There are places all over the world that are resilient to changes in house prices, interest rates and fuel prices. Places where you start your day walking to your locally owned shops, dropping your children at childcare, school or the mass transit stop. Places where your day ends with a family gathering in the busy town square socialising with friends. These places are cheaper to build, manage and run from a government perspective and they make for a very modest cost of living. They are more equitable places and places where people live longer. They are easy to plan and deliver.
Cities made up of perfect villages connected by frequent, reliable public transport, with clean air and beautiful streets. Clean, green and safe places with local small businesses keeping their residents’ hard-earned money in the community.
Greater Hobart is not one of these places. Our own community has rated it one of the least liveable capital cities in the country (Place Score’s 2023 Australian Liveability Census) because we have, so far, chosen for it to be like this.
There is an elite group of people who have access to a quality urban/suburban lifestyle, but the vast majority of us are sort of trapped in this low-density, unwalkable, unsafe ‘gaol’. We are forced to use the most expensive and dangerous mode of transport for every trip, creating unpleasant streets and roads where we avoid gathering at all costs. The result of this, of course, is that local village shopping has disappeared, giving rise to the insular ‘shopping centre’, which is basically a mechanism to ship money off our beautiful island. All this is encouraged by the current ‘plan(s)’ for Greater Hobart.
The government fears that if they improve anything they will be voted out. Fancy being so afraid of your constituents that you will not give them a happier and healthier life. The unfortunate fact is that our most entrepreneurial, energetic, inventive demographic is leaving the island. They have nowhere to live unless they buy a car, they have nothing to do at night, and they will get paid more for doing the same thing somewhere else. This is not something that is happening to us – it is what we, or our government(s), have chosen for us.
What does Hobart need to do to be more liveable, to increase our opportunities for health, happiness and prosperity?
Proper land use policy delivering diverse non-car dependent housing. Places where you can access childcare, medical attention, fresh food, open space and a local coffee shop without starting your car.
Proper transport policy that stops bullying our community into using cars, getting into congestion, crashes, and on the endless financial burden of owning and running a car. Instead use the money for clean, reliable and frequent public transport networks and elite walkable communities.
Contemporary economic policy that drives money to be spent on producing and improving, not on subsidising non-productive ‘hail mary’ investments and projects.
A real Greater Hobart Plan – The City of Perfect Places. A proper collaboration between local and state government, developed in consultation with the community and administered by a proper independent planning commission. This will deliver the city we desperately need to firstly recover, and then prosper, with the aim of moving all of us to the top of the liveability ladder.
If you are interested in joining us to develop a plan for the future liveability of Greater Hobart, enquire about membership today.
A complex web of challenges threatens to undermine our opportunity to take our place in the world proudly, confidently and sustainably for the benefit of future generations, writes Committee Chief Executive Danny Sutton.
A lack of coordination and oversight of the bigger picture sees us currently stuck in a hiatus, and this needs to change, writes Committee Chair Dr Dan Norton.
