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The Forum > Article Comments > Our growing and groaning cities > Comments

Our growing and groaning cities : Comments

By Brad Ruting, published 28/12/2006

Australia needs cities that aren’t just economically competitive and ecologically sustainable, but cities with minimal inequality and maximal liveability.

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Brad, you say..."Citizens should be shown the benefits of sustainable living." I say, you can show them all you like, but unfortunately true sustainability means putting an end to our current "growth at all cost" mentality and it's simply not going to happen. In the last couple of decades there's been an elevated interest in Permaculture, which is a good thing for those that are genuinely interested, but lets face facts. Permaculture could possibly save humanity from itself, but not without firstly putting an end to the growth interests of big business and consumers addicted to our current unsustainable way of life. The present notion of Permaculture leaves humanity with a warm, fuzzy feeling that everything can continue as normal without any, or with minor disruption to lifestyles should they too take up the Permaculture challenge, but it's not so.
Income and property growth go hand in hand with population growth and humans, being the greedy little pillagers they are, they won't stop until our planet is uninhabitable. Forget trying to plan for sustainable cities. You only have to look at the Boxing Day sales rush to see how greedy and unsustainable our lives have become. While you're extrolling the virtues of sustainability, make sure you keep your backside well tucked in against a brick wall or else risk being trampled to death by the crowds of humanity as they sing and dance their way down the road to Armageddon!
Posted by Wildcat, Thursday, 28 December 2006 12:00:43 PM
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“Buildings are designed with sustainability in mind, with energy and water efficiency and novel ways to recycle your rubbish. Who says you can’t buy environmental values?”

Blah!

Some buildings are being designed with more thought about energy and water consumption. But, that’s hardly difficult, given our terribly overconsumptive and inefficient practices. It doesn’t take an Einstein to considerably improve on this. While these sorts of improvements are welcome, they don’t direct us towards sustainability for as long as the growth of our cities continues unabated.

“Nevertheless, we need to look into the future and set the right goals for our cities as they continue to grow.”

Brad, this is the classic contradiction that so many people seem to express; a desire to be more efficient and to move towards sustainability, but without even questioning the absurdity of continuous growth and hence the ever-increasing rate of resource consumption despite improvements in per-capita consumption.

We are not going to achieve sustainability if we continue down the same track of rapid continuous growth with no end in sight.

The thing that you completely miss in your article is any sense of a limit to the size of our cities, reached by good planning with sustainability in mind, rather than being reached by a lack of planning, resulting in people stopping their movement into the cities because of declined quality of life factors.

We cannot just sit back and accept the continuous expansion of our cities. Limits to growth – this is the biggest single issue in the struggle for sustainability.
Posted by Ludwig, Thursday, 28 December 2006 9:28:49 PM
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I agree with other posters that whether growth of cities and materialism generally could be or should be limited is important to consider. But assuming that the drivers of economic and population growth are not likely to be switched off in the forseeable future, what can be done to prevent the decline of cities into increasing unaffordability and unliveability, a kind of urban hell that only the wealthy can insulate themselves from?

I think Brad has hit upon some of the ideas, such as decentralising city employment so that travel distances are reduced. Australians will also have to get used to increased urban densities as a cost of economic and population growth. But much of this is bound up in the issue of what kind of economy Australia will have in an increasingly globalised world economy. One key to the future sustainability of the major cities could well be a revival of the old, and mostly failed, idea of decentralisation. What can be done to reduce the decline of the rural economy, and to offset reduced rural employment from agribusiness integration and efficiency? These factors combined with drought, pressure from agricultural imports and the unwillingness of young people to inherit family farms is leading to the decline of rural towns.

