Have you lived in hilly parts of coastal Perth?

This may be a chicken and egg situation but do you know why your nearest shop is 3km away and there is no decent public transport in your part of Perth? Because the place spraaaawwwls too far as everyone insists on their 1-2 story house on a piece of land. You're not going to have a walkable city and decent public transport in a place with that much urban sprawl.

If blocks of flats have regulations against hanging washing on balconies that is just ridiculous. Why not? I read an article about some people in the US challenging regulations like that on environmental grounds and winning. Australians who live in flats should do the same. What a waste when the Australian sun will dry your washing in no time.

kiwilass - if you're ever in Rome I'll take you down to our local markets. They're great and only a 5-10 minute walk away from where I live.

Um, so what if it's hilly?

?????? Lots of cities have hills, (wellington, nz being one, san fran, etc) and, so? Gotta admit it's the first time I've ever heard "hills' being used as a reason why you can't plan for higher density.

I'm there, baby

I love my washing line. I had one in Melbourne too, things dry super fast in the summer. Admittedly, my old townhouse complex in Van had some rule against washing outside...but no one ever enforced it..it was supposed to be a 'green' complex...nothing 'green' about using a dryer!

Actually, our nearest shop was about 150 m away, but they have knocked it down and will re-build, the sooner the better, but that's why our nearest corner shop is 3 km away. Other cities do not have high-rise yet have facilities and walkability, so you do not need high-rise for that. When we visited London and other places recently, it was great to walk to the local shops, pubs, restaurants and train stations.

Perth doesn't have good planning or public transport. There are dubious planning decisions being made, eg medium/high rise in areas with bus services with limited destinations and existing traffic congestion (through traffic, as well as local), but 4 x 2 single houses in a sub-division a few minutes from a train station.

I've said it before MP....your talents are clearly wasted in IT. Without a doubt you should switch careers and become a town planner or a Pollie.

Although this is a discussion on the pros/cons of vertical expansion, it should be noted that all of these points address the symptoms, not the cause : population growth essentially resulting from high immigration.

Consider it this way...

By far the greatest beneficiaries of high immigration are the immigrants, not the resident population.

• High immigration lowers per capita productivity growth, a key to sustainable growth.
• It retards the growth of per capita wealth.
• It accelerates the rate of food importation. (Australia imported a record $8.5 billion worth of food in 2008-09.)
• It accelerates the increase in urban overcrowding and traffic congestion.
• It increases Australia's greenhouse emissions, per capita.
• It makes it unlikely Australia can meet its targets of greenhouse gas emission reduction.
• It lowers Australia's food security.

Adds a different slant to the discussion....

Urban sprawl is a hard habit to kick and I don't think Australia plans to kick it any time soon. Those McMansions have to go somewhere.

Downunder paddy makes an interesting point. The following is for Brisbane but the the other cities are probably no different.

Open up www.nearmap.com (updated monthly) find any new development on the outskirts and run google earth at the same, use the history function on google earth to back a few years and see the urban sprawn in progress.

The reason I mention this is because nearly 90% of forest clearance in Australia is for agriculture and deforestation here is 500,000ha per year. I am no greeny but I am not a big fan of hacking down forest in a country that is mostly arid to begin with. There are plent of brown field sites around Brisbane that could be developed first.

My source
http://www.environment.gov.au/biodiv...r6/bioch5.html

If population growth is a concern then why doesn't the govt starts penalizing those with 2 kids (like China does) rather than doing the opposite by providing baby bonuses. Skilled migrant intake is just 100k a year which is 0.4% of Australian population, that will further get halved next year to 0.2%

Also we can't resist the change by blaming everything on population. Population growth is inevitable, so better tackle is intelligently and get ourselves prepared for it

Oh yeah, that works real well now, doesn't it ?
http://www.gendercide.org/case_infanticide.html

This is an entirely different issue which I didn't even mention about. I am saying measures to control population growth if its really a concern, although we know it isn't as of yet.

There are more urgent issues to concentrate on, like knife crime, glassings, urban sprawl, home and aged care, ever growing cars on the roads, etc..and these issues can be solved if the ever growing population becomes cooperative in dwellings and transport. Cooperative with nature and other individuals of the society.

The one child policy in China has been directly related to high incidents of infanticide. If you seriously believe that is not the case, that is your right to do so.

I'm not sure all the benefits of vertical expansion espoused actually happen. I know in London some of the high rises have been knocked down and replaced with low level housing with a radical improvement in community and lowering of crime. Savings in cabling will be marginal as the houses still have to be cabled individually. Road savings are again marginal as the roads will be fatter rather than longer. I don't see London or NY having great cycling. The popularity of cycling seems to have more to do with national psyche than weather or other factors. There is great animosity to cycling in anglo-based countries which consequently creates a marginal and truculant cycling community. Having stayed in places like HK you might get good views from the penthouse but lower down all you can see is other towers which all look the same. Not the greatest views in the world.

(I think marginal might be my word of the day )

I partially agree with you. The relation exists for uneducated and parochial mentality couples. But for modern generation it is decreasing. I pesonally know many happy couples with a single girl child. As there are no child benefits, bringing up second child is very difficult so working couples stick to one or Dinks

now, for either the billion people in India or China, can you tell me the percentage of those populations that slot into the 'uneducated and parochial mentality couples' Vs the 'modern generation' ?

I would put it to you that it is very closely linked to the Poverty Line
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_line

India's official poverty level, on the other hand, is split according to rural vs. urban thresholds. For urban dwellers, the poverty line is defined as living on less than 538.60 rupees (approximately USD $12) per month, whereas for rural dwellers, it is defined as living on less than 356.35 rupees per month (approximately USD $7.50). By this measure, only 27.5% of Indians live in poverty, whereas by the World Bank standard of $1.25 per day, 42% of Indians live in poverty - this is the third highest rate in South Asia after Bangladesh and Bhutan.