Parents are more willing to let children do their own thing in parks. It’s a chance for children to make their own decisions, explore their abilities and imaginations, and weigh up risks.
Walking accounts for about 90% of all travel in Melbourne city centre, yet pedestrians are allocated only 24% of street space.
Adam Calaitzis/Shutterstock
A newly released ten-year plan for Melbourne aims for fewer cars, safer streets and more shared spaces. A significant amount of parking and road space would be reallocated to walking and cycling.
Pedestrians walking along Bridge Street to Erskineville station in Sydney could take advantage of an extra southern entrance, as could many people now choosing not to catch the train.
Chris Standen, used with permission
In Sydney, 44 of 178 train stations have a single side entrance. It adds up to 12 minutes of daily travel time for people walking the long way to their platform. It’s enough to make some drive instead.
Indonesia plans to relocate its capital from the sprawling city of Jakarta – and it isn’t the only country with plans to build whole new cities.
AsiaTravel/Shutterstock
Other countries are planning new cities using technological innovation to achieve more sustainable development. Such plans aren’t new for Australia, but existing city growth is the focus of attention.
Australia’s new National Construction Code doesn’t go far enough in preparing our built environment for climate change.
Sergey Molchenko/Shutterstock
Fires and building failures highlighted serious gaps in Australian building regulations. But recent revisions and recommendations still fall short of preparing our buildings for climate change.
People expect drivers to stop for them at pedestrian crossings, but what if they know autonomous vehicles will stop any time someone chooses to step in front of them?
Varavin88/Shutterstock
How will people respond once they realise they can rely on autonomous vehicles to stop whenever someone steps out in front of them? Human behaviour might stand in the way of the promised ‘autopia’.
Podcasters can introduce new voices to the conversations about the cities we live in.
Salim October/Shutterstock
Podcasters are creating new conversations about who and what the city is for. But even in the podcasting world, powerful interests can make it hard for new and previously excluded voices to be heard.
Multiple forms of electric aircraft are being developed rapidly.
MagniX
Some countries have already committed to using electric aircraft on domestic routes. These aircraft could slash costs and emissions on some of Australia’s busiest flight routes.
Public housing in Paris (left) and Melbourne (right) has similar impacts on residents’ integration into the community.
Wissem Felah, Sandra Carrasco
Pacific island nations are often framed as remote atolls facing rising seas and cyclones. But their cities are growing fast, so are efforts to help the most climate-vulnerable people hitting the mark?
Mandatory competitive design processes have transformed the Sydney CBD skyline.
Robert Freestone
For two decades, a competitive design process pioneered by Sydney City Council has been transforming the city skyline and, new research shows, raising standards as it goes.
Rob Stokes, pictured at the swearing in of the new ministry, is New South Wales’ first minister for planning and public spaces.
Joel Carrett/AAP
New South Wales now has a minister for public spaces, a nod to their importance to the life of a city. But not all is well with public spaces and some issues demand the minister’s attention.
The numbers of buyers able to celebrate moving into their first home are still well down on pre-GFC levels – and low-income renters are faring even worse.
fizkes/Shutterstock
Housing policy is a stark point of difference at this election. While the government took promising steps to set up social housing finance, it has yet to give any sign it will finish what it started.
While Scott Morrison and Peter Dutton boast about border protection, just quietly the numbers of asylum seekers have increased to a record 27,931 in 2017-18.
Lukas Coch/AAP
Immigration has featured as an issue in every Australian election since 2001. But the numbers often tell a different story from the political posturing.
The burden of regulatory failure hasn’t just hit residents of evacuated apartments like the Neo200 building in Melbourne – it affects everyone living in a building with serious defects.
Ellen Smith/AAP
Years of regulatory failure are having direct impacts on the hip pockets of the many Australians who bought defective houses or apartments. It’s turning into a multibillion-dollar disaster.
Marginal seat, major transport announcement: it must be election time.
James Ross/AAP
The Coalition’s infrastructure budgets over this term of government have been around the midpoint of government investment over the past decade. But how projects are chosen leaves a lot to be desired.
Can Australians be confident that the new National Construction Code will ensure new buildings avoid structural defects like those that led to the evacuation of the Opal Tower (left) in Sydney?
Dylan Coker/AAP
Under the new code, buildings are hardly likely to differ measurably from their fault-ridden older siblings and can still fall short of a six-star rating. It’s possible they may have no stars!
The main concern when talking about the liveability of a city like Melbourne should be sustaining the health and well-being of residents.
Leonid Andronov/Shutterstock
Rather than mourn the end of a seven-year reign as ‘world’s most liveable city’, Melbourne could raise its sights to become more liveable, healthy and sustainable for all who live in the city.
Lime is working on ways to overcome the problem of ‘helmet churn’ on its e-scooters.
Marvin Fox Photography
Every day, e-scooters and helmets are put out together, but some people ride without helmets and at the end of each day helmets are missing. So what can be done to ensure safe riding behaviour?
The exploding popularity of e-scooters could reshape mobility in our cities. Regulators need to adapt their approaches to handle the innovation rather than ban it altogether.
Ivan Marc/Shutterstock
The exploding popularity of e-scooters has the potential to reshape transport in our cities. Regulators need to adapt their approaches to handle the new mobility service rather than ban it altogether.