Would a revitalised rural and regional sector boost these small and large rural towns, reducing the population drift to the cities and easing pressure on them? And how can it be achieved?
Posted by PK, Friday, 29 December 2006 7:49:22 AM
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The groaning city of Adelaide.
This State Capital has been supported by prosperous regions such as the Riverland and the Lower South East of the State.
It relys on the taxes from these prosperous regions to sustain its existence.
The Adelaide automotive industry relies on State and Federal Subsidies.
Today the State and that means Adelaide rely on GST cash from the Federal Governmnet.
To call South Australia a State is an insult to the four most sustainable states of the Commonwealth.
The amalgamation of S.A. and the Northern Territory is the only positive move that the nation can make to advance the country in this century.
The scrapping of Adelaide as the State Capital for Alice Spings or Darwin would stop the groaning that comes out of Adelaide by every local politatian.
If taxes were redirected back to the economic producing centres of
Australia, the nation could become the richest country per capita
on the planet.
Importing cheap workers from overseas has always been the way Adelaide has approached any lack of skills.
The cheap labor price of S.A. is a national disgrace,most of the S.A. population live in poverty of less thgan $15,000 per annum and are forced to pay top rates and taxes on rates and water.
Posted by BROCK, Friday, 29 December 2006 9:46:23 AM
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Put the HUMAN FACE back into COMMUNITY.

Housing?

Housing Policies?

The role of the Bank is unsustainable?

Calculate the Real Level of Household Poverty?

Count the real level of HOMELESSNESS!

Australia dreams ....... that our cities...........

.............................................................."...aren’t just economically competitive and ecologically sustainable, but cities that are socially alive, with minimal inequality and maximal liveability. Anything’s possible if we work together."

Unsustainable Rural Commuities vs the Unsustainable Urban sprawl. No one wins this way.

Fair Go Australia needs a Revamp!

http://www.miacat.com
Posted by miacat, Friday, 29 December 2006 11:20:13 AM
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Today John Howard said, regarding nuclear power, something like "everybody knows that our power needs are going to increase ... its common sense ...".

Duh? Isn't it common sense to stop this problem at source i.e. stop immigration? It is a shameful grab for votes from the business and immigration lobbies to be bringing in more migrants when we dont have the water or energy. And a shameful way to cook-the-books to make everyone think the country is "growing" when our quality of life is declining - as shown by plans in Strathfield to pack more people on top of each other in highrise concrete jungles.

And I heard Amanda Vanstone bunging on about how our population will decline and there will be no-one to look after us in the nursing homes unless we have immigration of young people who have lots of babies. We are quite capable of looking after ourselves without more immigration.
Posted by online_east, Friday, 29 December 2006 12:57:51 PM
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Normally I steer away from the endless droning of 'stop immigration...' eminating from countless vaccuous morons but I'm tired and bored today so here goes.

Shut the hell up.

We don't live in a country, you shortsighted idiots. We live in a world. A big, round, world with all sorts of issues and problems that extend beyond any imaginary, contrived border.

You don't care what plight others are in? Fine, your prerogative. But there are people around who do, so get the hell out of their way so some good can be done and some decency can be instilled into an otherwise greedy, selfish, soulless, greedy (worth saying twice) culture.

Immigration is not an issue. An entire country starving to death, THAT is an issue. And its all a pendulum - the further you push it away from you, the faster and harder it will swing back.
Posted by spendocrat, Friday, 29 December 2006 2:57:47 PM
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Hear, hear Spendocrat. Phooey to the xenophobic, pull up the drawbridge, I'm alright Jack, anti-immigrationists. A point that seems lost on this set is that almost all of us are, or descend from, relatively recent immigrants. Without its history of immigration, where would Australia be? Without most of us who are here today, is where. Since it is immigration that has made Australia successful, who are these people to say that now is the point where there should be no more of it? And, why? Thankfully, no-one who matters takes any notice of them.

I agree with you, Spendocrat, that the problems of sustainable Australian cities is but a small one compared to world poverty, which could be dealt with pretty effectively if there was a real will to do so. However, I'm sure that you don't think that Australian immigration policies are in themselves any real answer to global poverty, do you? Thought I'd better make that clear before some of the anti-immigration set jump on you.
Posted by PK, Friday, 29 December 2006 3:25:30 PM
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Not a pendulum, a gate. We should help to solve other countries problems in their own land, not bring them here. The multiracial nirvana that you yearn for is one where, at best, everyone is alive but very few are happy:

"And what is happening to Los Angeles? According to Robert Putnam, Harvard political scientist and author of "Bowling Alone," the trust among people in "this most diverse human habitation in human history" is now at rock bottom, the lowest anywhere he could find.

