Melbourne is a city defined by its suburbs. It is the distinct character of neighbourhoods from Footscray to Frankston that help Melbourne regularly sit near the top of world’s most liveable city rankings.

The quality of life provided by Melbourne’s suburbs comes at a price. The findings of the latest worldwide cost of living reviewsees the city ranked as the fifth most expensive city surveyed. Melbourne is now a more expensive place to live than New York. The increasing cost of living, and in particular, the cost of housing risks seriously undermining the city’s liveability.

Plan Melbourne, the new metropolitan strategy for the city, recognises that housing affordability is one of the pressing issues facing Melburnians. The strategy offers a set of concepts aimed at shaping the city’s future and – the government hopes – addressing housing affordability and choice. It is embedded in the compact city theory; where new houses are focused in existing areas with good access to public transport and other amenities. The clear intent is to concentrate higher density housing in the inner city and urban renewal precincts thus helping to safeguard more than fifty per cent of Melbourne’s existing suburbs from infill housing development......Continue Reading

> via thisbigcity.net