Over 400 energised Surf Coast residents united by a concern for climate change

In July last year I made a submission to the Victorian Government titled Five Million is too many: Securing the Social and Environmental Future of Melbourne. So given that I think five million would be too many, you can imagine what I think of the idea of doubling Melbourne’s population to eight million. Melbourne’s population is growing on a scale not seen in Australia before, swelling by almost 150,000 people in the last two years. Its population is growing by more than 200 people per day, 1500 per week, 75,000 per year. This is much faster than all other major Australian cities. It will give us another million people in 15 years. The national rate of population growth has sped up since the mid 2000s. The recent growth rate of two per cent per year is faster than at any other time in decades, and faster than nearly every other developed country. Is this population growth good? Well it’s certainly not much good for the birds, plants and animals. This year Melbourne’s Urban Growth Boundary was expanded by 43,000 hectares; which is roughly the size of four Phillip Islands. This will allow the destruction of 7,000 hectares of volcanic plains grassland, and nearly 1000 hectares of grassy woodland. Since European settlement over 95 per cent of Victoria’s original native grassland has been destroyed. I believe we should be protecting the less than 5 per cent we still have. And it’s hard to see how extra population is good for people, either. Expanding the Urban Growth Boundary contradicts the Melbourne 2030 Plan. Melbourne 2030 was justified in the name of stopping urban sprawl. It hasn’t. Suburbs continue to march out onto the horizon.

Property developers are having their cake and eating it too. We’re growing both upward and outwards. Melbourne is becoming an obese, hardened-artery parody of its former self. At the current rate of car possession per household, Melbourne will add a further 1.1 million cars by 2036, or well above three million cars in Melbourne. Does anyone in this room seriously think moving around in Melbourne is going to get anything but harder? We presently have two million cars; we are heading for an extra million! And yes, we should be virtuous and get out of our cars and onto trams and trains, but, as it turns out, they’re full too. Melbourne’s population growth is bad for the environment. We all know we need to reduce our carbon emissions, but it’s pretty hard to reduce your carbon footprint when you keep adding more feet. We are using less water than we used to, but we still have to turn to energy-hungry desalination to cater for our growing population. And Melbourne’s 75,000 extra people every year undermine the value of the water restrictions we put on ourselves. Growing population puts upward pressure on prices and lowers our standard of living. Scarce resources like land, water, petrol, electricity become dearer, as we turn to more expensive sources of supply. Competition for food and housing pushes food and housing prices up.  These cost of living pressures are most clearly evident in electricity and gas prices and council rates. The most populated cities, Melbourne and Sydney, have seen the highest electricity price rises. 

Now you might think that more people – a growing population – would lead to economies of scale and lead to lower electricity prices, but you would be wrong.  Instead of rising population causing lower prices, it leads to a need for extra infrastructure and therefore higher prices. And the more crowded a city becomes, the higher the cost of doing business. Congestion costs kick in, and just maintaining electricity infrastructure becomes more expensive. The growth lobby says the problems are poor planning and lack of provision of infrastructure. If you scratch below the surface, they think it’s all about multi-unit developments, dual occupancies, and increasingly high rise. A problem is that high rise and infill spells the death of the suburban backyard. I confess to being a fan of it. There is something intangible but important about the  personal space of a backyard. I believe the children who grow up in concrete jungle suburbs are subject to more bullying and harassment and are more vulnerable to traps such as crime and drugs. What do you call a kid with a backyard? A free range kid. I think free range kids have a better time of it than battery kids.

 

Kelvins blog