Poverty rates across the suburban landscape have increased by 50 percent since 1990. This suburbanization of poverty is one of the most important demographic trends of the last 50 years.
Australia has had a large influx of skilled migrants in recent decades. Better educated and more highly paid than past generations of migrants, they are also creating a different sort of community.
As ‘Heart Month’ kicks off across North America, a cardiovascular researcher explains how the neighbourhood you live in can affect your risks of heart disease.
Low-density suburbs can cause social isolation that’s harmful for individual and community well-being. But research confirms we can plan neighbourhood centres so they become vibrant social hubs.
Residents of established middle suburbs are slowly coming round to the idea, but governments and the property sector lack the capacity to deliver compact cities that are acceptable to the community.
In a system that’s far better at identifying the best payers than finding the best players, the pipeline of talent gets choked out by costly tournament and team fees.
The mall’s inventor, Victor Gruen, envisioned thriving hubs of civic activity, rather than bland, asphalt-enclosed shopping centers. Is his original vision now being realized – or further corrupted?
With the winding back of government support for housing, ‘gateway’ suburbs that have in the past accepted and supported recent immigrants are becoming increasingly unaffordable.
Suburban areas feel infrastructure stress most acutely. Having to deal with severe inadequacies, suburbs offer fertile ground for infrastructure experimentation and innovation.
Nine out of 10 rural places experienced increases in diversity from 1990 to 2010. Data show a more diverse future is guaranteed across all of America, and there’s no going back.
Recently published research has found that the concentration of poorer people in hotter places is a real problem for cities’ capacity to cope with climate change.
It’s a project that creates benefits for Melbourne’s western suburbs and the state as a whole. But the inner-city elite don’t like it and recent experience suggests their opinion holds sway.
Early residents in new communities are known as ‘pioneers’ – they arrive before many services are in place. A five-year study points to the many benefits of putting in good services early on.
Curbing negative gearing will help get empty housing onto the market. This could go some way to bringing life back to relatively dense urban centres that are oddly lacking intensity of public life.
Interim Director, UWA Public Policy Institute; Associate Professor & Programme Co-ordinator (Masters of Public Policy), The University of Western Australia