Inner City

ICON Developments has welcomed the completion of its latest residential project, Inkerman &amp; 
Nelson.

The inner-city Balaclava development wrapped construction in August, delivering 26 townhomes to the city-fringe suburb, which have now all officially sold.&nbsp;

[smartcode_project:default project_id=25572 project_image_fid=205591]

Proving popular with young families, 70 per cent of the residences were sold just before the pandemic, with the remaining 30 per cent sold during Melbourne’s lockdowns.

ICON’s 20-plus years of experience working alongside communities and industry-leading 
experts to craft and deliver smart-designed spaces saw Inkerman &amp; Nelson designed with relevance for the Melbourne market, proving its success in a tightly held market.

The group’s Head of Development, Scott Jarzynka said in order for the project to withstand the many impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, the townhomes needed to speak to core values of space, location, and community.&nbsp;

“The project reflects collective living and puts the resident at the heart of the home. We’re 
proud to have developed a project such as Inkerman &amp; Nelson which reflects the vibrancy of 
the Balaclava community, Jarzynka said.

With architecture by MAArchitects, the project capitalises on its northern orientation and spacious floorplans, featuring two, three and four-bedroom homes.&nbsp;

[smartcode_project:default project_id=25572 project_image_fid=205592]

Each of the townhouses are light-filled, with whole-floor living zones that bask in the dual aspect and leafy outlooks, tactfully crafted by Eckersley Garden Architecture across the site.&nbsp;

As a wholly owned subsidiary of Japanese construction and real estate development giant, Kajima Corporation, Inkerman &amp; Nelson was delivered by Kajimaowned building group Minicon.

“ICON has a unique three-pillared business model as a developer, contractor, and financier,” Jarzynka said.&nbsp;

“With Kajima’s financial backing across ICON Developments and Minicon, we were pleased to 
be able to endure the many turbulent periods as a result of the pandemic and many lockdowns 
in Victoria.”

Director of Eisen Property and executive selling agent of the Inkerman &amp; Nelson project, Nat Eisen spoke to the awareness ICON has in the Melbourne market, which is widely-held by purchasers who do their due diligence when it comes to buying property, especially in the off the plan market.&nbsp;

“We were very impressed with the overall reception to Inkerman &amp; Nelson, particularly 
considering the unprecedented market conditions we experienced throughout the campaign,” Eisen said.&nbsp;

[smartcode_project:default project_id=25572 project_image_fid=205593]

“The project appealed to a broad range of segments including downsizers, young families, and 
first home buyers.”

ICON is also developing a collection of projects in the popular suburb of Brighton.&nbsp;

Both, Grandview and Willow, are bespoke residential offerings, brought together in collaboration with partners, Carpe Group and Samuel Property, with completion slated for later this year and the early months of 2023.&nbsp;

[smartcode_project_cta:default project_id=25572]

Proving popular with young families, 70 per cent of the residences were sold just before the pandemic, with the remaining 30 per cent sold during Melbourne’s lockdowns.

alisonwarters@gmail.com

ICON Developments completes latest townhome development, Inkerman & Nelson 

<html><body>While Victorian building approvals slowed during the pandemic, they are already starting to improve, according to m3property Victorian managing director, Luana Kenny.

Ms Kenny expects the inner city apartment market will struggle at least until international students return and borders reopen.

But also that most parts of Melbourne and regional Victorian towns are poised for further price growth, she told the Australian Property Institute and REIV State of the Market seminar.

“The owner occupier market remains incredibly robust as demand outstrips supply but as workers return to the CBD and hospitality opens up, we’ll see a rise in tenants seeking properties in the city.

“It is likely major apartment developments will remain on hold until we see how the economy recovers but as Australia is viewed as a safe place, it is expected foreign students will return which will bring life back into the CBD and city fringe precincts,’ she forecast.

Demand for units in Melbourne’s inner and middle ring suburbs has been good as a result of a strong owner occupier market, she said.

