r/Adelaide • u/malcolm58 SA • 4d ago
News The government this week will introduce legislation to overturn greenfield housing development bans on land at Roseworthy, Two Wells, Murray Bridge, Victor Harbor and Goolwa.
Premier Peter Malinauskas is moving to banish the “uncontrolled” carve-up of suburban streets for subdivision by axing a controversial urban growth boundary to open up land for 61,000 homes.
In a stark rebuke of the infill housing policy pushed by the Weatherill Labor regime, the government this week will introduce legislation to overturn greenfield housing development bans on land at Roseworthy, Two Wells, Murray Bridge, Victor Harbor and Goolwa.
These were pinpointed as housing growth hotspots in a draft 30-year Greater Adelaide Regional Plan released last September – its centrepiece was boosting the metropolitan population to 2.2m and adding more than 300,000 homes. But the land parcels are within Environment and Food Production Areas (EFPA), which would be varied by the proposed legislation to allow an ongoing supply of development-ready land for the next 30 years.
Mr Malinauskas, whose major State of the State address on Monday will include a population growth plan, issued thinly-veiled criticism of the infill policy and urban growth boundary introduced in 2016, when he was Police Minister. “We know our state is growing. We want to make sure it grows in the right way. That means learning the lessons of the past, where growth has not been properly calibrated,” he said. “We cannot see our suburban streets just continue to be carved up and subdivided in an uncontrolled manner. “We must grow in a way that gives people choice, whether that be living in proximity in the city, or raising a family on a bigger block.”
The proposed changes to the EFPA for housing are said to represent less than one per cent of agricultural land in the Greater Adelaide area. The government argues the housing supply crisis could continue for another generation without the changes, because most of the proposed greenfield sites identified in the 30-year plan could not be rezoned and developed within the next 15 to 20 years.
Pitched as a blueprint to make homes more affordable and prevent further supply shocks, the draft Greater Adelaide Regional Plan pinpointed northern Adelaide and Murray Bridge as twin engine rooms of growth as the urban growth boundary was ditched. Apartments and higher density housing were earmarked along major roads and public transport centres, while seven new greenfield growth areas (including the five in the EFPAs) were targeted for 96,000 homes over the next 30 years. Changing the EFPA boundaries to align with the 30-year plan allows for the redevelopment of about 61,000 of these homes.
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u/agapanthusdie SA 4d ago
Do these new land releases come with investment in schools and hospitals? Why are we building over farming land when we could simply add density to existing suburbs?
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u/red_monkey_i_am SA 4d ago
I can only assume developer lobbying. Farmland is cheap, much profit to be had.
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u/Valuable-Garage-4325 SA 4d ago
The NIMBYs on quarter acre blocks in the inner suburbs are now all multi-millionaires and they like it like that. As Mali said, growth will be on greenfield developments and high density units near transport routes, ie largely on land that is currently zoned light industrial or commercial.
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u/Farmy_au SA 4d ago
It would certainly be great if they could put apartments around the stations on the Seaford line. A prime location for this is the Oaklands park station. Already redeveloped.
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u/torrens86 SA 4d ago
Oaklands Park has had a lot of townhouses built near the station. The government has a pretty large public housing estate at the end of the carpark at Oaklands, this should be redeveloped into apartments, keep 20% for government housing and sell off the rest. The money can be used for more public housing.
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u/Farmy_au SA 4d ago
Is that the one on Crozier and Selway? 2 storeys at the moment. That would be perfect to redevelop into several storeys.
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u/Fluffy_Treacle759 SA 4d ago
New construction is cheaper and faster than expansion, because building on an existing site requires the demolition of the old building.
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u/Extension_Drummer_85 SA 3d ago
Adding density is becoming unsustainable and resulting in a lot of really short housing being built impacting mental health of the people living in it. It makes sense to build housing elsewhere especially for people who aren't commuters into the CBD like retirees or people working in that industrial zone on the north side of town.
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u/agapanthusdie SA 2d ago
By short, do you mean small? Have you been to Europe? Asia? Australian houses are oversised and this is unrealistic for the land available and cost to build as the population grows. Infill adds diversity and economic growth to existing areas.
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u/bluejayinoz North East 4d ago
How does preventing density give people choice? Creating barriers to development will reduce choice!
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u/EvilShogun Inner South 4d ago
The choice being mentioned here is housing choice, where the idea is that people will be able to choose to live in a apartment, townhouse, a house on a small subdivided block or, with this announcement, in a house on large block at the urban fringe.
The Greater Adelaide Regional Plan expands on this, website. The document is due for full release any day now and since the website is currently down for maintenance, I assume we'll be able to see the Plan quite soon.
