David Shearer on why Canberra needs denser housing

Urban planner David Shearer on why Canberra needs dense housing in the inner suburbs.

Transcript

00:00The pressure is that all of those inner suburbs were designed originally in Canberra as cottages

00:07on normal residential blocks.

00:10So as Canberra looks to become more compact and a more densely populated city, there is

00:17going to be more pressure on those inner areas to deliver the housing that people who want

00:23to enjoy the same sort of lifestyle that people who already live here have.

00:29So if not, if we can't find a way to basically repopulate these areas that were originally

00:39just suburban houses on large gardens and that have had, you know, people raise their

00:45families there.

00:46The way that it makes sense to do that is to find land within these inner areas that

00:52is basically underutilised or can be put to better use without compromising green space,

00:58without ripping down countless numbers of trees.

01:03And it is a challenge because the areas that are available, even interstitial sort of spaces

01:09between other areas, are areas that are valued for other reasons.

01:14So the challenge is to find areas that really have little inherent value and the number

01:23one target has got to be at-grade car parks.

01:27An at-grade bitumen or dirt car park is a soft target and it's not a high-value asset.

01:34Cars can go underground or they can go elsewhere.

01:37So these are the places that are naturally suitable for that type of more intense development.