"In the presence of diversity," said Putnam, "we hunker down. We act like turtles. The effect of diversity is worse than had been imagined. And it's not just that we don't trust people who are not like us. In diverse communities we don't trust people who look like us."

The more people of different races that live in a community, the greater the loss of trust, said Putnam. "They don't trust the local mayor, they don't trust the local paper, they don't trust other people, and they don't trust institutions. ... The only thing there is more of is protest marches and TV watching."

Welcome to the Brave New World our elites are creating for our children, as they consign the America we grew up in to the compost heap of history."

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=52531

Ditto Australia.
Posted by online_east, Friday, 29 December 2006 7:42:48 PM
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I couldn’t believe my ears this evening while watching the 7.30 Report: Melbourne’s water restrictions are set to tighten right up and Bracks is making a big hullabaloo about strict enforcement and application of penalties for offenders, including reducing household water allocation rates down to a trickle for offenders.

And yet not a word about the constantly increasing number of water consumers in that city.

How on earth can apparently intelligent people treat vital issues such as this in such an extraordinarily one-sided manner?

Come-on Steve, at least start suggesting that the population growth factor has to be mitigated somewhat along with water restrictions, or completely forego your credibility on this issue, if you haven’t already.
Posted by Ludwig, Friday, 29 December 2006 8:26:31 PM
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"We should help to solve other countries problems in their own land, not bring them here".

Agreed online_east. But this is not the issue with immigration, as the refugee component is only a tiny fraction of our intake.

One of the stupidest aspects of our immigration program is the virtual stealing of skilled people from countries that need those skills much more than we do. In fact this is so bad that it more or less cancels out our international aid effort. This is particularly relevant with doctors and nurses but also applies to many other professions.

I don’t have a problem with racial diversity, for as long as society is functioning well and the quality of life is high. But when these parameters starts to become stressed, all sorts of fractures open up, not least those between different racial, cultural, ethnic and religious groups.

But the most important aspect by far is the sheer numbers of people being added to our population, which by and large means to our cities, each year.

This is only half due to immigration. The other half is so-called natural population growth, or births in excess of deaths. Yes, this number is actually bigger than our immigration intake, which is hard to believe if you listen to the likes of Costello or Vanstone.

So, the thing to do is progressively reduce immigration down to about net zero, which would still allow an intake of about 35 000 per annum, and get the hell rid of stupid pro-natalist policies like that god-awful baby bonus.

Then, we will at least be on the right track towards seriously addressing the issue of our eternally growing and groaning cities.
Posted by Ludwig, Friday, 29 December 2006 11:43:52 PM
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The planning and development of urban conurbations is a vexing problem. However, the more relevant argument is not about population growth per se, but what is the sustainable footprint of a city like Brisbane? Some cities around the world have a cap of sorts, such as a bed cap, a green belt containing growth or even significant controls on land development.

One approach is as follows - A city's ecological footprint must be quantified and used as a yardstick with a view to ensuring it is reduced. Within the context of facilitating the growth of economic and social exchanges or capital, planning tools may then be better justified and adhered to to ensure growth is not unchecked. This is not about saving a furry animal, but instead, is about identifiying those values which we seek to enhance, and strive to achieve this enhancement through sustainble growth.

I believe that if city planners could arm themselves with the ability to apply a modicum of measurement to 'sustainability' starting with an ecological footprint, and couple it with the identification of values for which we wish to enhance (a healthy environment, social connections, increased trade, etc), they would not be held in a similar esteem to used car salesmen.

Given the growth at any cost mentality shown by all major political parties and governments, this will be difficult to implement. In south east Queensland, despite an 'almost visionary' regional plan, a supporting infrastructure plan was developed behind closed doors with a view to maintaining the unsustainable growth. Further, recent sneaky legislative changes have ensured that communities have little recourse to shaping to development of their neighbourhoods. In the words of the head of the Office of Urban Management who overseas regional planning, "we have now closed that loophole".

The future is not promising, despite the rhetoric delivered by purveyors of urban and regional planning. Sadly, because planners are disempowered and marginlised, a few road tunnels and a stillborn public transport system will ensure the decaying urban liveability cycle continues.

