Description of the selected issue
Discuss about the Housing and the Built Environment.
It has been estimated from the Australian Bureau of Statistics Household and family projections (ABS 2015b) that the number of households that are currently resident in Australia have a high increasing rate and the increase in the number of households would increase by 3.7 million and 4 million from 2006 to 2031 as per estimation (“5206.0 – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Mar 2018”, 2018). There are various types of housing facilities that are adopted by the people of Australia such as the Detached housing, free-standing housing which have be located on the quarter-acre building and these type of housing has been lending an predominant feature for the urban development within the country. The population density of the country has been comprising of around 20% of the total housing for the urban history of Australia. The Australian government has also increased the density of the high housing that would help the people of Australia to obtain higher level of housing types. In addition to this, the due to history of low density planning by the Australian government the most common type of housing for the general population in the country are the detached homes. Additionally, there has been semi-detached dwellings for about 9% in the country and units and apartment account for around 13 per cent in the country (“5206.0 – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Mar 2018”, 2018). Overall for the major change in the type of housing density for the country has taken a long time and huge improvement is required for the full development in the country.
The major driving forces towards the development of the housing and building environment in the country basically is dependent on the sustainability concerns in the country of Australia and this should not be halted with the construction and hence, the emergence of the housing projects has risen for the increase in the housing density (“5206.0 – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Mar 2018”, 2018). The newer designs of the housing environment describe the development of the systems and the ability of growth of the country. The newer housing also arises from the need to conserve the energy of the country as the country is losing out on the energies and fuel constrains of the country.
The Population of the country has been ever growing and area of the country has been constant and would also remain constant in the future. Additionally, the demands for the population has also increased and the demands for the natural resources and the fuel constrain within the country has increased to a great deal (Dieleman, 2017). Hence, creating more and more housing space is not the only concern but also making an efficient population density that can be maintained efficiently in the country and this is very important with respect to sustainable development within the country.
Driving forces
There has been a huge development in the standard of the living for the people of Australia and hence, the disturbance is caused mostly by the influence of the humans in the country. The natural ecological process also affects the changes to a great deal and the changes include the human infection and diseases which involve the destruction of the natural resources (Haselwandter, 2015). Also with the increase the in the housing area within the country the forest region within the country gets decreased and this hampers the production of the natural resources to great level.
Additionally, due to constructions and building developments huge amount of toxic and building wastes are released in the environment, and the exposure to these type of harmful chemicals and waste in the environment can sometimes cause widespread diseases for the people of the country.
Due of the detached housing complex system the people of the country are suffering from various type of disabilities. In addition to this, the lack of proper engineering would make the access to clean water very difficult and this might spread chronic diseases in the country (Carmichael, Connolly & Egan, 2016). Additionally, there are various other type disabilities that might be caused from the environment.
New households are no doubt enhancing the better livelihood of the individuals however; lands are necessary for building new houses. These new construction are not only leading to the deforestations but also influencing the community in both negative and positive manner. There is always two face of a coin and same matter is in this scenario where economic conditions are being enhanced and disturbed too.
The government of Australia is trying to make the way for the engineered house which would take up less space and hold a much higher level of population within the housing complexes (“5206.0 – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Mar 2018”, 2018). According to the National Housing Supply Council (NHSC 2013), the entire dwelling stock is accounted for the flats, units and apartments that would be accounting for the 3.9 per sent improvements across the whole of the country (“5206.0 – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Mar 2018”, 2018). The main increase is in the capital territory of country and New South Wales. The number of units that have been changed from the year 2011 there has been an increase in the number of housing that have transformed from the detached housing types. The share in the number flats that have three or bedrooms in them have increased from just less than 13 per cent in 2001 to almost 18 per cent in 2011, and there has been a suggestion that the apartments which closer to the detached dwellings have been ever increasing in number.
Pressure
In addition to the development of housing areas the government of Australia also adopted policies for the development of the urban landscapes that ecologically more sustainable and the key habitat structures are maintained in the region (“5206.0 – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Mar 2018”, 2018). These areas are located strategically, which would provide the people who are living there the option of reaching out to any type of facilities required by them and also have a very efficient Eco space distributed around the complexes.
The overall picture suggests that overall stock of housing complexes would take a linger amount of time for their complete evolution and despite the higher rate of suggestion from the national data centres there has been a very low level of change rate in the country from the year 2008 to 2014 (Wang & Lin, 2014). This is consistent as there has been a very low rate of change in the smaller proportion for the total housing stock of the country. The total stock in the country was around 9 million in country and by the year 2015 it was 227,000, with 52 per cent of these being detached houses in comparison to 56 per cent in 2013-14 and 58 in the years 2012-13 (“5206.0 – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Mar 2018”, 2018).
Greater Melbourne has the Largent number of residential homes and approvals range to 56,657 approvals in the year 2014-15 and percentage in inner Melbourne has risen to around 95%. Additionally, 65% of the approvals were also received from greater Sydney. 60% rate was also available in the city of Brisbane.
The Home affairs department of Australia has also made some policies to establish to act as a ‘portfolio agency’ for ASIO, the AFP, the Australian Border Force, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission, AUSTRAC and the Office of Transport Security. In the month of January, a Critical Infrastructure Centre was made available in the Attorney-General’s Department for the Assessments of the risks involving sabotage, espionage and coercion on telecommunications, electricity, water and maritime ports arising from foreign activities in the sectors (Rupp & Lamberts, 2015). A draft bill was also passed in this context.
The policies adopted by the Australian Administrators seems quite efficient and this would work in great way to help the population of the country, however some minor changes and development can be suggested to the administration. The integration of the IOT concepts in development of the city would help the developer to great extent and make their job easier. Smart city concepts would be making the city automated and the maintenance of the city would become very easy for the authorities and this would also increase the quality of living of the people of the country. Involvement of the online facilities would be very helpful for the people of the country.
References
5206.0 – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Mar 2018. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/[email protected]/mf/5206.0
5206.0 – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Mar 2018. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/[email protected]/mf/5206.0
Cao, X. (2014). Residential self-selection in the relationships between the built environment and travel behavior: Introduction to the special issue. Journal of Transport and Land Use, 7(3), 1-3.
Carmichael, L., Connolly, A. M., & Egan, M. (2016). House of Lords: Revised transcript of evidence taken before The Select Committee on National Policy for the Built Environment.
Dieleman, F. (2017). Households and housing: Choice and outcomes in the housing market. Routledge.
Gomez, S. L., Shariff?Marco, S., DeRouen, M., Keegan, T. H., Yen, I. H., Mujahid, M., … & Glaser, S. L. (2015). The impact of neighborhood social and built environment factors across the cancer continuum: current research, methodological considerations, and future directions. Cancer, 121(14), 2314-2330.
Haselwandter, E. M., Corcoran, M. P., Folta, S. C., Hyatt, R., Fenton, M., & Nelson, M. E. (2015). The built environment, physical activity, and aging in the United States: A state of the science review. Journal of Aging and Physical Activity, 23(2), 323-329.
Rupp, R. F., Vásquez, N. G., & Lamberts, R. (2015). A review of human thermal comfort in the built environment. Energy and Buildings, 105, 178-205.
Wang, D., & Lin, T. (2014). Residential self-selection, built environment, and travel behavior in the Chinese context. Journal of Transport and Land Use, 7(3), 5-14.