’s land use planning policies had been in effect, much of suburban Australia would not have been built, there might not have been a Great Australian Dream and the nation would be less affluent. Affordable new housing on the fringe is beyond reach until law, regulation and policy allow it to be built, Canberra’s money or not.

Probably no nation in the world has been more driven by egalitarianism and the hope for a better life for all than Australia. In that pursuit, generations of Australians have worked hard to better the future for those that follow.

But, more recently, radical land use policies have begun to extinguish this most attractive of Australian values. Restrictive land supply policies such as urban consolidation have made housing so expensive for up-and-coming households that many will never participate in the Great Australian Dream, unless fortunate enough to inherit their homes (how un-Australian can you get?). What is even more troubling is that these radical policies were adopted, without the slightest consideration of their likely longer term social or economic consequences. Indeed, some academic and planning elites scorn the likes of western Sydney from their upper-middle-class perches, unmoved by the reality that places like western Sydney had much to do with making Australia an inclusive nation of hope.

Few reforms could more restore the promise of Australia to younger households and immigrants than to abandon the radicalism that has virtually banned low cost housing on the urban fringe. In such an environment, larger first home buyer grants would also make housing more affordable.

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Wendell Cox is principal of Demographia, St. Louis (USA), co-author of the Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey and a visiting professor at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers in Paris.

The Tenth Scalp

Save Our Suburbs has been fighting over-development for 9 years. We have challenged the Government to show their high-density policies, which are so devastating to local communities, are to the benefit of the broader public. But they always shrink from the challenge, slinking back into their cushy offices and slamming the doors. Our tenth such antagonist, Minister of Planning, Frank Sartor has bitten the dust. Other now-vanished foes have been:

Andrew Refshauge, Minister of Urban Affairs and Planning
Sue Holliday, Director General of the Department
Craig Knowles, Minister of Urban Affairs and Planning
Di Beamer, Junior Minister of Urban Affairs and Planning
Andrew Cappie-Wood, Deputy Director-General
Jennifer Westacott, Director-General
Evan Jones, Sydney Strategy Administrator
Professor Peter Newman
Professor Ed Blakely
And now:

Frank Sartor, Minister of Planning


As with his predecessors, Frank Sartor, who regularly boasted his doors were always open, steadfastly refused to see me.

Frank Sartor claims he has been “cheated”. We suggest the thousands of Sydneysiders who have been deprived of their heritage, democratic rights and Australian way of life have more right to feel cheated.

Lony history of corruption

In our fight against political donations, I have occasion to mention the recorded case of NSW Premier Robert Askin receiving $15,000 in a brown paper bag in relation to a development proposal. I then encounter raised eyebrows. Many people just do not want to believe this. But it is necessary to fully appreciate how deeply embedded is this practice in NSW.

More on donations is now emerging from Alan Saffron’s biography of his father Abe Saffron in his forthcoming book Gentle Satan. The Sydney Morning Herald reveals that at one stage Abe Saffron was paying Askin (and the police commissioner) $5000 to $10,000 per week. And that was in the money of the 1960s and 1970s. Alan says Askin was totally corrupt. “In his early years as premier Askin would meet Saffron at restaurants at arranged times and speak to him on the phone regularly. But as Saffron came to the attention of law enforcement agencies intermediates were used”. He says Askin was also the recipient of payments via horse races that were fixed as “a courtesy to premier Askin”!

It is noteworthy that 11 developers received knighthoods from Askin.

But our battle against political corruption, started in 1999, is making progress. The report of the Select Committee on Electoral and Political Party Funding is out with many worthwhile recommendations. We need to work hard at getting them adopted.

Voice of Community Needed

"FIRST WORD" LETTER
Sydney Morning Herald 21 June 2008

Why planning needs the voice of the community
The passage of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Bill 2008 late last Tuesday night will sound the death of community participation in planning in NSW.

