The overcrowding of our major cities is resulting in the failure of their infrastructure. This problem stems from the fact that the large cities and their accompanying suburbs are being developed as urban sprawl with little consideration being given to future infrastructure developments such as roads, transport, sewerage, water, power and socal services. The cities just continue to expand unchecked and the cracks are begining to show.

We need self sustaining developments that will entice people to leave the big cities and hence alleviate the ever increasing strain on their infrastructure.

The main enticements to leave the cities would be jobs not based around unsustainable farming practices, abundant power and fresh water and cheap one acre water front house/land packages. With the baby boomers coming, this will be an ideal retirement alternative to the east coast.

If a salt water supply pipe from Spencer Gulf to Lake Eyre was constructed, Lake Eyre, which is a dry 9500 square kilometer salt lake, 100's of salt water lakes could be created using gravity, as it lies 11 meters below sea level. The salt water could be also used to create many lakes at Lake Torrens and the overall result would be the development of many thousands of kilometers of water front real estate.

New eco house manufacturing plants could be built at both at Lake Torrens and Lake Eyre, which would build relocatable houses that would strive to be energy independence. These houses would be of guaranteed quality and mounted on poles to avoid possible flooding. Cheap land/house packages would ensure a lot of people would sell up in say Sydney and relocate to a one acre lake side block.

Energy and fresh water generation will come from solar thermal and/or solar hot ponds technology. Liquid salt now enables this technology to operate 24 hour a day. The plants would be connected back to the national power grid at Port Augusta via a new Lake Torrens/Lake Eyre electrical grid.

And the increasing salt concentration of the lakes as they evaporate and are replenished with more salt water would go where exactly?

Hi Bugsy, these man made lakes would be filled via pressurised salt water thru' pipes that have valves on them. Periodically, the salt water supply would be turned off, the lake would dry up and the salt removed. The salt could be used to construct roads and then covered with melted rubber from old car tires. Building panels made this way maybe another option. Also salt is used to store energy in solar thermal plants although this maybe the wrong type. We need to start to recycle as many discarded thing as possible so we can move away from disposable societies. Desal of the worlds oceans would also begin.

Bugsy,
I just commented on Willie's other post without knowing that he wrote about the same thing I did.
anyhow, you ask where the excess salt would go. Well, just think what happens from a large body of water. Evaporation ! Now with a lot of evaporation you'll find that the consequence will be a substantial increase of precipitation. That in turn would in not such a very long time flush out much of the salt. That is a natural phenomenon that could be taken advantage of & have less environmental impact than big Desal Plants roaring away 24/7 with all their emission. Yes it would be a significant change in that area's fauna but does it necessarily have to be bad ? I mean, Lake Eyre floods periodically & an awesome amount of wildlife perishes after the water has gone.

“We need self sustaining developments that will entice people to leave the big cities and hence alleviate the ever increasing strain on their infrastructure.”

I thought “infrastructure” was supposed to be designed to support the population.

I did not think the population were there simply to utilize the available infrastructure.

Imho… the “problem” of inadequate infrastructure is a direct result of inadequate construction on the part of state governments, regardless of what they planned (there seems to be a plentitude of plans - plans for all occassions - but no actual construction happening especially when we look at state governments (and particularly the labor ones).

This is simple, people will follow the availability of earning an income.

If you want fewer people in capital cities, devolve the work opportunities to regional / suburban centers – starting with all the pointless public service jobs (the ATO already does some of this… hence my BAS returns go to Albury).

As for pipelines from Spencer Gulf to Lake Eyre and “The salt water could be also used to create many lakes at Lake Torrens and the overall result would be the development of many thousands of kilometers of water front real estate.”

Like I said before - And what are all these people, who are going to buy these waterfront palaces, going to do for work?

WILLIE, you're talking about sustainable societies without even mentioning our very rapid rate of population growth, which has no end in sight.

Sorry, but that is completely non-sensical. All you are doing is facilitating this populationg growth.

For as long as you do this and don't address population stabilisation directly, you won't be taking us towards a sustainable society at all. You'll be doing precisely the opposite.