This week I had the pleasure of attending 2 events focused on the growth of Cairns
This week I had the pleasure of attending 2 events focused on the growth of Cairns and the challenges (and opportunities) presented for our city as we move forward and continue to grow.
The first, with Cairns Regional Council, invited various stakeholders to contribute to an ongoing program titled “Towards 2050 – Shaping Cairns Growth Strategy”, imagining what Cairns could look like over the next 30 years and what planning needs to be done now to accommodate the needs of those future residents. With a long view, this is obviously an ongoing project but it was encouraging to see CRC take that long term view that often seems to be missing in various levels of government.
The second event was with the Urban Development Institute of Australia, with a property outlook update with a view to the more immediate future and what’s happening on the ground right now.
In both cases, there was a clear consensus that Cairns doesn’t have enough homes NOW, let alone to accommodate a growing population and a predicted extra 2500 (or more residents) each year.
Given some pretty well-established hard boundaries in the form of oceans and mountain ranges, densification is the accepted path, but this continues to have many different forms. Logically, constrained land availability points to going up (highrise) rather than out (urban sprawl) but the economics continue to get in the way with the cost of multi-storey construction a multiple of a standard single level build, and ruining the business case for most apartment developments as an affordable alternative to a detached home (though there remains a case for this as a luxury lifestyle choice).
In between the single house on a quarter acre (remember those?!) and that sky high apartment, there are however still a number of options, which we will need to embrace if we are going to fit everyone in. At the simplest end, and the option we have seen most often, is the traditional detached home but on a smaller allotment, with lot sizes of 400m2 (or smaller) doubling density.
The next step, and the best chance at getting something more affordable into the market space is villa style or medium density community title developments, with anywhere from 4 to 20 homes (either attached or detached) but with a body corporate overlay. Taking up less land per lot, and with fairly standard construction costs this amortises the cost of the land across more homes, helping to deliver something a little more attainable.
Whether these are the solutions or there is new and improved style to look forward to, its nice to think there might be a rosier (if different) future ahead for those frustrated in their property search.