Justin Wells, for
Sustainable Brisbane
Posted by Justin W, Saturday, 30 December 2006 12:01:25 AM
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PK writes “Without its history of immigration, where would Australia be?”

Well, for starters the lives of the Aboriginal inhabitants would have been different. Would PK equate their rights to decide who comes here then to our rights to decide who comes here today?

spendocrat refers to the greed and selfishness of those questioning Australia's immigration policy. My concern is the greed and selfishness of those profiting hugely from high immigration, wholly at the expense of all Australians and the environment. Would such a person be altruistic because they support high immigration?

Both spendocrat and PK seem to acknowledge that stabilising Australia's population by reducing immigration would lead to improved living standards. But they see such an act as amoral, as they see reducing immigration as turning away from the world's poverty problem. So how does immigration as a means of reducing world poverty compare in efficacy with birth control programs and other forms of foreign aid? Promoting high immigration can only reduce Australia's per capita capacity to help the rest of the world in other ways if living standards are reduced as a consequence.

spendocrat's “one world” concept is something I would like to see developed. Would spendocrat like this collectivising concept to go as far as sharing an individual's wealth, or only as far as abolishing the world's borders?

Controlling immigration to Australia did have a partial basis in egalitarianism. There were many examples of unscrupulous employers seeking to undercut wages with cheap foreign labour prior to the passing of the Immigration Restriction Act of 1901. And there is substantial anecdotal evidence that the same thing is happening with 457 Visa guest workers today. I would suggest that without borders, Australia would quickly become the feudal society that many feared over a century ago.
Posted by Fester, Saturday, 30 December 2006 12:09:16 AM
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On the subject of immigration, there is another question that I would love the bleeding hearts to address for me:

If it was wrong for the First Fleeters to come here, why is it right for anyone else to come here now?

The rate of immigration throughout our history has been adjusted to the needs of the country at any one time. For many years few would come unless subsidised, and all we had to do was turn the subsidy on and off.

At the start of the Depression the Governor-General issued a proclamation declaring that immigration would be stopped until further notice because of the unemployment. Why not do it again?

There is a simple way to reduce immigration and simultaneously improve average education - bring back the Dictation Test.

After all, one guy passed it in 1909.

It seems to me that the internationalists on this forum have no understanding at all of territoriality, which is an instinct that is so old that we share it with many animals.
Posted by plerdsus, Saturday, 30 December 2006 1:51:51 PM
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Is it possible for us to entirely plan our urban environments for the good of humanity, or to just extend our egos and power dogmas? Are minds inscribed in a diseased spiral caused by the urban landscapes themselves. Is the agenda in planning for humans to prosper, have fun, be under surveillance, or to simply survive?

If you look at the Marshall Mc Luhan theory, the insanity of our road traffic congestion and unsustainable mess is just the insanity of modernity, and worse, a televisual culture. An insane society that confuses the ephemeral media with reality can hardly solve the real world. Greed, ego and denial are beyond responsibility and humanity has an insatiable weakness.

Economy over aesthetics results in ugliness and therefore sadness.

Ego over family and humanity in such chaos results in emptiness, loneliness, even suicide or violence.

Ever seen Marshall Mc Luhan theory speak? He's on U Tube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7GvQdDQv8g&NR

I cannot help but think of Jane Jacobs with "Dark Times Ahead".

http://www.americancity.org/article.php?id_article=126

What is the meaning of the term "Dark City"?

Is it this? :-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6ngAlzE3FY

Charlton Heston in Soylent Green? :-

Bladerunner with Harrison Ford? :-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mID7iCAjnU&NR

Not to mention the film "Dark City", "Matrix", and Batman's "Gotham City" which are easy to find on U Tube or Google.

The themes film and art show converge into similar themes. Not just futuristic urban nightmares where the environment collapses causing chaos.

They also include the inescapable link between urban environment being a reflection of the mind. The riddle to the way we think is found in our street-scapes. The way we think is also affected by the environment as well.

In a culture where fear and lies create power, you will find houses without faces, streets that are inhuman, and humans that do not recognise each other as humans. Roads and traffic funneling into unfair tollways. The poor: pushed away to ghastly isolated areas so similar to Soweto dust-pans: they can't afford the rent.

