Structure Plans

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<p>On Wednesday 19th March the Planning Minister Matthew Guy <a href="http://premier.vic.gov.au/media-centre/media-releases/9434-major-new-jobs-precinct-for-melbourne-s-northwest" target="_blank">announced</a> the Metropolitan Planning Authority, Moonee Valley City Council and Essendon fields are to begin working on a new framework "to guide an exciting new aviation and employment precinct in Melbourne's inner north".</p>

<p>According to the <a href="http://www.mpa.vic.gov.au/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Brochure.pdf" target="_blank">brochure on MPA's site</a>, the plan will incorporate the Essendon Airport masterplan and Moonee Valley's Airport West structure plan into an overall framework which could have the capacity to create up to 25,000 jobs across aviation, technology and retail sectors.</p>

<p>Whilst stating "development of the precinct responds to the 20-minute neighbourhood initiative outlined in Plan Melbourne" the MPA talks up the road connectivity and mentions the #59 tram route in such a way that it's hard not to think it was merely added as a footnote.</p>

<p><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" scrolling="no" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/9bAF87hLi2U" width="100%"></iframe></p>

<p>Most interestingly Matthews Avenue is set to receive a makeover and the strip located south of Airport West shopping centre fronting Matthews Avenue has been zoned Commercial 1 and 2. This will allow mixed-use development to occur in the corridor thus diversifying the precinct beyond the light industrial/wholesale trade uses that currently exist.</p>

<p>Whilst work is just kicking off on the plan, readers with a keen eye for detail might have noticed the flyaround in the above video depicts an upgraded Matthews Avenue still dominated with car parks fronting the street and an English street with an interesting lack of pedestrian infrastructure.</p>

<p>Granted it's merely a video that showcases the potential of the area, however the visuals and the language employed in the MPA-produced documentation points to a potentially worrying missed opportunity should the auto-dominated narrative in the documentation follow through to the plan eventually adopted.</p>

<p>Home to La Manna and other large scale retailers and aviation businesses that are synonymous with auto-centric transport access, the Metropolitan Planning Authority would be wise to fight for the plan to have a long-term view on producing good urban design outcomes with extra focus on improving pedestrian amenity and sustainable transport options.</p>

<p><iframe frameborder="0" height="314" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="https://maps.google.com.au/maps?f=q&amp;source=embed&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=&amp;q=Macquarie+Park,+New+South+Wales&amp;aq=0&amp;oq=Macquarie+PArk&amp;sll=-37.725973,144.890742&amp;sspn=0.015292,0.033023&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;hq=&amp;hnear=Macquarie+Park+New+South+Wales&amp;t=m&amp;layer=c&amp;cbll=-33.781585,151.123564&amp;panoid=jdaEqona-mVApALRM7O7dQ&amp;cbp=13,303.12,,0,-4.15&amp;ll=-33.786477,151.124582&amp;spn=0.022399,0.048237&amp;z=14&amp;output=svembed" width="100%"></iframe><br><small><a href="https://maps.google.com.au/maps?f=q&amp;source=embed&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=&amp;q=Macquarie+Park,+New+South+Wales&amp;aq=0&amp;oq=Macquarie+PArk&amp;sll=-37.725973,144.890742&amp;sspn=0.015292,0.033023&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;hq=&amp;hnear=Macquarie+Park+New+South+Wales&amp;t=m&amp;layer=c&amp;cbll=-33.781585,151.123564&amp;panoid=jdaEqona-mVApALRM7O7dQ&amp;cbp=13,303.12,,0,-4.15&amp;ll=-33.786477,151.124582&amp;spn=0.022399,0.048237&amp;z=14" style="color:#0000FF;text-align:left">View Larger Map</a></small></p>

<p>Above is a Google Street view of Waterloo Road in Sydney's Macquarie Park. Despite two heavy rail stations on the Epping-Chatswood rail link, business precincts such as Macquarie Park still feature infrastructure and planning controls to support the automobile, robbing the streets of much pedestrian appeal.</p>

<p>Commercial 1 and 2 zoning and the expected dramatic increase in jobs over time will put pressure on the Tullamarine Freeway and specifically the Matthews Avenue/English street interchange and simply relying on the #59 tram won't allow employees who live to the West, East and North East of the precinct to travel to comfortably on public transport.</p>

<p>If Melbourne is to experiment further with decentralised and diversified employment and mixed-use precincts, we should not develop them under the false premise that the existing road network will be the dominant transport access mode.</p>

<p>Tomorrow a look at how we can enhance the public transport connectivity for Airport West and Essendon Airport through significant road-based public transport investment.</p>
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Alastair Taylor

Airport West and Essendon Airport: auto-centricity status quo?

