#1 Achieving Density

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Many years ago an Architect from Edinburgh noted that Edingburgh with a similar population to Sydney at the time (1970's) had most of their population able to WALK to WORK!!! This made me realise that the major period of population settlement throughout Australia has been in the 20th Century and more specifically following immigration policies and post-war baby boom, within the last half of the 20th century. At the same time there has been the incredible influence, most particularly on our town planning, due to the near universal ownership of the car. We no longer need to be close to our neighbours or our shops/markets.
All that indicates to me that there is a very substantial social inertia that will be required to be overcome, before we will really get anywhere with trying to reduce our sprawl. What will be important in that process then, will be IF we can, in some city, develop an area of tighter planning that clearly becomes an area of major advantage - and prestige, for the occupants. Until that happens, society generally, will not consider such arrangement as being desirable.
Perhaps fortunately, Sydney is getting to the stage where the CAR is no longer as efficient as it should be, simply because of the traffic congestion. This aspect may then be the lever by which we can then rationalise for a closer planned area, that will alleviate such traffic congestion (At least locally?) and provide efficient transport where needed. Part of that response would also seem to be to have sufficient employment opportunities LOCALLY, that are also served by the local inhabitants, rather than having labour transported from other urban areas.
(This last aspect sounds very familiar in that many attempts have been made at "closed planning", but it still seems to be relevant?)

I think one of the reasons Sydney suburbanites are so afraid of density is the dearth of good local examples. To someone living in the western suburbs, "density" implies those hideous and barely liveable brick unit blocks from the 70s that squat forlornly around train stations on the western line.

The other traditional typology for density in Sydney, the terrace house, is assumed to be too expensive and only for wankers anyway. There are recently built versions of terrace houses in the suburbs, but they are in effect just squashed up houses sitting around a hot carpark, AND they are often built in the middle of nowhere in any case. So I can understand the lack of demand for those also.

The suburbs are marketed for families and independence (ie, a car and a dog). Unlike in Europe where it is the norm for a family and pet to live in a flat (and the standards are generally far higher), in Australia dense housing has no equivalent marketing and limited and expensive product available for families.

I really liked your article Tim. Density is one of the key topics of interest being studied at the University of Technology in the masters of Architecture course. It influences the majority of our classes.
I think there is a lot of debate amongst government/planners/activists about densification of Sydney’s metropolitan area, yet there seems to be not enough action being taken in comparison to other cities around the world. The need for action is now; the question is how do we get the greater population to notice and adhere? http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/04/opinion/sunday/one-path-to-better-jobs-more-density-in-cities.html?_r=1
It is still such a young debate and people [urban planners; architects; strategic planner’s; government etc] have many design options yet do not know which is right; which will succeed; which people will look back on in 100 years and speak generously about. So how do we persuade the greater Sydney population who cringe at the word density, to agree with the designs put forward?
I think Tim you have raised a really interesting point of the comparison of Sydney to Paris. It identifies that density can happen within that allocated area. I think the state government would react positively to result of this concerning Sydney. But once [if] the government comes on side, what is Sydney’s next step? As you said, the city of Sydney has already proposed that 70% of new housing, approx. 540 000 new dwellings within the existing urban fabric of Sydney. Do you think they will or can be persuaded to change the plan so that greenfield sites are saved? (http://www.metroplansydney.nsw.gov.au/portals/0/pdf/METRO2036_D_HOUSING.pdf)
I think one of the big issues of today is getting the attention of the decision makers, as Arthur T. Velliss has said. Seeking ways of promoting ones ideas through the media is what today’s society seems to react to.
Overall, I think we may need to delve a little deeper though. The Sydney population need to be told the positives that can happen out of densification. We could use an overseas precedent like Paris or Bogotá (Columbia) to seduce them to agree with the strategy that density is the way we need to go. Local communities could start selling services instead of products. For example; every home has a power drill in their back shed. It may only be used twice a year. If companies sold the service of the power drill and then took the drill back, people would benefit from not buying the power drill and having excess waste in their homes, yet the service is still available. (http://sixthwave.org/)

There is much value in 'proximity' living, ‘Density’ or ‘Urban consolidation’ - whatever name you want to give it - we must embrace it, provoke it, unpack it and embellish the positive stories around it with visions and stories to entice the public and; it will follow, the politicians.

I sympathise greatly with Timothy's article and have written an uncannily similar piece myself. Comparable in sentiment it uses other statistics to make a parallel argument.
After all, it just makes sense. And it will happen, the question is, will we design it, or just have it happen around us, like much of Sydney's history.
please read
http://design-density.posterous.com/sprawled-infrastructure-by-nik-scott

and many other valuable pieces at the Design Density debate currently being proliferated at UTS.

I think you've hit the nail on the head with the consultants idea. Consider Nick Greiner and Infrastructure NSW, who are connected to the Government but are their own entity connected with the private sector. This setup lets Infrastructure NSW make a valued judgement on the future of NSW public transport that already has the backing of the private sector. If we have a body similar to this for the future densification of Sydney we would see a positive change happening in the future.

I agree 100%
When it comes to issues of urban density, I truly believe that the manner in which the data is used depends on the manner in which the data was collected.... we need a universal standard to measure this

Great article and discussion... enjoyed reading everyones input on Urban Density

EDG published a series of three papers on the 'Cost of Urban Sprawl' covering transportation, health and greenhouse gases (authors Roman Trubka, Peter Newman, and Darren Bilsborough). Go to environmentdesignguide.com.au and do a search for 'sprawl'.

Its great to see the debate on density progressing - a credit to architecture insights.

Too often the mainstream media reports only the simplistic extremes of residential density, i.e. suburbia vs high-rise.

