Merri-bek Council deferred a plan mandating commercial floor space in Brunswick's Sydney Road developments, to create 5,400 jobs by 2035. Melbourne unit rents reached $550, up 14.6 per cent, and Victoria's 53,554 housing starts were the lowest since 2013. Max Shifman says prescriptive zoning cuts feasible development.
As I told the Australian Financial Review: “International experience shows that prescriptive policies like this, similar to inclusionary zoning rules, might increase the proportion of commercial, but it will substantially reduce the amount of development that is actually feasible and gets off the ground in the first place,”
I also said: “That’s not what we need in the midst of a housing crisis.”



Australian Financial Review, 11 April 2024 — Read the full article