"Dark times ahead". Jane Jacobs
Posted by saintfletcher, Saturday, 30 December 2006 6:30:01 PM
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Oops

I missed a reference

Soylent Green can be found on : -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c25tTzGJmcs

For those curious to have a quick look.

Great retro sci fi stuff, scary as a possible future too.

: ) OLO's saintfletcher
Posted by saintfletcher, Saturday, 30 December 2006 6:43:23 PM
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spendocrat&pk, I would hope, that if your ideology comes to fruit, you have tribes of headhunters and cannibals settle near you plus a few tribes who do not practice birth control plus lots of mosques and quite a few interesting other cultural sorts.
You must find our quiet little country too, too boring. Have fun with your nice multiculture.
Posted by mickijo, Sunday, 31 December 2006 10:26:03 AM
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IT'S LIFE, BUT CERTAINLY NOT AS WE WANT IT
Dr Clive Hamilton, executive director of the Australia Institute.
30/12/06

"Plans revealed this week to squeeze a further 1.1 million people into Sydney over the next 25 years will transform it into the nation's least liveable city ...

Sydney must stop growing sooner or later. If the "endless growth" mentality is not reversed, in 20 years' time we will be reading in the Herald of the next plan to lever an extra million or so residents into a bursting metropolis.

The fact is that while the State Government can take measures to alleviate the pressures, in the end Sydney's expansion is decided in Canberra because overseas migration drives population growth.

Rarely in our history has a federal government pursued such a high level of immigration as the Howard Government. Each year about 130,000 new migrants arrive on our shores and a third of them decide to settle in Sydney. The Government plans to increase the numbers ...

The fact that John Howard, who has gained re-election by exploiting Hansonite xenophobia, has presided over a record inflow of foreigners is an irony little remarked, not least because the Government tries to keep the figures quiet.

The immigration program is a response to pressure from big business, which demands a steady flow of labour and dreams of a market of 50 million people.

The belief that Australia can accommodate a much bigger population is based on ignorance. Ecologically, Australia is not a wide brown land but a narrow green strip down the east coast. People don't want to live in Wilcannia and, as the national water crisis should tell us, there are not resources to support them ...

The business lobby and the Government will not admit it, but a high level of immigration is of no economic benefit. Gross domestic product grows but the higher income is merely spread over more people ...

Unlike natural population growth, the immigration tap can be eased back tomorrow. Doing so is the only way to protect the quality of life in Sydney ..."

http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/its-life-but-certainly-not-as-we-want-it/2006/12/29/1166895477172.html?page=2
Posted by online_east, Sunday, 31 December 2006 12:44:28 PM
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spendocrat and PK might consider an encore. A flash appearance describing immigration critics as selfish, greedy, soulless, vacuous morons, and then disappearing in a puff of dust, defies my understanding of the purpose of OLO. Even a reappearance to describe immigration critics as shameless racists would be a big improvement, though I would suggest forming an argument. For without an argument, what would all the selfish, greedy, soulless, shameless, racist vacuous morons have to stand on?
Posted by Fester, Sunday, 31 December 2006 11:06:15 PM
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Justin W wrote;

“However, the more relevant argument is not about population growth per se, but what is the sustainable footprint of a city like Brisbane?”

How can we possibly address the issue of the city’s footprint if the number of consumers and waste-producers is going to continue to rapidly increase?

Even if we are hugely successful in addressing the per-capita resource-consumption aspect, to the point of reducing it by say 25%, and the population increases by 33%, then we have gained nothing. With the current mindset of our political masters, the population is set to increase by an amount that will cancel out and completely overwhelm even the best improvements in the average personal footprint, and in a pretty short timeframe, after which it will of course just keep on increasing.

So the population growth factor really is of the utmost importance, far ahead of anything else. But of course all sorts of other measures have to be taken as well in order to address genuine sustainability in a holistic manner.

The “visionary” SEQ plan, along with the Integrated Planning Act amount do little more than improve organisation of rapid and unending human expansion.

As you say, “the future is not promising”.

Justin, you seem to have it together in terms of the basics of sustainability.

