Raze heritage houses: National Trust man

A prominent National Trust member says inner-city heritage houses should be razed
and replaced with Singapore-style high-rise developments.
Economist Peter Brain has written a report for the Australian Local Government
Association on ways of addressing the housing affordability crisis.
Dr Brain, who famously predicted the 1997 Asian financial meltdown, says Australia's
housing shortage would worsen unless the federal and state governments took radical
steps.
The National Trust member has recommended replacing old houses in inner-city areas
with Singapore-style high-rise developments during the next 10 years.
"There are inner-city precincts of lower-grade heritage value, which obviously
should be seriously looked at for high-rise development," Dr Brain told AAP.
"It may well be possible to preserve those precincts of high-heritage value and
still allow high-density housing without upsetting too many people."
The economist also advocates more development at the fringe areas of major cities.
But this would only be desirable for developers if Canberra and the state
governments took a China-style approach to building railway networks in Sydney,
Melbourne and Brisbane.
Dr Brain said railways and freeways needed to be built in greenfield sites before
the population moved there.
Shanghai and Beijing are quadrupling their underground train network so 95 per cent
of the population would be within a 10 to 15 minute walk of a station within a
decade.
"That is the type of approach we need to look at," Dr Brain said.
The Local Government Association's 443-page state of the regions report, released on
Wednesday, said under-investment in transport during the past three decades had
created a $350 billion investment backlog.
The property developers' lobby has criticised the association for blaming the
federal government for the lack of infrastructure, with Urban Taskforce Australia
chief Aaron Gadiel saying local government planning laws were prolonging the housing
shortage.
Australian Local Government Association president Geoff Lake said local planning
processes played only a minor role in the cost of housing.
He accused developers of acting in concert with federal and state governments to
perpetuate bad public policy and create the illusion they were addressing housing
affordability issues.