The then premier Neville Wran introduced in 1979 the original Environmental Planning and Assessment Act. In the decade before this, Sydneysiders saw the emergence of green bans and the rise of resident action groups. The end result of this activity was the push for planning to change.

Jack Mundey, a former recent chair of the Historic Houses Trust, was instrumental in campaigns in the late 1960s and 1970s in saving The Rocks, Woolloomooloo, Centennial Park and Kellys Bush in Hunters Hill. It was the actions of Mundey and the Builders Labourers Federation - which imposed green bans at the requests of conservationists, residents and community groups - that apparently influenced Wran's legislation.

The original planning legislation was based on consultation, something that is foreign to the current legislation. Consultation on the discussion paper "Improving the NSW Planning System" was limited.

The rights of residents will be eroded so they will not have a say about how their neighbourhood develops. What impact will this have on our streetscape, our heritage and our environment? The end result will inevitably be conflict between neighbours.

The residents in Kogarah municipality are proud of their homes, their streetscape and their suburbs. The mums and dads will only recognise the scope of the legislation when a neighbour attempts to build an inappropriate design next to their property.

Then, Minister Sartor, you'll see the rebirth of community activism across our local communities.

May the ballot boxes of September 13, in the local government elections across NSW, send strong signals in your direction that the legislation is to the detriment of our heritage, our environment and our communities.

Anne Field Kogarah

Inquiry needed

SAVE OUR SUBURBS

MEDIA RELEASE

23 February 2008

Save Our Suburbs demands inquiry into Government Planning Policies

The staggering revelations about developer donations inevitably lead to questions about the NSW Government’s high-density policies (termed “urban consolidation”). The Department of Planning has

never provided credible justification for this policy which provides huge profits for high-rise developers who in turn make large political donations.

It is undeniable and well documented that high-density is detrimental to the public good [1]. Greenhouse gas emissions per person are greater in high-density [2]. The policy overloads infrastructure. Choking traffic congestion and longer travel times result. Sewers overflow, electricity supply is at breaking point and there are chronic water shortages. High-density policies create land shortages that result in unaffordable housing. Concrete, tiles and bitumen replace trees, gardens and public open space. Sustainablility is adversely affected.

Current media coverage reveals the huge donations high-density developers make to the political parties. What is not yet being publicised is the long history the Department of Planning has of working closely with developers. The Department demands that councils submit strategies for high-density (under threat of taking away their planning powers) and developers who subsequently stand to benefit are actively involved in the assessment of these strategies [3]. Under these circumstances, a good example from the top state planning department is not being set for councils. Proposed changes to the planning system, involving state appointed planning panels, are unlikely to improve the situation.

It needs to be questioned why a policy detrimental to the public interest is being forced onto communities, as this policy provides huge profits [4] to organisations that are actively participating in its formulation and implementation and which make massive donations to the major political parties. Save Our Suburbs demands an Upper House inquiry into the motivation for this policy.

Further information: Tony Recsei 02 9487 2061

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] See www.sos.org.au

[2] See http://www.acfonline.org.au/custom_atlas/index.html

[3] For example as at 16 November 2000 the Departmernt’s “Residential Strategy Advisory Committee” consisted of:

John Collins (DUAP Assistant Director-General and Chair)

Peter Woods (Mayor of Concord and President of the Local Government Association)

Bruce McDonald (Director of Strategic and Economic Planning, Penrith Council)

Ian Costley (Mirvac Group - standing in for Robert Hamilton, the General Manager)

Neil Bird, (Urban Pacific Ltd)

Peter Lean (Urban Development Institute of Australia).

After this situation was publicly revealed on the ABC Stateline program of 30/03/01 the committee was replaced with a less obvious method of involving developers in the planning process but the overall effect is the same.