Please tell us more about ‘Sustainable Brisbane’.
Posted by Ludwig, Monday, 1 January 2007 9:30:49 PM
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To Fester and others, I read your diatribes and did not recognise in them a response to anything I had written. You, Fester, in particular have put words in my mouth and argued against those words. I'm not going to engage with that. For example, I made it clear that I believe that Australian immigration , while I am in favour of it, is not a solution to world poverty. Nor did I suggest that we should forgo our right to decide who migrates to Australia.

To the xenophobe who suggested that I might like migrants living next to me with 'lots of mosques and quite a few interesting other cultural sorts.' (not to mention cannibals and headhunters), that's very funny. Is that the sort of argument you want me to engage with, Fester? To Plersdus - I don't believe that I or anyone here has said that it was wrong for the first fleeters to come here - don't bother setting up straw men so you can knock them down, it might be entertaining for you, but not for most of us.

In fact all you anti-immigration xenophobes, there are plenty of other threads for you to parade your ugly prejudices on, this happens to be about urban sustainability. Do you have anything interesting to say on that matter?

There is a case for debating what Australia's future population should be and how it should be achieved, but that is only one aspect of the urban sustainability issue and would be better dealt with in other threads as I seem to recall it already has been. Certainly the origin of the migrants is not relevant to this topic.

Justin, I have seen arguments that the concepts of green belt and limiting city footprints do not work, they create big increases in land prices. I think that it was tried in London and Sydney post WW2 and more recently in Seattle, with limited success in achieving objectives and with the unintended negative consequences I refer to. I would like to hear more about it from you, though.
Posted by PK, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 8:59:18 AM
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Some people on this forum might profit from a short math lesson. At any given time, growth in population numbers is proportional to the population size P: dP/dt = rP, where r is the fractional (percentage) population growth rate. If the annual growth rate is 1% and you start with 100 people you will have 101 at the end of the year and 101,000 if you start with 100,000. Equations like this are first order differential equations, and any differential equations textbook will explain how to solve them. In this case the solution is P(t) = P(0)exp(rt), where P(0) is the population at the arbitrary starting time, t is the time since the start, and P(t) is the population at time t. For a constant r, if you know the population at some time you can also calculate the future population at any point. With this equation plus a basic scientific calculator and the CIA World Factbook (on the Web), you can now do all sorts of interesting calculations.

You can work out how long it will take the Solomon Islanders to reach standing room only at current growth rates (a little over 400 years) or the doubling time of Australia's population at its 1.3% annual growth rate (53 years). You can calculate that at the current global growth rate (1.3%) the population is increasing at 85 million people a year (and more every year after that), with most of the increase in poor third world countries. The idea that wrecking our environment and the quality of life in our cities by taking in huge numbers of people (even if all the developed countries did it) is a solution to global poverty is ludicrous, as is the idea that there is any humane solution to world poverty that does not involve a lot fewer babies. It would currently take 3 Earths to give everyone a modest European standard of living, even if all the resources were divided equally (see the Redefining Progress website).
Posted by Divergence, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 9:09:01 AM
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PK,

It is good that you are backing off from an open borders position, which seemed to be implied in your earlier post. However, I still object to your smear of xenophobia, unless someone has really given evidence that they object to foreigners as such, and not just to environmental damage and the way our cities are becoming less livable as they get more and more crowded. I am reminded of the American joke that a racist is a person who is winning an argument with a liberal or neoconservative. Personally, if I could choose between a multiracial, multiethnic Australia with a stable population of 13 million or a lily white Australia with a growing population of 50 million, I would take the former in a heartbeat.

People have not evolved as hive animals like ants or naked mole rats. They differ in their tolerance to crowding, noise, pollution, being cut off from nature, etc. To me, forcing people to endure such conditions (as effectively happens in such a highly urbanised country) so that more of them can be packed in is every bit as immoral as racism. I refer you to an article in the Dec. 6 Sydney Morning Herald reporting on a new study by Prof. Bill Randolph 'Children in the Compact City', detailing the damage that is done to children's development of social and motor skills by high density living. I also reject the view that only people matter, that we have the right to exterminate other species by denying them adequate habitat to accommodate more people.

