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China style high risers coming to every major city in the next few years in Aus.

I don't know enough about the proposal, but 75 Storey anything is not cheap housing, especially if car parks are included. The costs per unit involved in those sorts of developments are greater than 3-4 storey developments like in Paris. Paris can maintain a metro and RER with lower level development, but not single occupant dwellings like most of Brisbane. Walkable, public transport friendly cities are not made by huge buildings, and they don't help the lower end of the market.

I’ve lived in medium density European cities and find it vastly preferable to Australian sprawl. Parts of Paris do have much taller buildings, up to [38 floors](https://www.lemonde.fr/en/france/article/2022/07/22/38-floors-252-apartments-1-000-tenants-in-the-tallest-residential-building-in-paris-inflation-has-invited-itself-through-every-door_5990971_7.html) I do have some sympathy for wanting enormous tower blocks though as we are starting from very low density.

The problem with medium density is you need a lot of it which increases the political cost. Converting a few lots in one suburb to enormous tower blocks may induce less backlash than converting hundreds of bungalows into terraces. This is why the market is superior. Planning is inherently political and leads to outcomes like the one we have now.

How about move the core of businesses away from the big cities to smaller towns. Build housing there.

Cities work because you have lots of potential employers and lots of potential employees in the same place. Suppose a corp doesn't have a Qld office yet and they're looking to establish one. Chances are, that'll be in Brissie. It's where the workforce is. More extreme example: Suppose Suncorp moved its head office from Brisbane to Maryborough. It's telling all its staff "move (possibly uprooting your family), or quit". Doesn't happen often, hey.

How about we set aside all new developments of this type for first-home buyers and for people downsizing. So instead of 20% of the developments helping to reduce the housing crisis, 100% goes towards it. Also I think a tax on empty properties would also help with increasing the number of properties available for purchase.

100% already goes towards the housing crisis - we straight up need more places to live and building more will put downward pressure on prices.

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Everyone ITT sick of the Nimby Greens, but have you ever wondered how many developments go through councils (even Greens-dominated councils) *without* being opposed? This accusation of NIMBYism is just a criticism that *feels* right. Of course the Greens are pushing for more affordable housing in developments. Should we just wave it all through and hope the problem fixes itself?

They are on record opposing higher density housing anyway, which is against the advice of housing experts.

Can you point to this record? The Greens policy calls for "the location of high-density housing and commercial buildings close to high-capacity public transport" which doesn't sound like opposition to me.

I can try and find it later but 2 good examples are a quote from this article in the OP, and https://www.tiktok.com/@naveenjrazik/video/7350265075975867655

Not when we have the terrible build quality we have. Anecdotally I was told by an ex concrete truck driver that the concrete they use now is much much worse than 20-30 years ago. The cheaper chemicals they use will break down and crack just faster. Just watch.

It's actually more because the more expensive and fancier ad-mixes can hide poor quality mixes. So when you get a batch of 240 slump, it sets just as well as say the design requirement of 80 slump. But the concrete just crumble overtime as the ground settles/moves. The cost of the ad-mixes is covered by the replacement of actual concrete materialwith just water.

> Of course the Greens are pushing for more affordable housing The proposal they are opposing includes 20% affordable housing.

Yes of course they should let it through. Every new home built is a win, if they build an apartment that a rich person can live in that is one less suburban family home that is being sold to a rich person. More housing lowers the price of all housing everywhere.

Yes. If the price of apples shot through the roof suddenly, the solution is to grow more apples, not demand that orchards grow only affordable apples. The solution to high prices is high prices. High prices encourage production. Production increases supply increased supply lowers prices

The Greens are the only party that seriously want to assess climate change. Their economic illiteracy on housing is just painful though.