[4] In a letter to the Department of Urban Affairs and Planning dated 17 November 2000, Ian Costley, Development Director of Mirvac reports on the financial viability of development that would result if a residential strategy submitted by Ku-ring-gai Council were to be accepted by the Department. In this report internal rates of return of up to 128% on Mirvac’s equity investment were considered “not viable”.

Government Inquiries

The NSW Government has announced an inquiry into improving the planing system and has requested public comment. The address to send submissions is given as "Planning Reform".

An SOS member has written to this address as follows:

Dear Sir/Madam, Another point I should have made is my strong objection to your use of the term “reform” when you are putting proposed changes out for public comment on whether they will make things better or worse. By using the term “reform” you are saying the changes will definitely make things better, which implies that you are not going to be paying genuine attention to any public opinions that they will make things worse.

Could you please correct that misuse of English language by changing all your headings to ‘planning changes’?

Please let me know ASAP that you are doing that; and if not, why.

Can lies go on forever?

SOS member Adrien Krebs has done some research on the cost of housing. He writes:

In yesterday's Australian Financial Review (2 January 2008) an article entitled Adelaide Steals Perth's Crown mentions that the median house price in Australia in 2007 was $482 601 and that of a unit was $386 873.
So out of curiosity I did a little research and found the median home (I assume house and unit all included) price for the USA in 2007 was $212 000 USD, which roughly equates to $237 000 AUD.

Not including interest rates, which are slightly higher in Australia, the cash price of a home is DOUBLE in Australia of what it is in the USA, the world's wealthiest nation!!

- Is it that the USA have much more land available than Australia? NO. Mainland US covers 7.8 million km2, when Australia is 7.7 million km2. So reasonably the same size

- Is it that Australia has much more people competing for land? NO. The exact opposite is true with only 20 million people in Australia vs. 300 million in the US!

- Perhaps our Aussie homes are made of silver and gold or diamond bricks? NO. When driving through the Sydney suburbs, I mainly noticed sandstone for old and historic houses and mostly bricks for more modern ones, and a few wooden ones.

- The US must be going through a severe real estate crisis! There has been a lot of news about this, but according to the US Census http://www.census.gov/const/uspricemon.pdf the historical record month for Real Estate was April 2007 where the median home price was at $257 000 USD. Still a universe away from our Australian prices.

The American median income is also higher than the Australian one, so I am definitely out of options and can not figure out why a small 500m2 lot of raw land 60 kilometers West of Sydney will sell for the same price as a built house with a garden in the US.

This information is public. When spread accross Australia, lies will not be able to go on forever and people will want answers. What answers will Frank Sartor and our governments provide us with?

Letters published - usurpation of planning powers

Sunday Telegraph.com.au 4 November 07

It is astounding to learn that Landcom, an organisation set up by the New South Wales Government to offer affordable houses on the city fringe, is demanding up to an outrageous $380,000 for newly released housing lots in Helensburgh (“High-rise towers for the aged”, Sunday Telegraph 28 October). Such prices cannot be justified as agricultural land sells for the equivalent of only $6000 per housing lot. Instead of releasing sufficient land to meet demand, Landcom’s role has deteriorated to hoarding land and making housing unaffordable for most people. Those seeking a home are forced to live packed in like chooks in battery cages or to move to another State. No wonder Sydney is now numbered among the world cities with the most unaffordable housing.


North Shore Times 14 November 2007

The shortage of playing fields is yet another result of the Government’s high-density policy which crams more and more people into suburbs designed for low density without upgrading infrastructure (“Hundreds of kids miss cricket every week”, Times November 9). The result is not only children having nowhere to play, but also out-of-control crime, crumbling public transport, overflowing sewers, water shortages, power blackouts and human tragedy in our hospitals.

68 words


DAILY TELEGRAPH 5 December 2007

State Planning Minister Frank Sartor uses the "stripping back to basics" argument to justify more usurpation of planning powers (‘stripping back to basics – but no nudity,’ December 4).

