Hasbeen

Agree. The upside is that you and I won't be affected. We have had the best of Australia, and the ones who will have it tough are the ones who are pulling down everything built up by our ancestors and ourselves

I think that people not involved in family trusts have never had one. Most of them are just good investments for money you don't need in managed portfolios spread over many businesses - not particularly property. I don't agree that they have any effect on the housing situation. That problem can be sheeted firmly home to governments, their miserly rationing of land, favouritism to big builders and developers, and the mass immigration of people we do not need.

The demands of many first home buyers also play a large part in this crisis !

The lack of interest in this topic is the most scary realisation yet as to the indifference of people living here towards others !

Hasbeen wrote:

"People need much more personal space for things like back yard cricket to be happy at home."

Look, I agree that sardine like flats are just wrong. But not all density is bad. Bad density is bad. Not everyone in an area has to own a house for the kids to be able to go somewhere for community cricket.

What people need is a sense of place, and a sense of community.

The worst thing about suburbia is not just the economic cost of cars and traffic jams and heat islands and pollution. Nor is it the enormous city taxes to maintain all these unnecessary extra roads and plumbing and power-lines - paving over 10 times more land than needed.

It’s the fact that there’s no “there” there. We’ve forgotten what we’re missing out on - an attractive town square within a 5 minute walk of our front doors. The town square used to be the place to just go and hang out. The architecture tells us something about who we are - and it is surrounded by shops and services and the local school. It has a train or tram line, and is therefore a place where overlapping social functions creates spontaneous interactions.

It’s where the local 10,000 people or so arrive on on the tram and buy some groceries on the way home. They’ll pass parents collecting kids from school, people walking the dog in the local green, and others having a coffee or grabbing a bite to eat in the diner. Everyone is there, making it safer for women and children. Everyone is there, in multiple overlapping functions that create multiple overlapping opportunities for spontaneous interaction. For friendships to develop. To reduce loneliness.

But in suburbia you have to drive to the local super-mall that services 300,000 people from all over the place. As a result, we’ve lost a sense of place. We've become an awful lot lonelier as well. The car designed city divides us. Let’s design cities around people instead.

http://youtu.be/pErk61t1N70