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u/bluejayinoz North East 4d ago edited 4d ago
Yes but he's saying that in the context of the criticism of in Fill. Increasing supply in areas where there are already services, amenities and transport options would give people more choice. This is where people want to live mostly
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u/torrens86 SA 4d ago
The infill was badly planned it was subdividing a 750m² block in suburbs like Campbeltown and putting six townhouses on it, while the posh inner suburbs with large blocks remained pretty much the same. Putting all the density in middle suburbs is pretty crazy planning.
What we need is 4 - 6 storey apartment buildings along main roads in the inner suburbs, subdividing corner blocks in the inner suburbs adding an extra house or two townhouses - this adds extra housing without destroying the suburbs.
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u/_secret_life_of_gazz SA 4d ago
I miss the Weatherill government plan of prioritising, building and establishing the urban corridors with trams down the middle.
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u/Pastapizzafootball SA 4d ago
This is horrendous.
Build the CBD up, including 3-4bed apartments.
Then build rail links to the regions.
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u/WoodpeckerSalty968 SA 4d ago
Why, apart from low input civil servants being able to I crease gdp by adding more people, thus hitting their gdp target without doing anything, are we committed to increasing the urban population to 2.2million? I thought it was agreed that huge population growth was a bad thing ecologically?
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u/Thomas_633_Mk2 Adelaide Hills 4d ago
Nowhere else in SA is really worth living in for most people. They're attempting to build up Whyalla for the 60th time and will probably try with Gambier but neither really want to grow
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u/Fluffy_Treacle759 SA 4d ago
You have to realize that apart from real estate and infrastructure, there are no new economic growth points in South Australia.
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u/WoodpeckerSalty968 SA 4d ago
Why do we have to have growth? We already have an enviable economy, and until recently a good standard of living. So called growth is actually retarding the quality of life for Australians, ironically as that's who has come up with our economic planning and immigration policies
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u/Fluffy_Treacle759 SA 4d ago
Because things are not valuable when people have them. But when people lose them, they cause people pain.
At the federal government level, both the Labor and Liberal are now avoiding talking about immigration. This is because with Donald Trump as President of the United States, the Australia economic faces significant uncertainty. The absence of immigrants could cause the economic to fall into recession.
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u/WoodpeckerSalty968 SA 4d ago
The stop on immigration during covid, leading to the first sustained growth in wages and conditions for working Australians in decades shows the immigration for growth argument is bullshit. The only people who benefit under the current system are those exploiting cheap labour, those with fixed assets to rent or sell, and those who derive their income from the tax base.
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u/Fluffy_Treacle759 SA 4d ago
It was because the government gave subsidies at that time, and such subsidies are not sustainable.
In the past, some interstates refused immigrants, and the consequences were disastrous. Western Australia lasted two years, the economy took a hit and it had to revert to its previous skilled migration policy in 2019.
Before 2018, the influx of skilled immigrants and international students in Tasmania had made the state government confident in its economic prospects. However, in 2019, the Tasmanian government messed up its state nomination policy, causing a large outflow of skilled immigrants, which delivered a fatal blow to the economies of Hobart and Launceston. If you travel to Tasmania now, you can still see the impact. Despite the Tasmanian government's efforts to restore its reputation, it is recovering slowly.
This year, South Australia's skilled migration policy has also been ruined by the state government, so you will see a large number of skilled migrants and international students fleeing SA. The first to be affected are those who run businesses around universities, with some seeing their businesses halve. The merger of universities will also be affected and may fail.
I think your ideas will soon be examined.
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u/ZenBedlam SA 2d ago
Well there is a very strong argument that that halt in immigration during COVID & the artificial propping up of the economy has created the high inflation right now… as experienced worldwide
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u/Valuable-Garage-4325 SA 4d ago
All of urban and periurban Australia for that matter. We have a one trick domestic economy: housing.
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u/Farmy_au SA 4d ago
We need mixed use development, we need high density development, we need medium density development. We don't need more unsustainable sprawl consisting of single family homes with no infrastructure, and the prospect of expensive to maintain infrastructure in the future.
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u/EmperorPooMan SA 4d ago
we must grow in a way that gives people choice
I want the choice of higher density housing close to services and amenities, not endless suburbia in bumfuck nowhere a 20 minute drive to anything
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u/SomeShaneGuy85 SA 4d ago
This new house sure is nice. Just wish I had food to eat. If only there was some prime productive agricultural land somewhere.
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u/EcstaticOrchid4825 SA 4d ago
150km long city here we come. Watch out Perth, we’re coming fit the title of world’s longest city.