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Most parts of Melbourne and regional Victorian towns are poised for price growth, she told the Australian Property Institute and REIV State of the Market seminar.

jchancellor

Owner occupiers to drive Victorian apartment sales momentum

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As more apartments are developed across the inner-city areas of Sydney, one of the most interesting outcomes is the evolution of distinct, almost stand-alone neighbourhoods.
The appeal of inner-city living is made more attractive as these neighbourhoods take on their own unique character. It’s a pattern of development that doesn’t happen overnight, but it’s a trend that helps to make the city a much more interesting market and a more appealing place to live.
The same diversity helps to seed and then drive more sustained demand from buyers who are attracted to a particular neighbourhood. The trend also reflects how Sydney’s inner-city areas are championing a new level of maturity as the city enters the ranks of other international cities that have long been renowned as being great places to live.
This diversity is important for a number of reasons, including the fact that it influences the style of development, it sustains value, creates incentives for innovation and because it builds social inclusiveness. All of which are important for the long-term appeal of inner-city living for current and future residents.
Exploring an Example
This trend is not confined to Sydney, or just the City of Sydney, it’s an Australia and worldwide trend. The inner-city used to be seen as a disadvantaged area with crowded populations and a poor standard of living, but that’s no more. Over the past 20 years inner-city living has taken on a new attraction and new meaning.
It’s now a very desirable lifestyle, and the diversity of inner-city neighbourhoods reflects how popular the trend has become, and now it looks set to rapidly accelerate in the future. Inner-city neighbourhoods can be very appealing and I am going to look at Milsons Point, as a good if not the most top of mind example, and then (in next week’s post) I will look at a recent project there, 88 Alfred Street, Milsons Point to further explore this topic.
I have selected Milsons Point for two key reasons. Firstly it’s a compact area and a very distinctive neighbourhood and it’s also easy to relate the area to the more compact North Sydney CBD, in many ways it’s a very precise example.
Milsons Point
So let’s look at Milsons Point, its immediate neighbours of Kirribilli, North Sydney and the wider North Sydney Council area and then when we return to the project at 88 Alfred Street, it will be possible to see how the character of the neighbourhood and related trends influenced the project itself, the marketing and sales results.
The North Sydney Council area has a population of around 71,025; a figure from the 2011 census that I am sure we can assume has been constantly growing. The area has a housing mix that is 87% medium density (and increasing) and incomes are markedly higher than the national average.
At just 22% far fewer people have mortgages (nationally the figure is 33%) and many more people rent in the area, some 46% by comparison to the Australian average of 29%. The area’s popularity for rental accommodation dates back to the 1930’s and also to its contemporary investment appeal.
The make-up of the three key neighbourhoods I am interested in then fit into this big picture, starting with North Sydney. North Sydney has the biggest population of 6,397 residents spread across 147 hectares and this area has the lowest population density at about 50% of Milsons Point and Kirribilli – the area was settled in 1836.
Kirribilli has some 3,654 residents, spread across 44 hectares and is home to Admiralty House and Kirribilli House. There are also lots of apartments from as early as the 1930’s. Medium density living here is well established and of late has set some record prices associated with somewhat small apartments. The area has ‘to-die’ for views.
Milsons Point was settled back in 1805 and it has the smallest population of just 2,891 residents (2011 census figures), it’s a mixed use area of just 36 hectares, is home to Luna Park and North Sydney Olympic Pool. An interesting fact is that the resident population doubled between 1991 and 2011 as the number of commercial offices started to rapidly give way to residential projects. This trend continues today and may over the next 5-years or so see all commercial space gone from the area.
Across these three areas we can see some very distinctive neighbourhoods, they were all impacted by the construction of the Sydney Harbour Bridge in the 1920’s. The area is affluent, given the low population density there’s possibly a lot more room for further re-development in North Sydney and the area is a very popular residential area greatly enhanced by its harbourside location, great rail connections and views – all of which are classic ingredients for successful medium density developments.
 
Peter Chittenden is managing director for residential of Colliers International. He can be contacted <a href="https://www.projectagenda.com.au/" target="_blank">here</a>.
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The maturing of Sydney’s inner-city neighbourhoods: Peter Chittenden

