Professor Bill Randolph has recently returned from an overseas trip of which he attended International Conferences presenting the following topics:

• The Sydney Metropolitan Strategy 2005 Planning for a Socially Sustainable City?" 2006' International Forum on Metropolitan Regions Development, Research Center on Metropolitan Regions of China (RCMRC) Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China, 12 & 13 April 2006
• "Densification and Australian Cities: A Review of Current Metropolitan Planning Orthodoxies" , The Role of Socio-Economic & Spatial Planning in National Economic Development, New Delhi, India, 14 & 15 April 2006
• "Urban Poverty in Australian cities: Patterns, Processes and Policies", Seminar held at Jawaharlal Nehru University , New Delhi, India, 17 April 2006

Press Release: Mapping Sydney 's domestic water use
– why ‘silvertails' use more than ‘fibros'

Per capita domestic water use in Sydney 's northern and central suburbs is up to 14 per cent higher than in the western suburbs, according to a University of New South Wales report that maps water use among Sydney 's 1.5 million households.

Titled Water use and the built environment: patterns of water consumption in Sydney , the report breaks new ground by revealing that domestic per capita water use is predicted by geographic region. The report's use of per capita water consumption figures permits accurate comparisons between suburbs and housing types by adjusting for occupant numbers per dwelling.

Download Research Report 1:
Water Use and the Built Environment: Patterns of Water Consumption in Sydney

Download Map:
Estimated average annual per capita water consumption for CE in urban Sydney, 2001

New Event:

Planning for Australia's Major Cities: Sydney, Melbourne and SEQ Metropolitan Strategies

Tuesday, 30th May 2006
Museum of Sydney , Cnr Phillip and Bridge Streets, Sydney

Seminar with Paul Knox

"The New American Metropolis: Issues and Trends",
Thursday 23rd March. Download invitation (pdf) for more information.

Final Report: Housing Affordability,

Occupation and Location in Australian Cities and Regions
Authors: Bill Randolph, Judy Yates and Darren Holloway

Occupations characterised by low incomes (e.g. hospitality workers, sales assistants) are more likely to experience problems with housing affordability than public sector workers such as teachers or nurses. Housing affordability problems are more strongly associated with low income than occupation.

Using 1996-2001 Census data the project examined the housing affordability and residential and employment locations of a range of occupations. Given the focus on housing affordability and occupation, the research focuses on households in employment only.

Key findings of the research shows:

• 1. Amongst those in employment, an average of 10 per cent of households experience housing affordability problems - that is they pay more than 30% of their income in housing costs.
• 2. The occupations that have an over representation of those with housing affordability problems are characterised by low incomes and include hospitality workers (27%), sales assistants (18%), cleaners (16%), carers and aides (16%) and various service workers (15%).
• 3. Public sector occupations such as nurses (9%), school teachers (6%) and police officers (6%) have an under representation of those experiencing housing affordability problems, relative to the average.
• 4. Between 1996 and 2001 a trend towards living and working in the CBD was apparent for relatively higher paid occupations such as nursing and computer professionals.

Download Report

APA(I) PhD Scholarships available

Two full-time PhD scholarships (approx. $25,000 pa tax-free), with additional AHURI top-up sponsorship (up to $7,000 pa tax-free), are available for outstanding candidates to work within the CITY FUTURES Research Centre at UNSW, led by Professor Bill Randolph . The scholarships are open to Australian and NZ citizens and Australian permanent residents.

CITY FUTURES is dedicated to developing a better understanding of our cities, their people, the policies that manage their growth, and the impacts they make on our environment and economy.

The scholarships are available through an ARC Linkage Award in collaboration with the NSW Department of Housing, providing an unrivalled opportunity for undertaking research enabling candidates to combine academic development with the practical experience of working alongside policy makers, practitioners and the communities they serve. One scholarship will focus on the spatial implications of regeneration activity using GIS, the other will focus on developing innovative social cost-benefit assessments of housing estate renewal.