But Australians overwhelmingly don't want to live in high rise, high-density suburbs (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2004), they don't want bush land built on (such as at Gwandalan and Summerland Point ) and they want their opinions about the future of their suburbs listened to and not usurped by developer donations to both the Labor and Liberal parties.

Anthony Meaney
Summerland Point

HORNSBY ADVOCATE 20 December 2007

Frank Sartor wants to grab the planing powers of Ku-ring-gai Council in order to make it easier for his Department of Planning to force high-density into the local community.
He pretends this will be of benefit to the wider public.
It will not.
Research in Australia and the United States shows that high-density is less sustainable than single residential dwellings.
Living in units generates more greenhouse gases per head than does living in low density. But Frank Sartor’s motto seems to be:
“Please don’t confuse me with the facts … my mind is made up”.

Tony Recsei
Warrawee

Toward a Full Accounting of GHG Transport Emissions

Accounting for greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) is no simple matter in urban transport. It is not as simple as the GHG emissions from the vehicles themselves. For example, there is the vehicle manufacturing process. There is also vehicle maintenance and the energy used to keep stations and administrative facilities open. There is simply no central source of information for such data, a situation that is a serious “GHG omission.”

Three decades ago, BART, the San Francisco area rapid transit system, published estimates of the full energy requirements for operating public transport and cars, including such factors as vehicle maintenance, right of way maintenance, and stations. Generally, the analysis found that the rail mode required 41 percent more energy than is consumed in traction (transportation), buses 37 percent and cars 22 percent. These factors may be old, but they may be the only ones available (and it is possible that they are still valid).

If we assume the BART factors, then the comparison of GHG emissions between transport modes in Australia is even more favorable for cars. The average car would emit 229 grams of GHG per passenger kilometer, compared to 212 grams for buses and 148 grams for Sydney’s rail system. Cars meeting the 2010 National Average Fuel Consumption target would be better than both buses and rail in Sydney at 137 grams per passenger kilometer. The best hybrids could better buses by two-thirds and rail by one-half.

All of which points out the needed for objective, comprehensive analysis.

The previous post on GHG emissions by mode("Public Transport Greenhouse Emissions Similar to Cars", Wednesday, October 31, 2007) does not include any adjustment for vehicle maintenance, right of way maintenance, and stations. Its calculations apply only to direct transportation.

Posted by Demographia

Letter Published: Outrageous land prices

Sunday Telegraph 4 November 2007
It is astounding to learn that Landcom, an organisation set up by the New South Wales Government to offer affordable houses on the city fringe, is demanding up to an outrageous $380,000 for newly released housing lots in Helensburgh ("High-rise towers for the aged", Sunday Telegraph 28 October). Such prices cannot be justified as agricultural land sells for the equivalent of only $6000 per housing lot. Instead of releasing sufficient land to meet demand, Landcom’s role has deteriorated to hoarding land and making housing unaffordable for most people. Those seeking a home are forced to live packed in like chooks in battery cages or to move to another State. No wonder Sydney is now numbered among the world cities with the most unaffordable housing.

Tony Recsei
President Save Our Suburbs

Letters published - Power corrupts

North Shore Times 2 November 2007
Victoria Brookman (Labor candidate), the furore about Frank Sartor’s grab of Ku-ring-gai Council’s planning powers is no mere political beat-up (Times October 26). The community is objecting to the Department of Planning devising ever more despotic ways of forcing high-density into the community. There can be no doubt the residents overwhelmingly reject high-density, this was conclusively proved at the series of huge public meetings organised by Ku-ring-gai Council at Ravenswood School. What is more, imposed high-density is detrimental not only to the local community but also is indisputably bad for the public at large. This does not seem to concern the powers that be. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Tony Recsei
President Save Our Suburbs

Northside Courier 31 October 2007

Frank Sartor wants to take the planning powers of Ku-ring-gai Council in order to make it easier for his Department of Planning to force high-density into the local community. Over the last few years Council has bent over backwards to comply with his Department’s demands but it is never enough. Perhaps the councilors have at last discovered that it does not pay to cave in to bullies. They just hit you all the more. The community is now left with no alternative – stand up and fight. A determined campaign on all possible fronts by a united community of 100,000 people would make these would-be dictators think twice about any more despotic actions.