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EXPERT OBSERVER
COVID-19 continues to show an acute impact on inner city rental markets, the latest CoreLogic data on rental listings has revealed.
In the 28 days to August 9, total rent listings on market across Australia had eased on the previous month, falling 10.9% nationally.
While most regions are now seeing rental markets gradually tightening, there is still a significant uplift in rental stock around innercity areas, placing downwards pressure on rents and upwards pressure on vacancy rates.
A summary of the increases in rental stock by SA4 region is presented below. SA4 regions are defined by the ABS as broad regions of 100-300,000 people, and are a useful area of measurement because of alignment with labour force data.
The increase in rental listings represents the change in the level of total rental stock counted in the 28 days leading up to the 15th of March, the week in which Australia recorded its 100th case of COVID-19, compared with that counted in the 28 days to August 9th.
Of the 88 SA4 regions measured across the country, 78 regions saw a decline in the volume of rental listings between these dates.
Focusing on the 10 regions that have seen an uplift in total rental stock, 8 were regions across Sydney and Melbourne, while inner-city Brisbane and the Adelaide Central and Hills have also seen an increase in rental stock.
The dominance of Sydney and Melbourne with regards to heightened rental supply highlights the much localised nature of the shock to rental demand that has been seen since the onset of the pandemic.
<a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/images/2020/8/13/SA4%20CoreLogic%201.JPG" target="_blank">Click here to enlarge</a>:
<img src="https://www.urban.com.au/images/2020/8/13/SA4%20CoreLogic%201.JPG" alt="">
It is expected seasonally that most areas would see a decline in rental listings, as rental stock on market is usually highest at the beginning and end of each year. For the four years prior to 2020, rental stock on market at mid-August has on average, been -3.2% lower than what is seen over mid-March.
However, the 10 regions that did see an uplift in rent listings are large rental markets. Together, CoreLogic data suggests these regions account for about 27.6% of Australia’s total rent market.
More geographically granular data shows some of the highest uplift in rental stock is across Inner Melbourne and Sydney City and Inner South. SA2 regions with the largest uplift in advertised rental stock are shown below
<a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/images/2020/8/13/SA2%20CoreLogic%202.JPG" target="_blank">Click here to enlarge</a>:
<img src="https://www.urban.com.au/images/2020/8/13/SA2%20CoreLogic%202.JPG" alt="">
Across Southbank, rental stock has erupted from 568 rental listings in the 28 days to March 15, to over 1,200 by August 9th. In the year prior to the pandemic, total rent listings across Southbank averaged 450 listings per month. Interestingly, as Melbourne moves through its stage 4 restrictions, total rental listings have started to fall across most Melbourne regions.
Inner Melbourne, which has seen the highest surplus of rental stock since the onset of the pandemic, saw total rent listings fall -8.1% over the 28 days to August 9.
A significant portion of this decline was a reduction of 450 new listings counted in the lead up to the 9th of August, suggesting new listings have fallen off the back of physical restrictions around letting property.
The regions with large accumulations in rental stock reflect many of the pain points that have come with the COVID-19 downturn, particularly more recent commentary which has highlighted the gaping hole in housing demand because of international border closures. This is because the majority of new migrants to Australia are renters, at least initially.
The 10 SA4 regions which have seen an uplift in rental listings between March and August, together accounted for 29.1% of the net overseas migration to Australia over the year to June 2019. Other factors contributing to the heighted level of rent listings include a recent history of significant supply additions via a surge in high-rise construction activity, while the demand side has been additionally impacted by the weakness in labour markets typically associated with renters, including food and accommodation as well as the arts and recreation sector.
These trends highlight some of the acutely impacted markets. Due to the relatively high level of investor concentration, particularly in inner-city apartment markets, the patterns in rental supply and demand point to added downside risk for values in these precincts until international borders re-open and labour market conditions tighten.
ELIZA OWEN is the Head of Research Australia at CoreLogic
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pchatterjee-seVgoiQgz5

