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Planning

Yesterday

The Tzannes-designed 39 Martin Place office tower in central Sydney.

Sydney’s architecture ambitions on show as face of the city changes

The integration of office space with the new underground rail line creates a national template for the way Australian cities can work.

This Month

NEXT DC CEO Craig Scroggie and Victoria Minister for Economic Growth & Jobs Danny Pearson inside NextDC’s M1 data centre in Melbourne on Wednesday.

Victoria claims a land advantage in the data centre race

Even as states try to balance the needs of computing with other purposes, they see a big prize in hosting artificial intelligence-supporting infrastructure.

In some parts of Australia, getting approval for a modest townhouse now takes longer than building one used to.

What’s holding us back from a better housing, transport and clean energy future

Australia doesn’t lack ideas for solving problems in housing, transport and clean energy, we lack institutions that can follow through and create change.

May

Policies in place are good, but more change is needed to boost housing supply: Susan Lloyd-Hurwitz.

The 262,000-home shortage Australia needs to fix

Lower interest rates and stable costs have improved the housing outlook, but reforms are needed to fix the undersupply.

Resolution Property Group and financier Monark Property Partners have acquired a 15-hectare infill site for $44 million, at 800 and 820 Somerton Road in Greenvale, around 20 kilometres north of Melbourne’s CBD.

Liberman-backed Monark buys $44m infill site in Melbourne’s north

Financier Monark and development partner Resolution are targeting a strengthening market, but new figures make some economists question the pace of recovery.

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April

A render of the Harry Seidler-designed Hilton Brisbane building at 190 Elizabeth Street building in the CBD, which will reopen in July as an Intercontinental Hotel and will then undertake an extensive two-year refurbishment. 

ISPT to plug a gap with Brisbane’s first Intercontinental hotel

The super fund-backed developer and fund manager is pairing with operator IHG for the first part of its 1ha transformation of central Brisbane.

March

The five-bedroom house with a “very unusual floor plan” at 1 Beamsley Street sold for $3.9 million.

This house sold for $4.2m – and then for $3.9m a week later

The first buyer of a luxury property – with a question mark hanging over it – ghosted the agent. That forced the vendor to set their sights lower.

AFR AFR Architect Michael Lavery says Brisbane 2032 stadium planning needs to avoid the mistakes of the 2003 Suncorp Stadium/Lang Park upgrade that failed to accommodate public and active transport (eg cycling/walking) connections to the venue. Photo: Peter Wallis

10 March 2025

How Brisbane Olympics can avoid Suncorp Stadium’s mistakes

The Olympic host city is about to announce new venues. They’ll saddle the city with long-term costs long after 2032 if not done right.

Twists and turns: Little-known funder Open Capital says it wants to fund the trouble Sth Bnk project in Melbourne.

Little-known funder eyes Australia’s biggest residential project

Sydney-based Open Capital says it’s in talks to fund the full $2 billion cost of the troubled Sth Bnk development. But its source of funds isn’t clear.

Up at last: A surge in apartments in Sydney has driven the first increase nationally in new attached home approvals in almost 2 ½ years.

The development tide has turned on apartments

A pickup in approvals after nearly 2½ years of decline has economists cheering – although developers say further incentives are needed.

February

The proposed tower at 153-157 Walker St, North Sydney, which could provide 520 homes.

Office tower to apartment block: Inside the new push to fix housing

Planning reforms in Australia’s two biggest states have sparked political backlash, but will buyers and developers fill in the missing middle?

The owners say they can’t knock down the dilapidated building at 1 Rathdowne Street without a demolition permit.

Melbourne’s ‘biggest eyesore’ could be targeted in housing blitz

Victorian Planning Minister Sonya Kilkenny says a disused former Cancer Council building in the heart of Melbourne could be cleared for development into new homes.

Janette Sadik-Khan was instrumental in closing New York’s Times Square to traffic.

City planners have a radical strategy to solve traffic problems

Tired of traffic? Relief is at hand, as city planners everywhere explore a bold way to solve the problem.

Planning Minister Sonya Kilkenny and Premier Jacinta Allan have warned councils they will seize planning powers if they fail to create more housing supply.

Victoria must give up ‘ideological attachment’ to apartments: Metricon

Victoria will continue to miss housing targets until it realises Millennials and migrants want detached homes, not inner-city apartments, Metricon chief executive Brad Duggan says.

Sixty per cent of R3 zones across Sydney currently prohibit residential unit blocks of any scale.

The Sydney suburbs most affected by new higher-density housing rules

Council bans on apartments, terraces and townhouses to be overridden within 800 metres of 171 NSW suburbs.

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Stairway to amenity: A key feature authorities will be unwilling to see removed as Beulah tries to cut costs from the Sth Bnk development is the Sth Bnk Steps, which rise up to a public park between the two towers. 

Beulah to cut ‘hundreds of millions’ from tallest residential tower

The developer of Sth Bnk, to be the tallest apartment tower in Australia, aims to reduce its $2 billion construction bill, putting it in a tussle with authorities.

A Suburban Raild Loop site in Melbourne.

Suburban Rail Loop is an intergenerational endowment to Melbourne

If incrementalism was allowed to paralyse previous Victorian governments, the city and state we know today would be a backwater.

Chairman Rhett Simonds.

Home builders consolidate ahead of next bull run in housing demand

Big builders want to expand to shore up their position and boutique players will cater to wealthy buyers in a sector reeling after pandemic-era disruptions.

January

David Droga’s ‘menacing’ Tamarama mansion gets court go-ahead

The Adman’s planning application triggered a battle for the 1101-square-metre site over what character housing should have in the prestigious area.

Nigel Bennett at the Barbican, London.

This star British gardener has big plans for Melbourne

Horticulturalist Nigel Dunnett is about to embark on his first project outside Britain – the Laak Boorndap garden in the new Melbourne Arts Precinct.

Original URL: https://www.afr.com/topic/urban-planning-63m