Victoria and the price of popularity

This vitality is especially important when related to building communities, an aspect of planning that needs to be paid greater attention, according to most of the academics contacted for this article. Sue West, a Research Fellow at the University’s McCaughey Centre, has helped make such a building project easier, with the creation of a checklist for the development of a healthy, safe and socially connected community.

“Community wellbeing is enhanced when people feel they can contribute by saying what they desire for a community and when that community reflects those desires,” she says. “The size of the community being planned impacts on the level of community engagement. Participation and ownership by residents increases as the size of the community decreases.

“Some of the questions we ask are: will the development of a “local identity” reflect the physical and cultural values of the existing land and community? Have people in communities surrounding or near the precinct site been engaged in the Precinct Structure Plan development process, as well as future residents, where possible?”

Dr Whitzman believes that creating a local identity, particularly when associated with the high level of international immigration Victoria is having, is a vital and difficult task. “One of the dilemmas right now is that most of the migrant services are the in the central city, and more and more new migrants are getting priced out of the city. While there are great services that can assist new migrants with religious services or adult education, not many are properly funded and as a result they haven’t been able to keep up with where the new migrants are.

“There’s quite literally a price to pay for the benefits of migration. Right now we are suffering from an enormous pressure on social infrastructure in the middle and outer suburbs - schools, health care centres, community services, neighbourhood houses, all of those things that are necessary not just for new migrants but for anyone moving out there.”

While it’s clear Victoria needs migration - both incoming and outgoing - Dr Whitzman says that for the system to be successful, perceptions need to change. “I don’t agree with the notion that Australia as an ecosystem can support only ‘x’ many people or new migrants. The problems we have are not a function of the number of people, but of our way of life.”