The Demise of Place Equity in Sydney's Economic Development Planning

The role of planning in Sydney's economic development since the mid-1970s is explored, focusing on its role in reducing spatial disparities across the region. Planning policies during the period of each State government--Labor (1976-88), Liberal-National (1988-95) and Labor (1995-present)--are reviewed. The paper analyses a hierarchy of factors underlying the relative failure of policies to lessen disparities, notably intra-government failure to produce effective policies, the influence of prevailing ideology, local institutions and political culture, and the wider context of globalisation and the mode of capitalist accumulation. Each of these has been significant in limiting planning's role in addressing uneven development across the region.     

On the Fringe of Neoliberalism: residential development in outer suburban Sydney

Although there is widespread consensus in human geography that neoliberalism is achieved through the intersection of multiple scales and states, there has been growing emphasis in recent years on the hybrid qualities of neoliberalist-styles of governance. Because hybrid approaches draw attention to the wide range of actors and contradictory agendas underpinning the always uneven expression of neoliberalist projects, they are particularly suited to the identification of residual state capacities in contexts where neoliberalist forms dominate economic and political life. Drawing on two cases of large-scale residential development in New South Wales, namely Warnervale Town Centre on the New South Wales Central Coast and the Australian Defence Industry site at St Marys in Sydney's west, the present paper adopts an hybrid approach in order to identify current state capacities. Through a comparison of both sites, it identifies the potential for socially and ecologically balanced development in the outer suburban context.     

Prosperity along Australia's Eastern Seaboard: Sydney and the geopolitics of urban and economic change

Throughout the last decade, the Australian economy has experienced its second longest period of uninterrupted prosperity in recorded history. The paper argues that this prosperity is sourced from an extraordinary surge in finance-based economic activity along Australia's eastern seaboard, especially in the Sydney region. Population growth in the Sydney basin has further fuelled the region's economic growth. The spatialised nature of this prosperity has produced a major shift in distributional outcomes across Australian regions and among households. Sydney-based households, especially those in inner 'global Sydney' neighbourhoods, have had access to high rates of job creation and sustained increases in income and house values. On the other hand, non-metropolitan households away from Sydney--those in regional and rural Australia--have experienced largely negative consequences as historical inter-sectoral and spatial redistribution mechanisms have been dismantled. The paper shows how divergent experiences of the new prosperity have produced an unstable political landscape in regional and rural Australia. It concludes by urging further research into the spatialised nature of economic changes in Australia, especially research that is conscious of distributional flows and outcomes.     

Generation and Place of Residence in the Symbolic and Lived Identity of Maltese in Sydney,Australia

Maltese symbolic and lived identities are examined to explore the changes that occur in cultural identity between generations and place of residence within metropolitan Sydney. The results are employed to problematise Sandberg's straight-line theory, that is, that ethnic identity will decline with each successive generation. Our results, exploring ethnic identity in both its symbolic and lived-experience forms, confirm arguments that global cities are not homogeneous territories, as implied by Sandberg, but rather sites of cultural difference. The results suggest that, regardless of place of residence or generation, the symbolic Maltese identities remain similar, combating the old, naive assimilationist assumption that all immigrants would quickly abandon their ethnic identity, and favouring arguments supporting hybrid identities. Similarly, results for Maltese identity as lived experience suggest that their Maltese identity is less important only for those second-generation Maltese living in census collection districts with less than 10 per cent of the population born in Malta.     

The differential geography of housing affordability in Sydney: a disaggregated approach

ABSTRACT

Despite extensive studies being devoted to housing affordability in Australia, few have investigated housing affordability at a disaggregated level. This is in spite of the fact that there are existing socio-economic and demographic disparities across different regions of a city. This study aims to fill this gap by examining housing affordability in Sydney, a city that is characterised by diverse demographic and socio-economic mix, from a sub-city perspective. Two dimensions of affordability are assessed from 1991 to 2016: entry-level and ongoing housing affordability. The study finds that entry-level housing remains extremely unaffordable in all regions of Greater Sydney, although the level of unaffordability varies across regions. Specifically, the deterioration in housing affordability is more obvious in low-income regions such as Western Sydney. In addition, the ongoing housing affordability of those who have entered the market improves considerably within 5–10 years, although there are significant variations between different regions. Importantly, residents in low-income regions such as Western Sydney take a longer period to improve their ongoing affordability. The findings of differential geography of housing affordability have some profound policy implications. Policymakers should consider the disparities across different regions by formulating a more targeted and regionally balanced housing policy.     

