The real solution here is very rapid rail.
And the thing could pay for itself, if some of the resumed land, is rezoned as urban and sold to young folks who prefer a backyard!
These areas could be planed as largely self contained towns, replete with a CBD, independent power supplies and industrial estates, surrounded on all sides by green belts.
Green belts that could be recreational parks and market gardens that absorb use and safely recycle all the liquid biological waste, which could be sopped up by profit producing mop crops?
Like say, bamboo groves?
Bamboo has a higher tensile strength than steel, can be harvested trianually, used as scaffolding; or as compressed products, able to replace many building materials!
Populations of around thirty thousand is enough to allow things like competing supermarkets, sporting venues, theatres, cafes, and all one might find in any large capital city, except on a smaller scale.
You also have the added advantage of size, for security purposes, where the odd stranger stands out like a sore thumb.
Moreover, smaller communities seem to coalesce better and are usually more community minded?
I mean, the loneliest place in the world can be a very big city, where almost everyone is surrounded by self absorbed strangers?
Rents are usually much lower in smaller self-contained communities!
Everything is closer, and the residents produce a fraction of the carbon of large city dwellers, who on average, produce 2.5 times more carbon than their country cousins.
The only people who would miss out, in more pragmatic decentralisation, are profit hungry, billionaire urban redevelopers; the multimillionaire architects, who design their high rise towers for them; and the ever present predatory millionaire realtor's, who mass market them?

Dear Cheryl,

I could not understand the following:

<<Not only have Betty and Bob benefited from 30 years of population growth, but they have benefited by 30 years of property price inflation.>>

Does an inflated house grow more rooms?
Does it insulate better over time?
Is it more pleasant to live in?

What's the point of having a more expensive house when all other houses are also more expensive by the same ratio?
Does the nominal amount of inflated $$'s matter, so one can eventually claim to be a millionaire?
One thing is sure - council rates and the percentage-of-value part of water-bills only go higher!

You say that Betty and Bob also benefited from population growth - other than having more neighbours, more cars parked and more noise in their street, do they now have more friends as a result, and more time to enjoy all those friends?

This article is full of the same biases it accuses of green groups. Using rhetoric such as 'heritage huggers' gives the game away from the beginning.

I have yet to see the balance weighted in favour of green groups or those concerned about heritage. There are far more approvals of dodgy developments of which the outcomes have to be endured by those around them with little real consultation. Often the plans are a done deal before the consultation process has been begun as was the case as reported in some of the dodgy deals in Sydney.

Those who speak out about population growth are not out to control the reproductive rights of women. The strawman approach does not make the author's case very convincing. SA may not have a large influx of population but then if that is the case the development applications are, by that argument, unnecessary.

Cheryl please explain, just what these environmental credentials you talk about are. I see you are only impressed by those who are "publishing articles or journals on population."

From this I can only gather you have some misguided belief that anything of use comes from academics in the field. Those ivory tower dwellers, pontificating from a great height producing useless drivel consumed only by their compatriots.

Well sorry love, but it is the opinion of residents, not self styled experts that matters, & no other.

I don't know where you get the idea that Queensland has "greying greenies in spades", you are certainly out of step with the rest of your brethren. We find oldies are constantly referred to as reactionaries, not greenies around here. Strange isn't It, & doubtful they could be both simultaneously. The ones I know certainly are not greenies, & will tell you so damn quickly.

That people don't want their life stuffed up just to suit strangers is quite understandable, & reasonable.

I am shortly going to find the house keys, not seen for a decade or more. We can still leave things open in our district, but not for long. A 50,000 population satellite city is being developed only 10Km from us.

As with other such small block, dense population developments, this will bring a flood of rental accommodation, which is always accompanied by a drastic increased crime, particularly break & enter.

Insurance companies will force us to install deadlocks, & other such expensive paraphernalia, which of course only keep honest folk out, but make insurance companies happier, & our bank accounts smaller.

It is only the residents desires, & definitely not the opinion of some fool demographer that should control such development.

Just to correct any misunderstandings...

I don't work for the ACF. Cheryl made that one up. No one pays me or encourages me to post here. I do feel strongly about this issue (population growth and distribution), as I believe that it is behind a lot of our other problems (quite apart from cats in trees and dandruff), but I am not obsessed to the point of telling lies about people or deliberately misrepresenting them.

If Cheryl has a problem with the Productivity Commission, she should take it up with them, not try to shoot the messenger.

By the way, what is Luvox? I have never heard of Luvox, but no doubt Cheryl has some experience with it.

< Would you like some sustainability with your steak? Is that person sustainable? I want a sustainable haircut. >

Thanks Malcolm. You’ve done another terrific job in stirring up debate on this issue.

Just about all respondents to your articles on OLO, in the Adelaide Advertiser and on New Matilda, have let you know just how far off the planet you are.

I once said to you that it seems that you are actually playing devil’s advocate and are on the side of us population stabilisers and are trying to embarrass the pro-growth-forever lobby.

You didn’t respond.

I am now convinced that this is the case.

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/opinion/letters-population-growth-will-put-pressure-on-our-resources/story-e6freabc-1226659632353

http://newmatilda.com/2013/06/07/stop-breeding-nations-sake