Rental listings fell 10% across Australia in August: CoreLogic's Eliza Owen

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Options for buyers seeking inner-city housing solutions, outside of apartments and below the $1 million price point, are slim in the Melbourne property market.
Recognising this gap, Australian property group, Glenvill has introduced a new loft design into the YarraBend development in Alphington.
All 48 lofts released sold out in just a couple of weeks.
The lofts, located in The Mills precinct of YarraBend, are housed in four story low-rise buildings.
Each loft spans over two levels with the ground level lofts including a courtyard and those on the upper levels boasting a rooftop garden.
Each loft shares one party wall and are designed around hubs of eight neighbours with individual open spaces.
Director of sales at Glenvill, Ashley Bramich, explains that the unique design of the lofts creates a community feel.
He its captures the demand in the market for something in between a townhouse and an apartment.
“The low-rise boutique buildings are designed to make people feel connected to the community, without the density of an apartment building,” Bramich says.
“We decided to include the loft floorplans in the YarraBend masterplan to offer a solution to buyers who are looking to purchase in the inner city region, but can’t afford a house and land package, or a townhouse, and don’t want to live in an apartment.”
Attracting urban professionals and empty nesters in the sub-$1 million price range, buyers have been willing to buy off the plan.
“Cookie cutter apartment designs won’t cut it,” he said.
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j.ballantyne1990-6AQqhLzZaK

Yarra Bend dwelling design tackling inner-city housing affordability

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GUEST OBSERVATION
Nightlife precincts in Australian cities have come under intense scrutiny in recent years following a spate of “one punch” assaults and other incidents. Places like Sydney’s Kings Cross, Brisbane’s Fortitude Valley and Perth’s Northbridge have been framed as unsafe and unruly “problem spaces” – the kind of places that parents warn their teenage children to avoid.
Simultaneously, local politicians, urban planners and other policymakers have been spruiking the importance of the night-time economy to a city’s image and growth. A “vibrant” nightlife is seen as essential for attracting tourism and investment and creating jobs. If a city can get itself on some kind of “Most Exciting Cities in the World” list, this becomes a crucial part of its city boosterism strategy.
The championing and criticism of nightlife spaces create something of a paradox. On the one hand, the promotion of vibrant nightlife spaces may be seen as an invitation to people to revel and consume. It’s thought that failing to attract enough people to these spaces spells economic disaster for venue operators and for the city itself.
On the other hand, violence and fear discourage or exclude people from participating in nightlife. And labelling nightlife precincts as disorderly or “out of control” stigmatises these spaces and revellers, leading to more exclusion.
The policy challenge is to establish the right amount and types of regulation so that nightlife spaces allow for mild transgression in a safe environment.
When security excludes
Part of the response to these issues has been tighter regulation and security in nightlife spaces. “Lockout laws” were controversially introduced in parts of Sydney, following the example set in Newcastle and in trials in Perth, Melbourne and Brisbane. These laws wound back the operating hours of licensed venues in popular night-time precincts.
Other responses from governments and private operators have included expanding CCTV surveillance, introducing ID scanners at venue entrances, increasing police and private security presence, and slowing or suspending the issuing of new liquor licenses.
These measures are intended to make people safer and to make them feel safer, to reduce the exclusionary effect of fear. Ironically, these hyper-visible forms of security can in fact make people feel more unsafe.
These regulatory interventions are more than just about tackling violence and threatening behaviour. Ultimately, they are about imposing particular ideas of social and moral order not only within nightlife spaces but the city more broadly.
Gentrifying the night
Alongside the expansion of hyper-visible security, major public and private investment has flowed into nightlife precincts and surrounding areas over the last decade or so.
In Perth, as we have recently outlined, the impacts couldn’t be clearer. Four major redevelopment projects – New Northbridge, Perth Cultural Centre, Perth City Link and Yagan Square – have drastically reshaped the built form and sense of place within the inner city.
These developments have “changed the face” of Northbridge, which has been gradually gentrifying. The rapid rise in the number of small boutique bars, high-end restaurants and apartments is evidence of this.
The gentrification of Northbridge and other nightlife precincts across metropolitan Australia – whether through new “sophisticated” venues replacing older downmarket ones, or through residential development displacing nightlife altogether – is not a recipe for less exclusionary spaces. Rather, these developments produce a different kind of exclusion due to two factors.
First, certain groups may be priced out of more upmarket venues offering an “exclusive” or “sophisticated” experience. Second, these venues and the types of customers they attract can make other individuals and groups feel out of place. If they don’t fit the written and unwritten admission criteria they may be denied entry altogether.
Making space for transgression
In reshaping the moral geography of nightlife precincts, securitisation and gentrification are suppressing one of the fundamental appeals of nightlife – the opportunity for behaviour that transgresses social, cultural and even legal codes.
Participating in nightlife spaces in cities has been a way to briefly escape the often mundane orderliness of everyday home and work life. Nightlife spaces have historically been important for minority, subcultural and countercultural groups – LGBTGI communities, minority ethnic groups, punks, goths, fetishists and so on – to socialise and to express their individual and collective identities.
The increasingly expensive cost and overbearing regulatory regimes governing nightlife seem designed to attract the “right type” of people and to make them feel safer.
The risk of all this is that we might be sleepwalking into the creation of sanitised and yet more homogenous and exclusionary nightlife spaces.
Alistair Sisson, PhD Candidate, Urban Geography, University of Sydney
Paul Maginn, Associate Professor of Urban/Regional Planning, University of Western Australia
This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com" target="_blank">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/sanitised-nightlife-precincts-become-places-where-some-are-not-welcome-95870" target="_blank">original article</a>.
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'Sanitised' nightlife precincts become places where some are not welcome

