‘Doomed’: Expert loses it over jaw-dropping pic

Philip Oldfield, Head of Built Environment at UNSW mentioned Australia had the potential

to seem like Nevada within the US with a plethora of low-density housing surrounded by swathes of roads, which could possibly be unliveable with out airconditioning sooner or later.

“What we know is that this type of living is very carbon intensive,” he mentioned.

“But it is also bad for the people who live there. There is a very little green space, there is very little amenity, how easy is it if you live in an environment like that to bump into a neighbour, walk to the shops, or keep cool during a heatwave?”

Some suburbs of Nevada at present have 12 homes per hectare, in comparison with suburban growth in Australia which tends to be nearer to 15-20 homes per hectare.

While he acknowledges Australia must construct extra properties as a result of inhabitants development and housing affordability he says constructing must be executed in a extra considerate approach fairly than being pushed by pure economics.

“When you build a house it lasts 50 to 100 years when you build a community it last 100-200 years, the development we are making at a moment will be standing in our great grandchildren’s time. We need to have an honest and authentic conversation about how we want our future generations to live in a world which will be hotter, health will be more challenging, we need to be investing in this today.”

He makes use of western Sydney for example: “Instead of building out in Sydney why not build high speed rail connecting Newcastle and Wollongong, then we can build up Newcastle and Wollongong which is closer to the water and easy to ventilate?”

Associate professor Oldfield cites Singapore and Barcelona as examples of cities which might be getting it proper.

“Singapore has aggressive building regulations, that if you build a certain amount of green space.”