Tony Recsei
President Save Our Suburbs

Public Transport Greenhouse Emissions Similar to Cars

Contrary to the repeated claims of high-density advocates that public transport travel is environmentally far superior to travel in cars, it has now been found that this is not the case. Greenhouse gas emission data posted by Demographia shows that the average petrol car in Australia in 2006 emitted 188 grams CO2 equivalent per passenger km and the figure for the more efficient cars now is as little as 60 grams.

These figures should be compared with the average bus in Australia which emits 155 grams CO2 equivalent per passenger km and with the 105 grams for travelling by rail in Sydney.

The emission figures of the Toyota Prius and the Peugeot hybrid diesel cars are indications that even the surprisingly small advantage of public transport could soon be eroded away by technology.

The reality that public transport use is not significantly more environmentally sustainable is of huge importance for planning policies. For the past two decades the NSW State Government has been implementing a policy of forcing high-density into communities. The principal foundation of these policies has been the allegation that people living in high-density will be able to travel more sustainably by public transport instead of by car. We now know this is not so.

The rationale for the despotic policies that have destroyed home ownership and grossly overloaded existing infrastructure is baseless.

Car use keeps rising despite urban consolidation

Densification arising has not reduced automobile use in Australian urban areas, despite the claims and expectations of urban consolidation policy ("smart growth") proponents. Urban consolidation policies have been adopted in virtually all of Australia's large urban areas. Their principal focus has been to force new development away from the urban fringe, while densifying already developed areas. Urban consolidation theory holds that densification will lead to reduced automobile use.

However, data in an Australian Bureau of Statistics series beginning in 1999 shows that automobile use continues to increase in Australia's capital cities.

Among the five largest capital cities (Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide), per capital automobile use rose 11 percent between 1999 and 2006. The smallest increase was in Melbourne, at 5 percent. The largest increase was in Perth, at 26 percent.

Among the three smaller capital cities (Hobart, Darwin and Canberra), automobile use increased approximately 10 percent per capita between 1999 and 2006. The smallest increase was in Canberra, at 1 percent, while the largest was in Darwin, at 33 percent.

This is not to suggest that urban consolidation policy has had no impact in Australia's cities. Housing affordability has been virtually destroyed, as house prices have risen 70 percent relative to household incomes in just 10 years. For example:

In Perth, the purchase and financing cost of the median price house has risen more than $500,000 in since 1996 (inflation adjusted). By comparison, in Austin, Texas, an urban area of similar size and with somewhat higher demand as Perth, there has been a reduction in the purchase and financing cost of the median priced house over the same period. Generally, land use policies in the Austin area are responsive to demand rather than prescribed by the planning visions that have turned into such nightmares in Australia (see Demographia Third Annual International Housing Affordability Survey).

Data from: Survey of Motor Vehicle Use, Australia, 12 months ended 31 October 2006


Wendell Cox

"Demand" argument nullifies rationale for urban consolidation

Less than 0.3 percent of Australia's land area is in development. In the upside-down world of politics, it should come Less than 0.3 percent of Australia's land area is in urban development. In the upside-down world of politics, it as no surprise that public policy virtually bans urban development in the other 99.7 percent. Every large urban area has adopted "urban consolidation" policies ("smart growth" or "compact city" policies) to fight the dreaded demon, "urban sprawl," which, of course, is nothing more than the spreading out of urban areas to accommodate new population and maximize economic opportunity. The reality, however, is that urban consolidation is combating the middle-income quality of life, as housing prices have predictably exploded relative to incomes as a result of the land rationing. Any competent economist would have predicted this. No economist was asked.

