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Aldinga - new settlement in an old landscape

By Russ Grayson - posted Thursday, 8 June 2006


The place

The highway from Adelaide passes through countryside the colour of dried grass. Most people describe this as flat country: others, noting the land’s rise and fall, might call it undulating. Whatever description, a low range parallels the highway through this part of the Fleurieu Peninsula. It forms a natural boundary separating the coastal plain from the lands beyond. Here and there the range is topped with open forest but the coastal plain along which the road takes the visitor has a paucity of trees and gives the impression of land cleared long ago to make way for grazing animals and walnut orchards.

The Fleurieu Peninsula is a long finger of land that projects southwards, and it is here where the turnoff to Aldinga Beach is, about 45 minutes from Adelaide. Aldinga is one of a series of coastal towns stretching back towards Adelaide to form a ribbon of development along the foreshore of St Vincents Gulf.

The road to Aldinga Arts Eco-village passes through the undistinguished looking town and leaves it via a long, straight road that passes a new subdivision. Here, Stephen slows the ute and explains how the streets have been constructed with no regard to the free solar energy readily available in this mediterranean climate. It will mean years of high energy bills for residents.

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It's a different story when we reach Aldinga Arts. Here on 34 hectares of north-sloping land the streets follow the contours of the terrain, allowing houses on the 152 lots to be aligned towards the sun. A total of 16ha is devoted to residential development and about 44 per cent of the site is set aside as community land and common facilities, including the small pocket-parks with young fruiting fig, quince and persimmon trees.

All the houses have solar water-heating - reducing the cost of most energy consumption. They must, according to village by-laws, store a minimum 10,000 litres of water to cope with hot, dry summers and with drought. Sensibly, most houses store about twice that volume.

There is a diversity of housing options to suit Australia’s changing demographic. Lots of 650 square metres for larger families, and 450 and 200 square metre lots for smaller households, will soon be complemented by the construction of the village's first townhouses.

The village is financed through the sale of lots - Stephen says about 30 per cent of total sales were made before work started on the village. Infrastructure development has been made in advance of housing construction and in the three years since building began, many of the lots in stages one and two have been sold and built on. Stage three was recently released and already two houses have been built and occupied. There is a market area and according to Stephen, markets will eventually be held more frequently than every quarter.

Conserving water in the landscape is a priority and a drive through the village discloses wide drains lined with rock known as rip-rap. These take winter's rainwater to storage in the small dams seen throughout the village. As the weather warms through the summer, the dams become muddy wetlands, the water being held in the soil.

Aldinga Arts is two kilometres from Aldinga Beach - the sea can be glimpsed between low headlands from the higher parts of the village.

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At present, a 12 hectare area accommodates the village's sewage treatment system, the treated wastes to be used to irrigate a wood lot. Eventually, the farm area will house an education centre and livelihood opportunities, such as the planned community kitchen. Already, one family is planning to make use of the kitchen as part of their livelihood mix. They hope to purchase organically certified produce from local farmers and process and bottle it in the community kitchen. Their market will be specialty retailers in Adelaide.

Another resident is planning to take advantage of passing traffic by developing a site at the entrance to the village as a cafe and bar. Stephen explains that the village will also feature artists' studios and performance space.

Demonstrating renewable energy - the Heij hut

Elizabeth Heij, with her husband, bought a lot at Aldinga Arts and built a state of the art, modern house of modest size. Upstairs is Elizabeth's office - she teleworks for the CSIRO. In her front yard is a vegetable garden that yields fresh, organically grown herbs and vegetables for the household. The side yard conceals two buried 10,000 litre water tanks. Water is also harvested from the garage and greenhouse roofs and stored in above-ground tanks.

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About the Author

Russ Grayson has a background in journalism and in aid work in the South Pacific. He has been editor of an environmental industry journal, a freelance writer and photographer for magazines and a writer and editor of training manuals for field staff involved in aid and development work with villagers in the Solomon Islands.

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