I spent the past few days completing the Expression of Interest for this – Maluka Drive Development in Palmerston, about 20km SE of Darwin. The NT government is willing to release under 4ha of land to give to a developer in return for a multi-unit residential development that solves the issues of massive housing shortages in that part of the territory. We at Brutal Art have assembled a wondrous argument of addressing all issues in a multi-layered fashion using good design as a driver to solve competing interests. Linearly, this could never have been successful, such is the power of lateral architectural and urban design.
Let’s see if the fish up north bite this unusual and innovative proposal. If only the rest of the government had as much foresight as to release crown land for residential development purposes!
Nice blog! Just thought I’d pick up on your last sentence here. While the notion of releasing Crown land for residential development might work in the NT, I think it’s fraught with risk on the East coast. In most cases I’d say it’d bring only very short term benefits for a select few (probably some rich developer). Surely it’s much better to use Crown land as a public (social!) good. Why do you say it’d show foresight? The answer to the current housing shortage surely isn’t allocating even more land for housing – isn’t the existing sprawl in Melbourne and Sydney enough?
Perhaps it should be said that releasing crown land for residential development to a developer (us) for this purpose would need to have a social return indeed. For this Maluka Drive development, we’re proposing to give back to the local council or relevant Housing Association a portion of units (25 in this case) FOR FREE. Likewise, any gift of underutilised crown land here in Melbourne will be developed by us with the intention of half of it being given back to whomever released it for their social needs.
Great pick up though! Yes, the sprawl IS more than enough – up to us to provide the innovative solutions!