Equity Issues in the 'New Prosperity' of the 1990s: The case of Sydney

Equity issues associated with Sydney's engagement with prosperity, especially over the last decade, are examined. Sydney is positioned within the historic contexts of major national economic change and of globalisation, noting especially the rise in importance of the financial, property and business services sectors. These sectors are concentred in inner Sydney and have helped position Sydney as Australia's leading global city, thereby generating jobs and growth in incomes. At the same time, however, there have been major shifts in patterns of income distribution across the Sydney metropolitan area and between Sydney and other parts of Australia. In particular, we note the 'revitalisation' of Sydney's inner-urban areas and their association with new forms of Central Business District (CBD) workforce growth and a significant realignment of journey-to-work patterns. Using Australian Taxation Office income data, the dynamics and some of the equity outcomes of 1990s prosperity within the Sydney metropolitan area are examined, paying particular attention to the impact of change in and around the Sydney CBD and the City of Sydney local government area. We find that there has been a complex shift in the nature of inequality across the Sydney metropolitan area, including a widening in incomes in some instances and a major geographic shift in Sydney's income-divide axis. The paper concludes by arguing that ongoing economic prosperity in Sydney will depend on the extent to which social cleavage can be avoided by a more equitable sharing of the benefits of prosperity.     

The scale of segregation: ancestral groups in Sydney, 2011

Most studies of urban residential segregation analyse it at a single-scale only, usually the smallest for which relevant census data are available. Following a recent argument that such segregation is multiscalar, this paper reports on multilevel modelling of the segregation of 42 ancestral groups in Sydney, Australia, looking at its intensity at four separate scales in which segregation at each scale is presented nett of its intensity at all higher-level scales. Most groups are more segregated at the macro- and micro-scales than at two intermediate meso-scales, with variations across them reflecting their size, recency of arrival in Australia and cultural differences from the host society. The findings are used as the basis for developing a multiscale appreciation of residential patterning.     

Islam in Sydney: Contesting the Discourse of Absence

Non‐recognition is one of the key modes of re‐inscribing the Other. In Sydney's anti‐mosque politics this form of oppression was manifest as a discourse of absence. Sydney Muslims have been portrayed as non‐existent within, or external to, localities where mosques have been proposed. In these circumstances claims to belonging and citizenship by Sydney Muslims have been fundamentally injured. Census data are used to challenge the historical and contemporary constructions of Islamic absence in Australia. Sydney Muslims are a culturally diverse and somewhat disparate faith group. They are increasingly present in areas outside of the initial zones of residential focus. This diversity and dynamism is a substantial challenge for Islamic community building (Ummah) in Sydney and presents rich foci for further research.     

The Particularity of Global Places: Placemaking Practices in Los Angeles and Sydney

What makes places different from one another in the context of globalization? An analysis of 17 emblematic practices in two global cities, Los Angeles and Sydney, provides the empirical basis for answering this question. Evidence from the built environment, the social geography, and the patterns of disorder in the inner cities of these two global places shows that these cities were more alike in the late 1960s than they are today. The differentiation of the two places has increased as the effects of globalization have become more pervasive. The evidence presented in this paper suggests that there is nothing inherent in contemporary globalization that requires global cities to have inner city slums, ghettoes, massive homelessness, residential disinvestment, White flight, relict or suboptimally-utilized brownfields, illegal prostitution, a war on drugs, public spaces awash with guns, and so forth. Places are viewed here as constellations of distinctive practices configured in particular geographical settings at the intersection of specific conjunctures of historical change. Places matter in the epoch of globalization as differentially embedded, bounded particularities consisting of a mixed assortment of human practices forming causally consequential fields of effects.     

新亚欧大陆桥东端城市群空间结构规划构想

基于陆桥经济理论,着眼陆桥经济带东部崛起,分析了当前新亚欧大陆桥东端淮海城市群空间结构特点,指出当前陆桥经济发展带来的新的挑战和机遇。通过淮海城市群中心城市职能指数和经济联系强度的相互验证计算,进一步明确徐州作为本区域的中心性城市地位,提出了新亚欧大陆桥东端淮海城市群"一心五轴六组团"的总体空间规划构想,以及实施规划的三大措施,即建设具有强大辐射力的区域性特大中心城市、实施淮海城市群核心区一体化、推动淮海城市群规划上升为国家战略。     

Strategic planning and urban restructuring: the case of Pyrmont‐Ultimo

The City West Urban Strategy is concerned with redevelopment in part of inner metropolitan Sydney. Such plans should not be seen in isolation, but in a wider temporal and spatial context. Pyrmont and Ultimo have been undergoing significant socioeconomic changes for a decade and this trend is likely to be reinforced and intensified if the Strategy is implemented. Also the recent and projected changes are consistent with a global pattern of restructuring in urban waterfront areas where former port and industrial functions have declined.     

