PLANNING, TRANSPORT: "Outer-city blues makes planners holler"

The Sydney Morning Herald
14 November 2008

BUILDING McMansion-style suburbs on the outskirts of Sydney costs the economy and the environment twice as much as inner-city housing, according to research released this week.

As the State Government prepares to make it easier for developers to build homes on Sydney's fringe, work done by Curtin University and a planning and infrastructure consultancy, Parsons Brinckerhoff, found hundreds of millions of dollars could be saved if governments chose inner-city housing over suburban sprawl.

Fringe development contributed to the recent financial crash in car-dependent cities around the world, said Curtin University's Professor Peter Newman. "The old economy of car dependence is over; with rising oil prices and climate change, people cannot afford to live in outer suburbs and drive to work," he said...

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