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<p class="rtejustify">Following on from <a href="https://www.urban.com.au/news/matthew-guy-on-the-mpa-transport-advice-and-pans-ops">Alastair's article on Monday</a>, Urban.com.au continues its coverage of the <em>Plan Melbourne </em>Strategy by today taking a look at the Reformed Zones, particularly the new Residential Zones - setting the scene for what is effectively Part 2 of our interview with Planning Minister Matthew Guy.</p>

<p class="rtejustify">July 1st 2013 saw the introduction of five new zones across the state - Residential Growth Zone, General Residential Zone, Neighbourhood Residential Zone, Commercial 1 Zone and Commercial 2 Zone. Replacing the nine previous zones, in an effort to streamline the planning process and encourage and enable<em> ..."a broader mix of new businesses nearer to existing services and where people choose to live. The reformed residential zones also aim to better manage growth and protect liveability and neighbourhood character."</em></p>

<p class="rtejustify">The strategy behind the new residential zones is best summarised by the following paragraphs, taken from <em>Plan Melbourne:</em></p>

<blockquote>
<p>Reformed residential zones were introduced across Victoria on 1 July 2013 to better manage growth and protect liveability and neighbourhood character. The certainty provided by the reformed residential zones enables local governments to clearly determine the scale and location of new unit, townhouse and apartment development, and greatly improves local governments’ ability to plan for this type of development with confidence that the zones will influence outcomes on the ground.</p>
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
<p>The new zones are the Residential Growth Zone, General Residential Zone and Neighbourhood Residential Zone. The Reformed Zones Advisory Committee has suggested that metropolitan local governments seek to apply each of the zones together, to provide a balance between protecting local attributes and addressing ongoing housing needs. In locations where the community is seeking to promote housing diversity and housing supply, it might apply the Residential Growth Zone. Alternatively, for locations where the community is seeking to limit housing change and population growth, it might apply the Neighbourhood Residential Zone. It is challenging for communities to clearly define locations for housing growth and locations for protection from change. However, the reformed residential zones will ensure that change will occur according to community expectations.</p>
</blockquote>

<div class="rtejustify"><strong>See table below for a summary of each new zone.</strong></div>

<div class="rtejustify"> </div>

<div class="rtejustify"><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/Reformed%20Zones%20Table.jpg" rel="gallery-all"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/Reformed%20Zones%20Table.jpg?itok=Xu03Mw_0" typeof="Image"></a></div>

<div class="rtejustify"> </div>

<div class="rtejustify"><strong>And a look at how these zones may be applied, for example, to Dandenong:</strong></div>

<div class="rtejustify"> </div>

<div class="rtejustify"><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/Dandenong%20Zones.jpg" rel="gallery-all"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/Dandenong%20Zones.jpg?itok=rl9Id4WS" typeof="Image"></a></div>

<div class="rtejustify"> </div>

<div class="rtejustify">And now a word from the Minister:</div>

<div class="rtejustify"> </div>

<div class="rtejustify">UM: One of the issues with <em>Melbourne 2030</em> is basically that it had the same broad aims of reducing development in suburban streets away from transport and concentrating development within activity centres. One of the things that happened was councils said we don't need development in backstreets so we'll discourage that but also they used the structure planning process to introduce controls that were so harsh that they were basically saying they don't want growth in activity centres and also don't really want growth anywhere. So we're not sure whether with the new zones some councils will try and propose very low or no growth areas. Can you explain how the new zones will be implemented?</div>