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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/76998/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-advanced" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1">
GUEST OBSERVER
Noise is everywhere. We live with it, inside and outside our homes. It defines contemporary urban life, the world over. Its companion, silence, also holds its own: from the stretches of suburbia to the degraded spaces of nature, a seeming absence of life is apparent. 
The first “Let Cities Speak” article finished by asking: how do communities discover sonic identities within these contemporary soundscapes? This article points to research projects that seek answers to this question.
I have argued elsewhere that sound installations can act to “rupture” noisy soundscapes, producing zones of experiential diversity. There are many international examples that attempt to achieve this. The artist locates intensive listening encounters within the city, bringing our attention to new sensory experiences.
An excellent local example, in Melbourne, is Sonia Leber and David Chesworth’s Proximites at William Barak Bridge. This is a permanently fixed sound installation that provides experiential diversity for those willing to seek it. Voices of the Commonwealth countries dance around the listener as they look upon the city.  
Robin Fox created a temporary installation in Northbank, Melbourne, titled Giant Theremin. This interactive sculpture produces electronic sounds that entice a range of playful responses from visitors, including dance, laughter and even BMX stunts. 
But, increasingly, such artistic interventions, while important and valuable, serve only to provide the “possibility” of new listening experiences. Whether such spaces should become places of significant sonic identity is an entirely different question, and one that is presumably beyond the artist’s control.
Increasing appetite for “placemaking” sounds
My research is turning toward community-led design in which a more meaningful essence of “placemaking” might be found.
After all, how can we expect to develop sonic identities if members of the community are not involved in their very discovery?
I am involved in two research projects that are exploring this proposition. One reshapes motorway noise into meaningful listening experiences. The other searches for a soundmark in the silence of suburbia.
Transforming motorway noise
Research funded by the Transurban Innovation Grant is working with communities living with motorway noise to discover “noise transformation” approaches that help to produce more liveable conditions.
Where the constant drone of passing traffic is inescapable, noise transformation combined with urban design aims to reclaim those unused green spaces that border these busy roads.
The research is in its early stages, but what we have found to date is that the community members who have experienced our prototype point very strongly to those transformed soundscapes that – in their words – reduce anxiety, and provide interesting listening experiences that warrant ongoing visits.
The researchers were surprised by the community’s enthusiasm for the transformation sites. There was certainly no expectation of a positive response to what might have been seen as a band-aid solution to an ongoing urban problem. Instead, what we witnessed was a genuine curiosity and fascination with an act of futuristic placemaking that could one day be part of everyday life.
Creating a suburban soundmark
In Melbourne’s southeast, research funded by the City of Casey is working to integrate an interactive artwork into a community centre plaza at Clyde North. The artwork plays back local field recordings that were identified by the local community via a Facebook page. The question was posted:
What sounds define your suburb?
Not withstanding a few droll, though humorous, responses (“the voices in my head”, “the sounds of hoons doing burn-outs at 2am”), we were encouraged by the range of positive responses. These suggested strong civic pride – especially those that pointed towards the sounds and smells of multiculturalism and social life in general.
The work’s behaviour is dependent on how locals choose to interact with the central “sensing” stone. The sensing stone is sculpted bluestone with four aluminium strip inlays. The aluminium strips detect human presence through the electrical charge latent in our bodies, which is sent as data to a memory system that responds with audio, lighting and vibration. 
The more interaction, the more lively will be the soundmark, which it generates at dawn and dusk.
Those who read the first “Let Cities Speak” article might note a relationship with the temporal consistency of the village bell. The artwork’s soundmark emerges twice a day, imbuing it with a quotidian character. 
But in this case, the sounds played have been identified by the Clyde North community, and shaped by them. Given that the soundmark’s behaviour is based on community interaction during the day, the work acts as a type of social barometer reflecting back to the community their relationship with the artwork.
The following recording is of our working prototype, yet to be installed. The low hum is a vibrating steel plate, which responds to human interaction. The other sounds are field recordings of the Casey suburb, as identified by the community: <a href="https://cdn.theconversation.com/audio/718/casey-soundmark-rec-01.mp3" target="_blank">a youth park and a local wetland</a>.
It’s time to start listening 
While these research projects are funded by two very different sources – private industry and local council – what they both expose is an appetite within local communities to be informed and included in art, design and infrastructure projects that affect community life. 
Rather than solutions being imposed “from the top” – by industry, governments or even public art programs – today’s challenge is to learn from the community. Because it is here that identity is to be found. 
Jordan Lacey is research fellow, Architecture &amp; Design, RMIT University and author for The Conversation.
He can be contacted <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/jordan-lacey-184928" target="_blank">here</a>. 
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jchancellor-FAypfDUnLy

