Worth a Read - March 2020
Why we need to drop the helicopter view approach
From Government News
Authorities need to stop ‘planning cities from helicopters’, according to an urban design expert who has observed successful and not so successful cities around the world for 30 years.
Ludo Campbell-Reid, recently appointed director of City Design and Liveability at Melbourne’s Wyndham City Council, says planning has entered a new age.
I showed this article to a friend in the US and she wrote back and said:
"and not so successful..." are the words that stand out. We focused on advocacy planning with heavy community involvement when I studied urban planning at Rutgers the State University of New Jersey.
“Then I worked in the trenches as a town planner at the municipal and county levels of government, fighting against suburban sprawl and planning too heavily influenced by uber wealthy builders. There is now a growing movement back to community based planning, successful in some sprawl areas, which have been overbuilt and have deteriorating infrastructure; however, some things never change.
“It is still difficult to fight developers who have enormous power over local government officials. They continue to tear down perfectly good existing homes and build "luxury" condos and apartments affordable only to the wealthy.
Targeted road safety guidance for local government
Austroads has published a research report to guide local government on developing and implementing road safety management frameworks according to Safe System principles.
Local government manages approximately 82% of Australian and 88% of New Zealand road networks, accommodates around 36% of all travel in Australia and half of all travel in New Zealand, and has more than half of all crashes at a crash rate nearly double that of state-managed roads.
Why road rules should be rewritten to put walking first
You are walking east on a footpath and come to an unmarked intersection without traffic signals. A vehicle is driving north, across your path. Who has right of way in Australia? Pedestrians should, argues Professor David Levinson.
Uber on-demand electric bike scheme comes to Melbourne
From Government News
A new electric bike share-scheme will be rolled out in Melbourne next month following a deal between three inner city councils and Uber.