Spendocrat might consider that politicians who put mental patients out on the streets and deny poor people dental care can hardly be humanitarians. They ignore our views because high population growth is making their corporate backers richer: bigger markets, easy profits from land speculation, an oversupply of labour to keep their workers cheap and compliant, savings on training costs, etc., etc.
Posted by Divergence, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 3:47:29 PM
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PK

It is fine for you to use this forum to abuse people who have a different opinion to you, but surely you could do better by responding with your own views? You dont seem held back in hurling abuse at anti-immigration xenophobes, yet you seem very reluctant to provide justification for your own position, other than a few vague statements. Are you afraid to advance arguments? You consider it inappropriate to discuss immigration in relation to sustainability in this thread. I would point out that the reason immigration keeps getting mentioned is because torrents of abuse from enlightened folk like yourself does not constitute a refutation.
Posted by Fester, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 4:32:32 PM
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'Torrents of abuse', Fester? You wouldn't be just a teensy bit prone to exaggeration, now would you? Look, in two posts I have said all I want to about immigration and its links to urban sustainability. If that's not enough for you, so be it. I am not really interested in engaging in debate with you on it any further. Do you have any ideas about urban sustainability that are not linked to immigration?

Divergence, I don't particularly disgree with anything you say. It's just that I don't see much relevance there to any of my previous posts, so not sure why you opened with a reference to them.
Posted by PK, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 9:11:18 PM
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PK

You didn't say anything of substance in relation to immigration and sustainability. What you did do is engage in an attack upon the morality and intelligence of immigration critics. I would think that forming such a generalised opinion of such people on this forum far exceeds sound judgement and embraces all of the hatred and prejudice that you seem to rightly detest.

You have my sympathy.
Posted by Fester, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 9:54:36 PM
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Environmentalists have been expressing concern for decades about our immigration levels, and for good reason, because these levels are not based on ANY research about what is a sustainable level of population growth. We should question why our immigration levels are where they are, and the "endless growth" philosophy.

Sydney is fast becoming a transport disaster- the last real money that was put into public transport was back in the 1970s. The planned rail link between Chatswood and Epping along with all the other existing rail lines, was originally envisaged by Bradfield in the 1930s. After 70 years, I think it is about time for a new transport plan for Sydney.

And as for decentralising employment throughout Sydney - that was already tried decades ago - it was called the Dept of Planning "Centres Policy" of the 1980s - you can now see the (lack of) progress with that.

Sydney has been described by Professor Ed Blakely (Sydney Uni urban research centre) as 2 cities: a world-class, high amenity city of 1.5 million people with good infrastructure , and a second city of 2.5 million people with poor access to infrastructure, employment etc. The real estate market reflects this.

Without serious investment in infrastructure, starting with public transport, amenity in Sydney is just going downhill. And the "world class" part of the city is not quarantined from this, as the state government's Metropolitan Strategy envisages squeezing more people into the inner suburbs WITHOUT any serious investment in infrastructure. If schools and transport in the inner suburbs are at capacity now where they do they think the new resident's children are going to go to school? how are new residents going to get to work? Answer: by overcrowding existing schools and trains (ie lower amenity for everyone).
Posted by Johnj, Wednesday, 3 January 2007 11:33:55 PM
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“Environmentalists have been expressing concern for decades about our immigration levels…”

Have they?

It has been a pretty muted expression if you ask me.

“We should question why our immigration levels are where they are, and the "endless growth" philosophy.”

Of course. Nothing could be more important.

The most perplexing thing that I have ever struck is the reasonable overall level of awareness of sustainability issues amongst environmentalists and indeed the general community, but this extraordinary lack of concern about the biggest issue of all affecting sustainability: the rapidly growing number of consumers and waste-producers.

This is the ultimate psychological mystery.
Posted by Ludwig, Thursday, 4 January 2007 8:34:41 PM
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Speaking of which, Australian of the Year Tim Flannery takes a guess at Australia’s optimal sustainable population:

"Q: What do you think the ideal population of Australia should be ?