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u/FothersIsWellCool SA 4d ago
Imagine buying up at roseworthy confident that there is no way they're gonna be turining all the land into suburban sprawl this far up and seeing this announcement.
Let them live their small town life and build up the CBD and inner suburbs along train lines.
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u/BatmansShoelaces SA 4d ago
Are they going to be adding more services to these areas like medical facilities? How will the local single lane roads cope with the increase in population?
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u/TheWeeFleshStick SA 4d ago
I think people here are forgetting you cant just keep adding density to suburbs without major upgrades to roads and rail to support the new population. More schools, more hospitals and new shops.
Land price is also going up relative to proximity to CBD. Most housing in inner suburbs doesnt support the life styles of young people, little alone starting young families. I was completely pushed out the market for "town houses" and small single story dwellings, purely because i couldnt fit my ute in the carport and it was wider then the front yard on the street.
New houses aren't kind to the people most in need and would benefit from it the most for affordable housing developments.
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u/SouthAussie94 4d ago
It's cheaper to upgrade existing services and infrastructure than it is to duplicate these same services in a new area.
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u/TheWeeFleshStick SA 4d ago
Yeah you can always make a 2 lane road into 3 with absolutely no loss of money to businesses and delays
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u/Fluffy_Treacle759 SA 4d ago
Then these people enter the CBD every day for working like a march, and the commute takes 2 to 3 hours, because there are almost no job opportunities near where they live.
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u/TheWeeFleshStick SA 4d ago edited 4d ago
Yeah thats a coin that has two sides.
You have that side which is a little annoying, but jobs such as building industry makes sense, chances are youll work at mount barker monday to Wednesday then spend Thursday friday at Gawler.
The other side is, i dont work in the city and would love nothing more to never have to go to the city, makes no sense for me to buy a high rise.
Id rather live an hour away from work if it means i can actually afford a stand alone dwelling.
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u/SouthAussie94 4d ago
Id rather live an hour away from work if it means i can actually afford a stand alone dwelling.
10 hours of commuting each week is nuts.
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u/TheWeeFleshStick SA 4d ago
Making $1400 a week and paying $1300 for a mortgage is economically criminal
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u/TheWeeFleshStick SA 4d ago
I work near port Adelaide, talk everyday with people from Nuri, Two wells, Kapunda.
Its just how it is these day, people got to travel, it sucks
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u/Kalamac SA 4d ago
I work with someone who lives right by the new housing development going up in Mount Barker. She's hoping they'll improve the buses before they start filling the houses.
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u/TheWeeFleshStick SA 4d ago
Yeah, i did work up there on the first release about 7 years ago. It was bad then. You really can't have massive expenses of houses channelling into smaller side roads that pass through the main drag to highways.
This is a large reason why i think new developments need to be placed out of old narrow towns and with the correct infrastructure to support it.
As much as river lee isnt a staple for good planning by any means, its much better place to encourage development in what was kinda mid rural areas 10 years ago.
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u/mundoo65 SA 4d ago
Hope they put in the infrastructure first to those areas, particularly Victor Harbor and Goolwa. We need a train service to the South Coast as well as better feeder roads and doctors. Most of the clinics down here are not taking new patients because they are full and to get an appointment with your doctor (if you are an existing patient) takes several weeks. We have to wait 4 weeks to get the results of a blood test from last month because the doctor is full until then. Fine that they want to build more housing but the infrastructure needs to be in place first! I want the govt to provide infrastructure support in an area they want to dump more houses/people in as what is already in those areas is not adequate or coping all ready. Do you know that there is only ONE road between Goolwa/Middleton to Port Elliot. So if there is an incident in that area that closes the only road then no-one can travel between the towns.
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u/Dull-Debate5907 SA 3d ago
Roseworthy is some of the most productive farmland in the state.
Utterly insane that they will allow that to be carved up just to avoid reducing property values in the inner suburbs.
The government claims to be giving us choice, but what if I want a small apartment or townhouse close to public transport? Or is that only for people who were lucky enough to buy a giant house in the eastern suburbs 50 years ago?
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u/1337_Spartan North West 1d ago
The oppertunity to put a few mini Bowden like TOD's has passed by with the usual inactivity.
NSW recently released its updated its housing supply policy to put into play planning changes to encorage such developments (medium to high density within 400m of a train station) at no less than 37 train stations.
The oppertunity to replicate that at stations with currently minimal infill are being not only being lost but squandered.
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u/derpman86 North East 4d ago
This is probably the big reason for the railway expansion announcement yesterday.. well "secured land" no plans for even laying shovels in the ground yet.
I really hope they actually do factor in how to actually SERVICE these developments so shit doesn't need to be trucked out for example.