The urban planning community is in denial, putting forth the view that their land rationing policies have not driven up prices. Perhaps the most invoked refuge is the view that people don't want to live on the fringe, where development is banned and that they prefer to live in the cores of urban areas. Everyone has abandoned the fringe and they are all bidding for properties in places like Sydney's eastern suburbs, driving up prices. This is both disingenuous and absurd.

Before the planners managed to seduce governments into destructive urban consolidation, Australians, like Germans, French, Canadians, Americans, Japanese and Swedes were moving to the urban fringe, where housing was affordable. Then came the development bans and the perpetrators tell us that Australians are somehow different — that young families with children would much rather live in rental units without gardens and have their children play on balconies (actually the research, ignored by the planners, says the opposite).

Indeed, if the market is no longer interested in less expensive housing (and home ownership) on the urban fringe then there is no need for urban consolidation policy. Eliminate the urban growth nooses and see what happens. If we are to believe the planners, the hundreds of thousands of renting and forming households will stay put in the core… perhaps two or three will take advantage of the cheaper housing on the fringe. This is the absurdity. The planning community, which has often been more inclined to act on personal impressions, while ignoring the data, hasn't anything to support this view but a statistically insignificant sample of opinions exchanged at their inbred conferences.

There are, however, signs of hope that some states may begin to release more land for develop and release the Great Australian Dream from captivity. The governments of Queensland, which is already receiving huge migration from overly regulated (even by Australian standards) New South Wales and South Australia, with its near zero population growth. Much more is needed, but it is a start.

Wendell Cox

Sydney's Urban Consolidation (High-density) Depression

Brickworks, one of Australia's largest building materials suppliers, has warned that the Sydney area is about to enter its most prolonged housing construction downturn since the Great Depression, according to an article in the Sydney Morning Herald.

Sydney house prices have exploded relative to incomes. In just 10 years, the cost of the median price house, including mortgage interest, has risen $450,000 in Sydney (inflation adjusted). Sydney prices relative to incomes are now running three times prices in Atlanta, which is the fastest growing large urban area in the high-income world.

Some analysts have blamed higher interest rates for the downturn, apparently unaware of the fact that interest rates today remain well below post-World War II norms. Moreover, interest rates can hardly be cited as the cause of either the price run-up or the current Sydney depression, since neither has occurred in other markets, all of which have experienced the same global interest trends.

The problem is more fundamental and is the result of government land rationing and taxing policies, which are called "urban consolidation" (called "smart growth" in many other nations). All of this has contributed to an explosion in land costs, with little new housing being constructed. The result has been a virtual destruction of housing affordability,

Housing starts in New South Wales are at their lowest point today since 1958, according to the same article. This, in context, is extraordinary, given that there are more than twice as many households today in New South Wales as in 1958.

Wendell Cox
Demographia | Wendell Cox Consultancy - St. Louis Missouri-Illinois metropolitan region
Visiting Professor, Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers, Paris
France..33.6.10.59.59.92
USA..1.618 632 8507

Heart Bypass Operations a Mistake?

The efficient circulation of people and goods are as vital to a city as is the circulation of blood in the body. Restrict the flow and the results are harmful. Yet there are people who vigorously oppose the building of new roads - they say new roads will just fill up with traffic. But that indicates a pentup demand - people do not just drive around for the fun of it. The anti-road advocates say that public transport should be developed instead. But public transport cannot do the job - look at any city around the world (with the possible exception of Hong Kong where people mostly live in bird cages).

To these head-in-the-sand obstructionists Wendell Cox says:

You read it first here. I have been advised that prestigious medical research is soon to be published suggesting that heart bypass operations no longer be performed.

The problem is that the bypass arteries simply create more blood flow, creating no relief for the old arteries. It is said that researchers were first alerted to the problem when they were exposed to the theory of "induced" traffic, whereby building new roads just creates more traffic.

