Bix

Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney.

These are the big 5 centers of life and work in Australia.
They continue to sprawl across the landscape in ever increasing numbers of suburbs and with them comes the inevitable infrastructure related issues.

Is this healthy for Australia?

My view is that these bee hives are getting far too large if not already so. It's a massive country but the truly habitable regions are much restricted. Yet why cram everything into these few places?

Why oh why doesn't government enforce a spread of the population? There are many so called regional areas that could be expanded.

The governments task would be to encourage, entice and provoke businesses to spread away from the big 5. I am sure there are a lot of people who would leave the cities if work was available elsewhere.

They can control new population settlement in terms of immigration "You want a visa? Sure, but these places are off limits for x years." Some visas already do that of course.

Any views?

jimbo_d

It's because the place is so damned big, so everyone congregates around the big cities to reduce travelling times. The only place where there is any sort of small town/village lifestyle is Victoria, the smallest (apart from Taz/Act) state, and everywhere is closer together, you can still travel 2 hours to get anywhere though. In WA you're never going to get a network of towns like Europe, it will always centre around Perth and then a couple of towns here and there on the Coast.

Bix

Interesting theory JD

But don't you think it would make sense to spread the population by expanding those other towns rather than the humungous cities?

mulben

Quote jimbo_d
"The only place where there is any sort of small town/village lifestyle is Victoria, the smallest (apart from Taz/Act) state"

Not actually correct, Queensland has the greatest percentage of a states population in regional towns/cities

a greater percent of Vic.by a large margin live in Melbourne

just a piece of useless info I remember from economics

jimbo_d

Yeah if they had the money to put in the infrastructure to transport people between the places, other than roads and rail and the odd airport between major towns there's nothing

And regards to Queensland having the most provincial towns, that may well be true but most of them are located in one corner, most of the state is deserted like everywhere else in Oz

mulben

Originally Posted by Bix
Why oh why doesn't government enforce a spread of the population? There are many so called regional areas that could be expanded.

Not that long ago Dubbo,Tamworth and Albury/Wodonga where classified as preferred growth centres by the Commonwealth and NSW Govt. but even with preferential loans and deferred relocation expenditure it was only moderately successful .

The govt. can,t really force people to live away from where they want to be . Government department were shifted but I think they all were downsized in preference to the city centric based departments as soon as budget cuts became common (NSW very much so)

fish.01

Most Qld provincial towns aren't located in one corner BTW, they are mostly limited to the coastal strip but run right up the coast to Cairns.

The Bloke

..... but in country areas they (past governments) have ripped up most of the rail lines as it apparently was not cost effective.

iamthecreaturefromuranus

How about enforcing the idea of "Green Belt"?.
No more expansion allowed by those existing major conurbations.

Nu-Shooz

Yes, then it wouldn't be so damn boring

Time for change, expansion, lets do it, now

IvanM

I completely agree. Places like Wollongong, Newcastle, Geelong etc should be connected up better and take up the strain the cities are under. Other than London all the UK cities are smaller than the capital cities here.

Mipik

The main issue is obviously work or lack of it in places away from main cities.

And it is a bit of catch 22 situation as from business point of view there is also no workers there so they can not set up operations in places without workforce.

IvanM

Rather than small country towns they should target places that they could get people to move to.

Amazulu

Keep building, and building, and building.........

Bix

I agree.
But currently I feel it is a case of where people need to be rather than want to be.



That would be an essential part of any plan to spread things. Stop the spread of housing = prices go up = people more receptive to looking elsewhere.



How do you fancy the title Head of Mainroads?



Indeed.
A concerted effort would be needed as one can't work without the other.



Agreed.
I'm pretty sure people would go to those places if work was available. We hear it on BE all the time. "I'd love to live in xxxxx but have to go to xxxxx because that's where the work is."