Quantifying the sustainability of urban growth and form through time: An algorithmic analysis of a city's development

Throughout the latter half of the 20th century, households and cities have changed dramatically. Dense urban developments have given way to lower density suburbanization, while the changing face of the typical family has led to different household makeups. Analyzing how changing urban form influences the sustainability of cities is important for planning future ways in which society aggregates itself. Using current data layers, such as urban boundaries and building footprints, along with past aerial photographs of the city and census data, a detailed reconstruction of the city of Pocatello, Idaho was possible for 1941 for both urban form and population. Using these data sources an algorithmic analysis of various aspects of the city, clustering, compactness, connectivity, and density, was performed on a decadal basis. Results showed an overwhelming trend toward less sustainable development for the city, larger blocks, measured by intersection density, larger distances between houses, fewer people utilizing more space, a more irregularly shaped urban form, an average greater distance from the city center for development, and decreased connectivity, as measured by intersection density. Because the data sources used for this study are readily available to most planning municipalities, the same analysis could be performed on various cities and metros across the United States.     

Network-scape metric analysis: a new approach for the pattern analysis of urban road networks

The spatial patterns of road networks reflect the morphological and structural characteristics of cities. Previous studies have focused mainly on seeking universal laws in road networks rather than explaining their differences. A new approach for road network pattern analysis is proposed that has been inspired by landscape metric analysis. The utility of this approach is illustrated through (but is not limited to) the extraction of the main factors in network landscapes, or network-scapes for short. Twenty-four metrics were calculated for network-scapes of 100 cities worldwide, before an exploratory analysis is performed to detect the main factors. Four main factors were revealed and may be regarded as the characteristic indicators of road networks, which were identified to be evenness, richness-density, shape irregularity, and size and shape variation. The meanings of these factors are explained, and their spatial distributions are illustrated. Compared to existing road network analytics, these factors depict better the characteristic differences of road networks. The proposed approach provides a new framework for road network pattern analysis from a cellular perspective.     

国土空间规划中城镇空间和城镇开发边界的划定

在2016年国务院印发的《省级空间规划试点方案》所提出的“开展基础评价”和“绘制规划底图”两项主要任务中,城镇适宜性的评价与城镇空间、城镇开发边界的划定属于核心内容,同时也是一项具有较强探索性的工作。以国家对国土空间规划的基本设想为依据,对城镇空间和城镇开发边界的概念和内涵、空间关系、相关规则进行深入探讨,确定了城镇适宜性评价与城镇空间、城镇开发边界划定的主要思路和技术路线。结合福建省空间规划的案例,分析了城镇适宜性评价与城镇空间、城镇开发边界划定的过程、方法和结果。不同于以往各部门开展的空间性规划,城镇空间和城镇开发边界的划定建立在资源环境承载能力和国土空间开发适宜性的基础评价之上,这使得城镇开发建设活动的空间布局在资源环境本底方面得到合理保障,城镇空间和城镇开发边界的划定也有了较为科学、客观的依据。此外,把基础底图的研制与城镇发展潜能、城镇开发指向的评估,以及开发建设的规模管控、空间管控、开发强度管控系统地整合起来,使得规划底图的随意性得到了较好的控制。实践表明,本文的思路和技术方法是合理可行的,这一尝试可为空间规划理论和方法体系的完善提供参考。     

The development and application of a land use diversity index for Oklahoma City,OK

Characteristics of land use and land use diversity play an integral part in determining how a city develops, and also can influence the allocation of funds for urban redevelopment, crime prevention, and civic and transportation projects. With the rise of the sustainability movement and concern about environmental degradation, more cities are interested in optimizing transportation routes and utilizing their budgets to accommodate high-priority projects that benefit the most people. This paper develops a method for measuring land use diversity for Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and explores the relationship between land use diversity and a suite of demographic variables. To accomplish this, a land use diversity index (LUDI) was developed to examine spatial patterns in diversity of land use. The analysis shows that areas with a higher LUDI are near interstates and main corridors while areas with a lower LUDI are located closer to where newer residential areas have been developed. A multivariate statistical approach was then used to identify those variables that might explain the specific spatial patterns of the LUDI in Oklahoma City. The results identify the relationship between the demographic variables and land use across the city, and illustrate the most interesting and significant spatial patterns. By coupling the land use diversity index and demographic data, Oklahoma City planners can apply the information to help make important decisions for the city, and it will provide quantifiable data to support their decisions.     