Flannery: Well, my personal estimate is that's probably going to lie somewhere between six and 12 million. But the great tragedy for the nation is that we don't know the answer to that question. We've never asked it sensibly. I may be proven to be wrong, but I don't think I'm going to be greatly wrong. The answer may be 20 million, but it's certainly not going to be 200 million."

That’s between 14 and eight million fewer people than currently inhabit Australia.

http://timblair.net/ee/index.php/weblog/begin_the_cull/
Posted by online_east, Monday, 29 January 2007 8:15:39 PM
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More from Australian of the Year Tim Flannery:

"Q: How would we control our population?

Flannery: Well, the main and easiest thing to control really is immigration levels because that is what's contributing to the major population growth at the moment. We're below replacement level as far as births go, but we do have a very large number of baby boomers having children which is causing a temporary increase in numbers. But really, in the long term, it's going to be immigration which will cause the big change.

Q: Your strong stand on population has earned you the criticism of being a racist. How do you respond to that?

Flannery: All I can say is that I think there's a place for immigration and always will be in Australia's population policy. I don't care in the least where anyone comes from - it's just total numbers that really worry me. My concern as a scientist is simply to ensure that we have a sustainable future in Australia.

Q: If we are to curb our population, Tim Flannery believes we need to change the image we have of ourselves and our country: we must get away from the erroneous view that Australia is a fertile and empty land just waiting to be filled.

Flannery: I think many Australians see themselves living in antipodean United States of America that just needs more population to become a huge southern giant. And that, I think, is clearly not true. The real future of Australia will lie in being a small, stable and affluent, confident country. Not a large ailing giant which we'd become if we tried to follow that option. Things that grow forever in the natural world are called cancers and they eventually bring about the downfall of the system."

http://www.abc.net.au/quantum/info/q95-19-5.htm
Posted by online_east, Monday, 29 January 2007 8:21:43 PM
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Online_east

Tim Flannery is well and truly on the right track with his comments on population in Australia.

But given that he thinks that our ideal population is somewhere between six and twelve million, I would have thought that his comments would be considerably stronger and more frequent.

He hardly ever mentions the population factor! And yet it can be brought into practically every aspect of our environmental and economic problems.

For example, in an interview he gave on Australia Day, he had all the opportunity in the world to tie in the continuously increasing population and hence pressure on resources and environment into the subjects being discussed. But he just didn’t.

I don’t get it.

Crikey, if we are that far over the ideal population level (and I believe we are), then it needs to be shouted from the rooftops. And who better to do it than our new Australian of the Year.
Posted by Ludwig, Tuesday, 30 January 2007 11:36:08 AM
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Populate and Our Environment Will Perish

By Paul Collins
02-Feb-2007

Listening to John Howard and the state premiers discussing the drought, the Murray-Darling basin and water policy is increasingly difficult, especially if you've ever given the natural world more than a passing thought. The sight of any Australian government claiming 'green credentials' leaves me gobsmacked, especially given the liberties taken with our natural environment in the last decade.

Actually, I think the premiers are worse than Howard, although his environmental credentials are hardly stellar. They talk endlessly about water shortages, citizens are harangued about saving the precious liquid, and quotas imposed and then, literally in the next sentence, the same premiers are talking about "the need to increase population," as though more people won't need more water.

Take Victoria's Steve Bracks: in one breath he talks about water shortages and dam levels being dangerously low, and in the next says Melbourne needs a million more people by 2025. Or Jon Stanhope of the ACT: he preaches jeremiads on Canberra's dire water shortage, and then announces four new Canberra suburbs full of Mac-mansions ...

One of the unmentionable (and nowadays politically incorrect) questions in Australia is how many people the continent can sustain while retaining some respect for the integrity of the landscape. Political parties, including the Greens, scamper for cover the moment population policy is mentioned. But Australia is not infinite; there is a limit to our productive capacity, and we may well have already exceeded it ...

I'll begin to take John Howard's water policies and 'new environmentalism' seriously when his government, and the premiers, begin to take some of these interconnected issues into account.

... what is most important? Is it sustaining the natural world and giving it a chance to recover, or the illusion of endless economic growth in which the environment is treated merely as a resource? You can't have it both ways.

http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=2193
Posted by online_east, Tuesday, 6 February 2007 1:39:37 AM
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