<div class="rtejustify"> </div>

<div class="rtejustify">MG: The new zones, in particular the C1 (Commercial 1) zone, is like (the) Capital City Zone throughout every Municipality. The C1 is very flexible and it is a zone that encourages growth within it. Someone in the development industry said to me<em> "well why do you allow Glen Eira to put 76% of their residential areas into Neighbourhood Residential (Zone)? You've locked the whole place up!". </em>Well I say to them you've got to view it within the context of all the zone structure within the municipality. They've got a decent amount of C1, which again, residential has a right of use, the ability to build in that area is strong. There's the urban renewal precinct in Caulfield, then there's two sites down south which are quite significant and you look at the population trends in there,and you look at the Bureau of Statistics forecasts and they can almost get 60% more dwelling numbers (than) what they need to the year 2030 in the areas that they've got than they would under the current system. They can get it through the C1, through the Urban Renewal Precincts and they can get it through the General Residential Zone. So it's about looking at all the zones in the municipality rather than just bits of it.</div>

<div class="rtejustify"> </div>

<div class="rtejustify">I was in Banyule today and the council there is again saying that they'll probably only have a third of the municipality that they'll ask for Neighbourhood (Residential Zone), most will be in General (Residential Zone) and they'll tweak the General - there'll be a General Plus if you like, and a General Minus. So a general with a little less development and a general with a bit of a development focus to it and they'll use the (Residential) Growth Zone in a number of strategic sites and they're saying in the Structure, in terms of estimates on dwellings vastly exceed what we've been told to (provide) even under previous Governments and they've dropped off. So it's just about making sure they've got the right...not just the right mix but the right ability to get supply... and they do but it's in the defined areas which the C1 has helped enormously.</div>

<div class="rtejustify"> </div>

<div class="rtejustify">Look out for Nicholas Harrison's conclusion to Urban.com.au's<em> </em>epic<em> "Conversations with Matthew Guy"</em> Trilogy in the coming days. Peace out.</div>

<div class="rtejustify"> </div>

<div> </div>
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Laurence Dragomir

Conversations with Matthew Guy, Episode II - In the Zone

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<p>As a precursor to numerous planning applications appearing for Fishermans Bend, today we'll focus on Montague - one of four defined Fisherman's Bend sub-precincts planned by the state government. Montague has a structure plan, with the City of Port Phillip adopting it during September 2012.</p>
<p>To view the entire structure plan document suite, click <a href="http://www.portphillip.vic.gov.au/montague-precinct-structure-plan.htm" target="_blank">here</a>, but for the time being we'll focus on Montague as seen through Port Phillip's eyes.</p>
<p>In the southern area of Montague, City Road is to have the least amount of change as seen below. City Road, according to the structure plan will have a simple and easy to understand built-form profile.</p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/city_road_1.png" rel="gallery-all" title="Indicative scope of change for City Road - Image credit City of Port Phillip"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/city_road_1.png?itok=9RcwgXSl" title="Indicative scope of change for City Road - Image credit City of Port Phillip" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/city_road_2.png" rel="gallery-all" title="City Road's basic height/setback principles - Image credit City of Port Phillip"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/city_road_2.png?itok=KhzEKzf8" title="City Road's basic height/setback principles - Image credit City of Port Phillip" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/city_road_stats_map.jpg" rel="gallery-all" title="City Road Neighbourhood map and stats - Image credit City of Port Phillip"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/city_road_stats_map.jpg?itok=zeYe6bRS" title="City Road Neighbourhood map and stats - Image credit City of Port Phillip" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p>Moving toward the central area, the density and height of buildings will increase markedly compared to City Road as seen below. The difference between City Road and Southern Neighbourhood is clearly outlined in the basic height/setback and street profile - note the change of uses.</p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/southern_1.png" rel="gallery-all" title="Indicative scope of the Southern Neighbourhood - Image credit City of Port Phillip"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/southern_1.png?itok=N1Nt4FAN" title="Indicative scope of the Southern Neighbourhood - Image credit City of Port Phillip" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/southern_2.png" rel="gallery-all" title="South Neighbourhood's basic height/setback principles - Image credit City of Port Phillip"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/southern_2.png?itok=ZLdu0QMh" title="South Neighbourhood's basic height/setback principles - Image credit City of Port Phillip" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/southern_stats_map.jpg" rel="gallery-all" title="Southern Neighbourhood map and stats - Image credit City of Port Phillip"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/southern_stats_map.jpg?itok=J35Bu-_e" title="Southern Neighbourhood map and stats - Image credit City of Port Phillip" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p>The Northern Neighbourhood of Montague is where City of Port Phillip has planned to have mixed use towers of up to the 100m in height.</p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/northern_1.png" rel="gallery-all" title="Indicative scope of the Northern Neighbourhood - Image credit City of Port Phillip"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/northern_1.png?itok=jRRGGKlm" title="Indicative scope of the Northern Neighbourhood - Image credit City of Port Phillip" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/northern_2.png" rel="gallery-all" title="Northern Neighbourhood's basic height/setback principles - Image credit City of Port Phillip"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/northern_2.png?itok=Xxo1ev3g" title="Northern Neighbourhood's basic height/setback principles - Image credit City of Port Phillip" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/northern_stats_map.jpg" rel="gallery-all" title="Northern Neighbourhood map and stats - Image credit City of Port Phillip"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/northern_stats_map.jpg?itok=trhb-vuZ" title="Northern Neighbourhood map and stats - Image credit City of Port Phillip" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p>Given the brief outline above, what is not clear is if the Port Phillip vision will be fully implemented or even partially implemented as the Planning Minister has extended his <a href="http://planningschemes.dpcd.vic.gov.au/portphillip/ordinance/61_01s_port.pdf" target="_blank">authority</a> to the City of Port Phillip lands located within Fisherman's Bend (all land South of the West Gate Freeway).</p>
<p>Planning minister Matthew Guy's getting a bit of bad rap in the mainstream media at the moment with titles such as "Mr Skyscraper" and the like. We don't wish to join this mainstream media gravy train, however the Planning Minister has the authority to override the City of Port Phillip planning framework if he desires.</p>
<p>The Montague Structure plan on face value ticks a lot of boxes: significant increases in density, diversity of land use (heavy integration of residential, commercial and retail), unashamedly urban and very much public transport friendly (however in saying public transport friendly, we still have reservations that Light Rail will not cope with the influx of people to the area).</p>
<p>Many questions remain unanswered about Montague and Fishermans Bend in general. One thing is known, Urban.com.au will bring readers information first.</p>
<p>To that end tomorrow we'll look at 123-125 Montague St South Melbourne, one of the area's first submitted applications.</p>
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Port Phillip's Montague Structure plan