Let cities speak: reclaiming a place for community with sounds

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The latest Master Builders Survey of Building and Construction shows industry sentiment holding up, despite a recent deterioration in some of the leading indicators. 
Matthew Pollock, housing national manager said there had been a bounce in sales contracts and a loosening of skills shortage constraints. 
“By sector, house builders for detached housing were the most positive, particularly in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland where strong population growth continues to support a healthy pipeline of work-on-the-books," he said.
"These results show that while activity in inner-city apartment markets may drop off over the next two years, broader industry sentiment remains positive,” he said in reference to the September quarter issue of Master Builders quarterly National Survey of Building and Construction. 
“Sentiment here is supported by ABS statistics which show residential construction work holding up - up by 1.2 per cent in the June quarter 2016 to be 6.6 per cent up on over the year"
“But areas of vulnerability remain,” he said.
“Non-residential builders have lowered profit expectations and non-residential work-on-the-books is soft. Typically, these are good leading indicators for industry prospects, with the current results pointing to a slower period for the nation’s non-residential builders,” Matthew Pollock said.
“The CBD office markets in Perth and Brisbane remain a lingering weight on broader sectoral business conditions as the resource boom hangover continues to cast a long shadow. Other pockets of vulnerability include inner-city apartment markets, and pretty much the entire engineering construction sector,” he said.
“In terms of employment, the survey shows labour availability has loosened across the board, with all construction related occupations covered in the survey showing index values of below 50,” he said.
The loosening of labour market conditions is good news as long as building activity holds steady, but less positive prospects going forward may pose a risk to employment.
"Jobs may be at risk if building activity was to deteriorate beyond current market expectations,” Matthew Pollock said.
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Inner-city apartment markets have a vulnerability: Master Builders

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With residential building at record levels and markets headed for oversupply, Frank Gelber, the chief economist at BIS Shrapnel, expects the worst impact will be in Melbourne and Brisbane inner-city apartments where the oversupply will be greatest.
He says the tightening of lending is containing the extent of damage from oversupply — but not completely.
Apart from Melbourne and Brisbane inner city apartments, the oversupply is not large.
He says the downturn will not be uniform 
"We’re building too much and headed towards oversupply in most capital city markets," he wrote in The Australian.
"The exception is Sydney where a decade of under-building led to extreme deficiency — hence the magnitude of the upswing — so that, even given the escalation of building, there remains a significant deficiency of residential stock."
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Melbourne and Brisbane have the worst of the apartment oversupply: Frank Gelber

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<h4> </h4>
Jean-Paul Gagnon, University of Canberra; David Carter, University of Canberra; Fanny Thornton, University of Canberra
 