It is just this issue that has lead to the recent launch of www.shapingsuburbia.com

Shaping Suburbia puts forward information and solutions for how the low density parts of our cities - the suburbs - can play their part in our cities growth. Multi-unit residential developments whether three or 30 storeys high are clearly not the only solution, nor the right solution everywhere.

Can we keep the characteristic leafy open nature of existing suburbs and increase the concentration of people living there? For the sake of our health and well-being, of course we can.

www.shapingsuburbia.com provides information and ideas that will lead to the best possible places for where most of us choose to live – the suburbs. It aspires for all people to live a more healthy, connected, livable, sustainable and affordable life.

Very interesting points raised by all, I would like to focus on some of Mr Tim Williams' comments first.
Quoting Mr Williams, "the population of Sydney is extremely low compared to the amount of land it occupies" and "The population density is falling by 0.8% each year". This sort of information should be posted on all the Local Government Councillors' bulletins at least once a month, we need to educate the 'decision makers' that sit down once a month in most Council Chambers and make the planning decisions for items such as local infrastructure, DA's for housing, DA's for shopping centres and many other every day urban matters.

Mr Williams also rightly points out that "many of our suburbs have very low densities and could be incrementally transformed to accommodate higher densities", i totally agree and I have pursued this matter with many council planners, community representatives and local business' for some 23 years of private practice.
What amazes me every day when dealing with council planners on 'density issues' is that even though we have planning instruments in place, with FSR controls, which allows for the development of medium density housing within the Sydney Metro area, which follow 'good quality design' planning principles, suddenly at the DA 'finishing line' we are confronted by the 12 or so councillors that decide on the work presented. Very Recently, we presented a DA to demolish 2 derelict houses, and storage sheds used as a formworkers storage yard for many years, and to construct 13 townhouses with basement parking for 17 vehicles, on a site with an area of approx 2300 sq m. The project was recommended for approval with minor conditions. (land value approx 2.5 mil).
To my amazement, at the site inspection with councillors and neighbours, we were asked by a councillor to delete a 3br townhouse, when i asked why? the response was "i think it would look better and be better for the environment!" The project was recently approved as submitted (13). l One debate on density is who decides? and once the densities are in place whether they be at a local council level or state level, can they be modifed to allow 'better designs' to happen? Should density controls be 'performance based' to suit a street, suburb, zoning etc?
From my experience the most important issue is how to explain densities to clients and neighbours.

Why does such a simple word – density (mass divided by volume) – cause so much confusion and debate? The confusion arises because at least five types of measurements are used by planners, developers and academics to describe density in an area (Cardew, 1999). These include site density; net residential density; gross residential density; suburban density; and metropolitan area density.

Then there is the issue of what to measure. Planners and developers commonly use dwellings per hectare, especially when describing smaller self-contained areas or precincts, whereas for large urban area comparisons, persons per hectare is often used.
The measurement debate arises whenever density has been used as a proxy to illustrate differences in urban areas. One of the more controversial uses of density has been by Peter Newman and Jeff Kenworthy (1989, 1999). They used a persons per hectare density figure to illustrate that cities with higher population density had lower car use rates (and higher public transport rates) than lower density cities. Their figures were calculated by dividing the population of a municipality or similar type of administrative region by its gross area. They concluded that cities would become less car dependent if they increased their population densities through urban consolidation policies.

Several commentators took issue with the data presented in this research (including Paul Mees, 2000) by suggesting that the use of municipal and administrative boundaries, which are often used to identify the extent of a city’s built up area, rarely correspond to actual urbanised areas. Mees (2009) points out that some cities like Brisbane contain large areas of vacant land within their boundaries, while others like Toronto in Canada occupy only the inner part of the urbanised area. He argues that this type of consistency has been lacking in most discussions of density by urban planners.

When it comes to issues of urban density, I truly believe that the manner in which the data is used depends on the manner in which the data was collected.

If, for example you wish to study the number of cows in a town, you could do so in a number of ways. Firstly you could do so on a per farm basis, taking the total number of cows at each farm, and dividing the total between them. You could of course count the number of cows then divide them by the number of grazing hectares across the town, or indeed total farming hectares. Each sum would produce different results, each being right. The density figures produced at a local, national or international level are correct for the context in which they are being used, and its important to be aware what the data was produced to show before assessing its usefulness.

The subject of Density is growing as a focus in its own right for planners and architects as a central part of creating successful and sustainable places.

As world urbanisation increases and cities house more and more people, the issue of how we live and how close we will live to each other interfaces with many issues including sustainability, affordability, community and our personal lifestyle/aspirations.

So how dense is Sydney? How does it compare to other international cities? Paris? London? Well of course it’s a trick question - there is no one density that is meaningful to use for such large areas. Such averages are very misleading. Even within small suburbs of say 3 square km, there are always distinct areas with their own character, house types and community.

It is at this scale – the scale of the community - where density becomes a fantastic predictor for the types of places we want for our cities. Density tells us how many people (or dwellings) there are in a given area, but because density is usually closely linked to the types of houses that must exist to create that density, the metric begins to become a predictor for what a place is, or should be like.

Yes, its important to have good design, walkable suburbs, low infrastructure costs per person, great social services and access to public transport, but these things occur and survive best when the density is just right – a ‘sweet spot’ – as discussed in my recent article in Architecture Bulletin September/October 2010

It is a common misconception that increasing density lead to ‘high density’. Understanding and balancing the implications of density as a controllable variable is the key issue here, and architects are perfectly placed to provide insights and innovative solutions for our cities.

Getting the density right is not just about housing more people – it is about creating vibrant, active, safe, more sustainable places where people can live in connected communities and be their healthy best.