Creating value through connecting our cities

Over the past few weeks I’ve been fortunate to spend time with a group of people passionate about the future of the city of Melbourne, and what it will look like. Some of these stories have started to pop up in The Herald Sun over the past week:

The land Melbourne forgot - dozens of sites identified for urban renewal

Driverless trains a part of expanded airshuttle proposal

Future Melbourne: Call to appoint minister for city’s western suburbs

All of these stories, and the Herald Sun’s broader campaign around the future of Melbourne being led by journalist John Masanauskas share a common thread. This is all about maintaining and connecting the critical infrastructure and utilities than have made Melbourne the most liveable city in the world; while acknowledging we are going to have to see Melbourne respond to our spike in our population growth.

Having spent the past 20+ years looking at the tools and techniques that can be used to make cities tick, I have three key thoughts of where we might see the Melbourne of the future grow:

1.Precincts of the future

As the city swells to 8 million in population by 2050, connecting precincts and the central hub of Melbourne will become ever more critical. The Monash precinct is currently our second biggest employment area in Melbourne. Monash University alone swells to be our fifth biggest city in Victoria on a daily basis. Ensuring that the transport connecting precinct with the other precincts needs to be world class.

2. More strategic ways to use space

In our piece with the Property Council of Victoria, ‘Hidden in Plain Site’, we identified 15 sites with high potential for repurposing or redevelopment.

Our analysis showed how we could unlock up to $600 million dollars in current assets in Melbourne; by repurposing existing land which is currently being used for lower value activity (eg carparks, and waste transfer stations). The sites identified by the analysis were not identified as surplus or ready for development as such, but rather for their potential to be re-used for for higher value activity, such as housing.

Making better use of Melbourne’s available space will be crucial moving forward.

3. Infrastructure as our defining industry

The convergence of the demographic trend, technology (i.e. driverless transport, etc) and the commitment to keep Melbourne moving will see a swathe of significant infrastructure projects continue for the next two decades at least. The Committee for Melbourne’s vision in Melbourne 4.0 has multiple scenarios where they show the impact of a lack of infrastructure expenditure. This is what we need to avoid at all costs.    

The influence of new infrastructure on Melbourne will be substantial. Each will have an impact on the appeal of different areas of Melbourne. What we have seen is that the right type of infrastructure substantially changes accessibility, amenity, connectivity, and the social fabric of an area. 

About PwC’s Strategic Value Advisory Team

The Strategic Value Advisory area enables PwC to help clients create, enhance and capture the value derived from infrastructure projects, especially within cities. The highly predictive models that are able to assess the value new infrastructure can deliver, enabling PwC to provide evidence based insights into who would benefit most from the infrastructure and how this can be factored into project funding.