Candidates will have a 1or 2A Honours or Masters degree, and practical experience will also be welcomed. Strong interest in housing and urban change is a must; knowledge of urban economics and spatial mapping an advantage.

To discuss these opportunities, please contact
Professor Bill Randolph ph 02 9385 5117 email b.randolph@unsw.edu.au
or Dr Simon Pinnegar ph 02 9385 6042 email s.pinnegar@unsw.edu.au

Closing date for expressions of interest is 10 April 2006.

Creating a socially sustainable higher density Sydney

Professor Bill Randolph speaking at Mayors Forum 2nd March

"Many higher density Sydney suburbs have been built simply to fail in social terms. We must not allow this to happen again. If higher density housing is to provide 70% of all new homes in Sydney in the next thirty years, then we owe it to our communities to get it right".

Copies of the presentation can be downloaded from the following links:
Presentation
Power Point slides

City Futures to lead Community Renewal Evaluation
Partnership

The NSW Department of Housing and City Futures Research Centre have announced the development of a Community Regeneration Evaluation and Research Partnership. The key focus of this Partnership is to develop a Community Regeneration Monitoring and Evaluation framework and a set of protocols for an ongoing partnership to involve future collaboration and joint initiatives related to community regeneration and social housing estates in the areas of research, data collection, policy analysis and student education. The Partnership will also include researchers from the Social Policy Research Centre and the School of Social Work , both at UNSW.

Community Regeneration is the NSW Department of Housing's new strategy to build strong and sustainable communities in neighbourhoods with high proportions of disadvantaged social housing tenants. The project will target five priority estates in the first instance. The aim of the Research Partnership will develop a multidisciplinary approach with the capacity to draw on expertise across a broad range of interconnected social, cultural, economic and environmental issues.

This project parallels the research City Futures is currently undertaking for the Department through a recently awarded ARC Linkage Grant which will develop an evaluation methodology for the urban renewal program. Two APAI PhD Scholarships for the latter project will shortly be advertised.

Contact: Dr Simon Pinnegar on s.pinnegar@unsw.edu.au

NEW 2006 ARC LINKAGE AWARD TO CITYFUTURES TEAM

In the most recent awards of ARC Linkage projects, CITYFUTURES researchers Prof Bill Randolph , Assoc Prof Bruce Judd and Dr Rob Samuels and their industry partner the NSW Department of Housing were successful recipients of a Linkage Grant for their project Assessing the Effectiveness of Public Housing Estate Regeneration in NSW. An ARC grant of $326,782 was awarded for this project which together with industry partner cash contributions represents a total research budget of $441,782 over 3 years. The project will commence in 2006 and includes two fully-funded PhD students on Australian Postgraduate (Industry) Awards.

According the ARC project summary, “This project will assist in strengthening the social and economic fabric of disadvantaged public housing estates by developing an innovative framework for monitoring and evaluating the impacts of estate renewal programs in NSW. The framework will be capable of evaluating change not only in the estates themselves, but also in surrounding neighbourhoods. Special attention will be focused on issues of community wellbeing and safety. The development of more advanced techniques to assess the financial and non-financial benefits of renewal activity will make a significant contribution to the national body of knowledge about these complex and important renewal programs and their impacts in local communities.”

The award of this grant reinforces the role of CITYFUTURES as Australia 's leading research group on the urban and community renewal of public housing estates. A number of previous ARC and AHURI research projects have been undertaken by Randolph and Judd on aspects of estate renewal in various states of Australia , with a recent AHURI study by Judd and Samuels on crime reduction and public housing estate regeneration.

International Conference:

'The Role of Socio-Economic & Spatial Planning in National Economic Development'

14 - 15 April 2006 New Delhi, India

This conference will bring together professionals from the government and private sectors, and academicians from premier universities of India and Australia. The main aim of the Workshop is to discuss and deliberate on the relationship between socio-economic planning and spatial planning, and the role of planners in determining the path of economic development of a nation.