It is expected that medical insurance companies will soon remove coverage for heart bypass operations, since as soon as the new arteries are made available, they fill up with blood.

Dreaming About Rail in Norwest and Macquarie Park

An article in the Sydney Morning Herald of 24 September 2007 describes the exodus of jobs from downtown Sydney to suburban office parks like Norwest and Macquarie Park. This is simply the continuation of a trend that has long been underway, not only in Sydney, but also in Paris, Portland and Pheonix.

The clueless NSW State government, which oversees transport and planning, imagines somehow that they will serve these areas with new rail systems, and reduce automobile commuting. Norwest, probably the largest new business centre in Australia will be served by one rail station, while Macquarie Park will get three.

What they don’t understand, of course, is that rail transport is about the city centre --- that there is no way any government can afford to provide the level of service necessary to serve suburban office parks. What do they expect? Do they imagine commuters from Liverpool will somehow use the overcrowded (not to mention unreliable) rail system to travel through the city centre and then to Norwest or Macquarie Park? Will residents of Penrith choose travel by rail to Parramatta, then through the city centre or Chatswood and on, circuitously to Macquarie Park or Norwest?

What makes public transport viable, even if unreliable, to the city centre, is that routes converge there from all over the urban area. No urban area can afford that level of public transport investment in more than one centre. Rail stations in Norwest and Macquarie Park may get government ministers the odd favorable headline, but they will be of virtually no account in reducing automobile commuting.

Wendell Cox

Developers close ranks

The Housing Industry Association was one developer body that stood against higher densities, preferring the alternative of new homes on greenfield sites. No longer. In a press release today the organisation says there is an urgent need to increase the supply of affordable rental housing. That means high density.

Save Our Suburbs is issuing the following press release:


An Appalling Call says Save Our Suburbs

"Save Our Suburbs views with great concern the call by the Housing Industry Association (HIA) for the supply of rental housing to be increased (HIA press release 20 July 2007)" says Dr Tony Recsei, President of Save Our Suburbs NSW.

He asked "why is HIA promoting the investor rental market instead of home ownership? This can only result in yet more high-density being forced onto unwilling communities".

Dr Recsei asserted "The ‘Great Australian Dream’ has been home ownership, not home rental. Self-reliant home ownership, not dependant life time rental, has been Australia's overwhelming success story. It will be tragedy if the Australian way of life, the envy of the world, is to be abandoned."

Eastern Suburbs to get "their share" of high-density

The Sydney Morning Herald 20 July 2007 reports that 20,000 houses are to be "squeezed into some of Sydney's most densely populated areas". Botany Bay has to cram in 6500 more homes, Randwick 8400, Waverley 2200 and Woollarha 2900. This is a rude shock for some of the residents who were hoping that their current high densities would quarantine them from more impositions. They can now look forward to further overloading of the locality infrastructure - clogged roads, overflowing sewers, power failures and water reticulation problems. And of course vanishing gardens and open space.

SOS Adelaide - Patrick Troy addresses AGM

SOS in Adelaide report on some points made by Patrick Troy (Emeritus Professor and Visiting Fellow, Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies, ANU) in his address at their April 2007 AGM:


"Developers have inordinate influence"


"We must make the planning process public."


"Granny-flats were built in back-yards in the 1970s. Advocates said this would free up big houses for families. There never were enough grannies to go around. Dual occupancy has had a devastating effect with single houses replaced with six-packs. All the trees are gone and sites are concreted over."


"The replacement of trees and shrubs by concrete is resulting in the greying of Australian suburbs."


"The McMansion phenomenon is tragic. We’ve destroyed our own sporting capacity through the removal of back-yards where kids can play. And there’s not been a murmur about it."


"Developers almost never live in the developments they put up."


"The quite infantile idea that all you need to do is increase the density of the city and that everything will be all right is really quite bizarre."