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<p><b>Update: 30/8/13.  Kevin Rudd has announced if the ALP are re-elected on September 7th, they will establish a Minister for Cities.  We welcome Federal Leadership in cities and hope everyone who views the following lecture walks away with the same impression we did: increasing density in appropriate areas - distributed thoughtout entire metros - increases localised economic opportunity away from the central cores of Australia's cities.  </b></p>
<p><b>If we're to have a debate the future of our cities, we believe strategies like Transforming Australian Cities should be at the forefront of outlining alternatives to never-ending outer suburban growth and a way to get a better return out of each and every Australian city's existing infrastructure for future productive growth.</b></p>
<p>Original Text 11/03/2013:</p>
<p>The City of Melbourne's Director of Design, Rob Adams, authored a report in 2009, which was then revised in 2010, on how it is possible to grow Melbourne by another 2.5-3.5 million people by utilising a mere 10% of the existing urban area - without sprawling further and further beyond the Urban Growth boundary.</p>
<p>If you have a spare hour, a must for anyone wishing to understand the Transforming Australian Cities strategy should watch <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfnynzD0yDI">t</a>he following lecture Rob gave to the Simon Fraser University in Canada where he paints the historical context and goes through the 11 steps of elimination to calculate the area available for redevelopment in future.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="400" scrolling="no" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/lfnynzD0yDI" width="100%"></iframe></p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/AboutMelbourne/Statistics/Documents/TransformingCitiesMay2010.pdf" target="_blank">supporting documentation</a> is also available on CoM's website. </p>
<p><a class="colorbox colorbox-insert-image" href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/www.urban.com.au/s3fs-public/pictures/article-images/transforming_australia_cities_banner.png" rel="gallery-all" title="Title page from the Transforming Australian Cities report - © City of Melbourne"><img alt="" class="image-article-full-width-702px" src="http://urbanmelbourne.info/sites/urbanmelbourne.info/files/styles/article_full_width_702px/public/pictures/article-images/transforming_australia_cities_banner.png" title="Title page from the Transforming Australian Cities report - © City of Melbourne" typeof="foaf:Image"></a></p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
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