空间规划政策在中国五年计划/规划体系中的演变

作为社会主义国家,国民经济和社会发展五年计划/规划对调节中国区域发展具有重要的作用。自1953年第一个五年计划以来,尤其是随着市场化改革和权力下放,中国政治经济背景发生了重要变化,客观需要五年计划/规划体系中的规划内容做出相应调整。本文分析了空间规划元素在中国五年规划体系中从无到有、不断丰富完善的演变特点及其机制,同时指出了五年规划对空间发展作用的变迁:① 初期,并无空间规划,空间发展只是部门工业项目布局的结果;② 改革开放之后一段时期,空间规划的形式主要体现在划定特殊的政策区域和空间分类引导;③“十一五”规划以来,空间规划则以空间分类引导与约束并举的形式出现。通过构建政府与市场主体的关系、中央和地方的关系,以及空间发展状态所引起的规划反馈3 个维度的分析框架,着重探讨了五年规划体系中空间规划元素的变迁机制。“十一五”以来重点加强和改善了空间规划内容,其目的是使经济规划与空间规划的结合更加紧密,以克服中国当前空间管治的各种困境。     

Prosperity and the Suburban Dream: Quality of life and affordability in western Sydney

Over the past 10 years Sydney has experienced a remarkable wave of economic prosperity and growth, partly due to its developing role as a regionally significant global city. Through this period, maintaining the quality of life in the city has been regarded as particularly important. Yet traditional accounts of the global city have stressed quality-of-life features of the inner city. In this paper I examine the implications of the prosperity of global Sydney for the quality of life of western Sydney, paying particular attention to environmental amenity and the affordability of housing. The paper argues, first, that growth in the Sydney region has depended upon continued growth in western Sydney. It highlights key instances in which residents have resisted developments associated with this growth and regarded as major threats to the environmental amenity of the region. Second, the paper argues that the prosperity of Sydney, combined with changes to government policy, have impacted upon the supply of affordable rental housing in western Sydney. This is particularly significant in the case of public housing. Managing growth in the city will require attention to managing quality-of-life issues in the metropolis as a whole.     

The Decentred Firm and the Adoption of Sustainable Office Space in Sydney,Australia

As the social, ecological and economic benefits of green buildings become more established, firms, especially professional service firms, are responding by adopting sustainable office space (SOS). Accelerating this uptake demands a nuanced appreciation of firms’ understandings of and motivations for adopting SOS. Through a qualitative study of professional service firms in Sydney, this paper brings together a decentred understanding of the contemporary firm drawn from the ‘new economic geographies’ approach and theories of corporate social responsibility to trace and interpret the diverse and overlapping motivations shaping the uptake of SOS amongst these firms. The firm is shown to be a site of plurality and agency, governed by multiple logics. Whilst motivations informed by economic logic remain persuasive and pervasive, the adoption of SOS is simultaneously informed by a wider palette of logics, including environmental and social logics. The paper argues that a decentred conceptualisation of the firm brings the multiplicity of firms’ orientations towards SOS into view and, in so doing, has the potential to inform a politics of intervention for steering firms towards more socially and environmentally sustainable behaviours.     

Transportation sustainability in the urban context: a comprehensive review

ABSTRACT

Although the term “sustainability” did not gain traction until the 1980s, concerns about the consequences of transportation technology started long before. This paper reviews the literature on urban transportation sustainability using three frameworks. First, urban transportation can be unsustainable environmentally, economically, and socially (the three pillars of sustainability). Second, sustainable strategies tend to fall into two paradigms. Sustainable Transport Technology improves current patterns of modes and trips by consuming less resources and generating less waste. Sustainable Travel Behavior and Built Environment takes a more holistic approach that targets more sustainable travel choices, recognizing that changes in the built environment that currently constrains those choices are also essential. Third, the Planner’s Triangle helps explain commonly encountered situations where inherent tradeoffs can impede win-win-win strategies across environmental, economic, and social domains. The paper concludes with future research directions and concluding thoughts about urban transportation and sustainability.     

空间重构背景下城市多中心研究进展与规划实践

科学认知城市多中心演化规律和规划实践对理解中国在经济转型期的发展逻辑有重要意义。论文从城市多中心概念与测度、驱动机理、绩效研究,以及中国城市多中心的规划实践等方面梳理了相关进展。研究表明,多中心性的概念涵盖形态、功能和治理3个维度,通常基于中心与次中心的识别从不同维度进行测度;城市多中心是社会经济发展与体制交织、市场力量权衡选择和政府规划干预互馈的空间结果,触发和推动的主导因素既具有趋同性,也存在异质性;多中心发展策略在优化空间组织的同时可能带来一定负外部性,其合理性和有效性应纳入研究范畴;多中心发展是中央和地方各级政府进行空间治理、实现协同发展的关键举措,但规划实施成效有待检验。未来,城市多中心研究应重视理论体系和框架的创新,利用多源数据探究不同维度不同尺度的多中心性,重视城市多中心的动态演化模式与动力机制研究,加强对城市多中心多重绩效的系统分析,以及关注多中心规划实践涉及的多层次治理以及治理变革中的整合与冲突。