Most of us know the story of what Salon’s Elias Isquith calls “Wall Street’s favourite disrupter”. Uber, the ride-hailing service run primarily through smartphones, is a global economic success story.
In 2008, it was but an idea held by Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp. Today it is a profit-making “unicorn”. It was recently valued at US$62.5 billion.
How Uber came to be worth such significant sums is a question often posed.
Integral to its success was its speedy efforts at connecting riders with drivers through smartphones. This saw Uber become an on-demanddisruptor business. In the process, it has alluringly branded itself as a service “for the good of all” that puts “people first”.
Uber seemingly takes from over-priced taxis, facilitates livelihoods for its drivers, gives to the needy rider and sticks it to urban regulators – or so the story goes.
Much closer to the truth may be that when Uber isn’t wrapping itself in cloaks of communal good, it is busy trying to institute a monopoly on ride-hailing. It actively encloses what could be a more open city in which riders and drivers work to benefit city residents.
<h2>Now you’re open, now you’re closed</h2>
Uber “opens” cities to “close” them. We think this way because Uber is just another intermediary capitalist (like eBay, Airbnb and PayPal) that profits from the needs of typically urban people connected to the internet.
Uber is therefore an extension of capitalism and, because of that, can be understood as a business trying to maximise its market share.
Uber “opens to close” a city in three steps:
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to disrupt the existing taxi monopoly (a closed system) through marketing and paying fines incurred by its drivers;
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<li>
to entice riders to download its app, drivers to “share” their car, and urban regulators to acquiesce to the popularity of the Uber service; and
</li>
<li>
to exclude ride-hailing alternatives through its maximised market share.
</li>
</ul>
 
The marketing Uber uses to disrupt the grip one or more taxi companies have on a city is to present a rich rhetoric of being the “alternative”, somehow “grassroots” and, most importantly, a “communal” choice for drivers and riders. It casts itself as a Robin Hood in the struggle against unjust, or simply outdated, urban regulators.
This branding, Uber’s cheaper price and its convenient app make it an alluring option for ride-hailers. So long, cabbie dynasty, this city’s now open.
But because Uber grows within the shell of the taxi industry all it really does is open a city to enclose it for its own benefit. It does this through consistent marketing to riders, but also by enticing drivers to partner with Uber with promises of higher pay and a be-your-own-boss mentality.
Uber also crows about creating tens of thousands of jobs and getting one million women into work. This helps to get regulators onside.
A city is “closed” when Uber’s enclosure is complete: when it has successfully disrupted taxis, changed ride-hailing regulation and has a city’s residents on board (so to speak).
We say closed because an “Uber city” is a city captured by intermediary (middleman) capitalism. Defeated taxis are creating their own apps, and alternatives abound. But Uber’s market dominance makes it very difficult for more meaningful alternatives to emerge.
Market dominance means the exclusion of competitors and the control of the means of production so that profits keep rolling in. “Capture your market” is a mantra for a reason. And that reason is because it works – it’s Capitalism 101.
<h2>An open-city alternative</h2>
The need to get around a city safely and conveniently shouldn’t be viewed as an opportunity for businesses like Uber to cash in. STML/flickr
A truly open city would be one where residents are invited, supported and backed by their city government to create their own ride-hailing apps.
Riders still get picked up for a fair price, drivers still get paid more, but profit goes into a public trust to ensure the apps provide good service but also to fund resident-specific projects, like bike roads fully separated from cars.
Not only will this keep jobs and money inside the city, but it also puts a vital transportation resource into the hands of city residents and not a foreign business.
The need to get around a city safely, conveniently and with as little carbon emissions as possible shouldn’t be viewed as an opportunity for businesses like Uber to cash in. It should rather be treated as a common pool resource.
Since the majority of people in cities still depend on cars and roads to get around, chasing the wrong incentives can lead to chronic traffic jams and a host of other problems.
City residents don’t want traffic jams; moving around is a vital part of their daily lives. Uber doesn’t necessarily mind traffic jams because of surge pricing and a rolling meter – it still makes money. Ironically, despite this conflict of interests, Uber is the US$62 billion Wall Street poster child and the open-city alternative is excluded.
Uber may open cities from taxi rackets, but it closes them off to the possibility of more radical and meaningful alternatives.
To read more from The Conversation <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-uber-opens-cities-only-to-close-them-59067?utm_medium=email&amp;utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20July%206%202016%20-%205178&amp;utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20July%206%202016%20-%205178+CID_f7988f9ce5c939534436cde1d2bfddde&amp;utm_source=campaign_monitor&amp;utm_term=How%20Uber%20opens%20cities%20only%20to%20close%20them" target="_blank">click here.</a>
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