Wednesday, 31 August 2022

Environment and Planning Committee

Inquiry into Environmental Infrastructure for Growing Populations

Dr READ (Brunswick) (10:25): This morning I want to talk about the Environment and Planning Committee’s report that came out about six months ago on their inquiry into environmental infrastructure for growing populations. There are some really interesting recommendations in this report, and findings, which I enjoyed reading. I could not help but think of my inner-city electorate, one of the smallest electorates in the state by area, at about 4 kilometres by 4 kilometres, and a mere 20 minutes north of here on a bike. Just on that point, recommendations 2, 3 and 5 all refer to active transport, particularly bike riding. I will just read one of them, recommendation 5:

That the Victorian Government work with local councils to identify opportunities for increased separation of walking and cycling paths.

Recommendation 2 is similar but is about separating cycling paths from motor traffic. I think these are really important, obviously because of the health benefits of active transport—that is, walking and bike riding—and also because in the context of Brunswick, being so close to the CBD, a lot of people chose to live there because it was close, and they actually walk or ride bikes into either the city or the nearby hospitals or universities or the biomedical precinct. The problem is that the environment in which we walk and ride is dominated by cars—often fast-moving, noisy and polluting—and it is detrimental to our safety, not to mention our respiratory and mental health, to be surrounded by heavy traffic all the time. That brings me to the very first recommendation of this report:

That the Victorian Government investigate all options for the identification and development of walking corridors.

Whether you are walking or on a bike, the report finds that it is important that we are protected from traffic but also in a pleasant environment, something that cheers you up to walk through rather than something in which you have to worry about taking your life in your hands. I have spoken many times in this place in support of separated bike paths, and I will not dwell on that this morning, other than to encourage the government to pick up this report and think about it in the context of important state government roads.

I want to talk a bit more on walking corridors. Particularly, I got a letter from a constituent who lives in or near Breese Street, which runs north-south, parallel to Sydney Road, between Sydney Road and the Upfield line near Anstey station. It is an area that has been selected for high-rise development. This would have to have one of the highest population densities of Melbourne. There are a series of roughly 10-storey apartment towers either completed or going up there. One of the most famous that many people will have heard of is known as The Commons. The population density in the area is very high, but as the buildings have gone up and as the population has gone up, the streets have not got any wider. What that means is that it is a concrete jungle with a lot of cars squeezing through narrow streets. I think it is urgent that the state government observe some of the report’s recommendations here. I note finding 31, which is:

Rapid population growth in inner metropolitan Melbourne presents an ongoing challenge to maintaining the standard of environmental infrastructure currently enjoyed by Melburnians.

It is important that the government help cash-strapped councils to invest in providing shade, greenery and seating and to deprioritise car transport in these areas. There is a lot more that can be done, not just in my electorate of Brunswick but in inner-city electorates generally, where population density is high, car density seems to be growing and humans have to live there.