Sunday, March 1, 2015

Breaking all the rules of a '10-minute city'


City planning in a carbon-rich world is strikingly different from what will be needed, and essential, if we are to endure in a carbon-constrained world.

A new book released just this week by Melbourne’s Grattan Institute examines the planning that it claims is “broken”, particularly Melbourne and Sydney.

The book: “City Limits: Why Australia's Cities are Brokenand How We Can Fix Them” had been published by Melbourne University Press.

A story in today’s Melbourne Age headed: “Melbourne's planning disaster: jobs boom in CBD while affordable housing grows ever outwards in suburbs” discusses the disconnect between where the jobs are and where people can afford to live.

What wasn’t alluded to, but is a clear implication, is the wider cost to society in the carbon dioxide emissions resulting from the constant commuting forced upon people when jobs are in one place and their homes are in another, frequently an hour or more way.

Any reasonable response to climate change demands that we live with easy walking or cycling distance of where it is we work – some people have advocated that we live in a “10-minute world”, meaning that most everything needed for day-to-day survival is within 10 minutes of where we live.

No comments:

Post a Comment