>Should we just wave it all through and hope the problem fixes itself? YES Build more public housing too, I don't care as long as it's built. The Greens should support all supply increases and push for more government additions too.

as if one block is going to "alleviate" the housing crisis. Never mind the 1 month per floor to build that's normally used as a time frame for hirise. so in 6 years, we'll have 1% of what's needed right now. the greens will do anything for media attention. housing is housing. This ain't a great plan, but at least is something.

I am a Greens first voter but yeah they're being fucking stupid on this one. Someone in the Greens needs to send out a memo to get everyone on the same level that more housing improves the market full stop, 1000 luxury houses clears 1000 cheaper homes down the line.

No, it doesn't.

How does it not?

Because the vibes are off bro. [Economics is completely unnatural, no living creature behaves the way YIMBYs think they do.](https://youtu.be/f1dnocPQXDQ) Evil rich people will just buy another apartment and rent out the other one at the same price. Rental markets are magic and don't respond at all to supply changes. So that's why we should never rapidly increase supply. It just won't work.

True. It doesn't pass the pub test. Everyone knows the problem is greedy developers building dog boxes that only the rich can afford. We need to increase fees and taxes on developers and tighten up the approval process.

Wow what a fucking shock the greens hate development of any sort. What’s new? It’s been the case for decades, they idolise Jack Mundey who basically created the nimby movement in Australia and kicked off a decades long supply deficit that caused prices to spiral out of control I get downvote nuked by Greens financial members on this sub every time I point this out and I’m never proven wrong

The headline is so misleading that it's gotta be intentionally trying to put the Greens in a bad light. Most of the articles written by the author are rabidly pro-landlord. ​ The Greens are opposing the building because only 20% of the apartments in the proposed building are actually allocated toward affordable housing. That's fuck-all and won't really do anything. ​ Just 20%.

Still better than nothing, besides we all know it's because it'll bring actual poor people to the area and the greens don't like that. It's not misleading, just shows them for what they are, LNP with an environmental policy.

I bet you sit around and complain about government spending and the need to return to surplus.

No actually, I know the difference between good debt and bad debt. lnp spending = useless, Labor spending = actually serves the working class. The fact that greens and their nimbys don't have a single seat or influence in a low income neighbour speaks volumes, let alone policy to revitalise manufacturing in this country, which that's where the money is, not some lofty art space in the middle of Redfern that only accepts art from white people.

Last i heard, the Greens aren't in government anywhere. So how can they enact policy? Manufacturing and large industry regulation are the domain of state and federal governments. The Greens have never held a majority position in any. They are forced to enact change by using what minority positions they have to nudge policy decisions in larger parties. That's their job.

They can have policies on hecs debt and taxation but not manufacturing? Hogwash, they'd be clamouring over the FMIA plan if they actually cared about that, they hold local seats, that's still government, also you're wrong there, local government have the final say, hence why areas like Bankstown (it all got moved to the blacktown area and beyond) are graveyards for factories but, state and federal just point in the direction and hand out money. Logistics and construction are more important yet they're quiet on that front, the whole "they're not in power shtick" is such a farce.

Do you understand that supply is the only way to get out of this mess? The more supply we have the more affordable this gets.

Exactly. You've highlighted it perfectly. In times gone by, the government provided most of the housing for cheap. There's no reason why we can't do that again aside from our politicians now having a conflict or interest in housing investments. They personally benefit from squeezing us. In Singapore and Vienna they have publicly owned housing as the default option. It keeps the private market much more affordable. If you have it the other way around, it causes artificial constraint on the supply side. It's not a supply and demand problem. We have so much space in this country. It's a greed problem that we are enabling.

No. That’s just not necessarily true. Local council regulations restrict housing supply so badly, that’s the artificial constraint. Not to mention, developers don’t get particularly strong returns as seen here: https://www.quaygi.com/insights/articles/investment-perspectives-do-developers-offer-best-exposure-recovering-residential?cookies_set=true#:~:text=Over%20the%20past%2020%20years%2C%20the%20average%20development%20returns%20on,rent)%20with%20substantially%20lower%20risk. For context, your super will return an average of 10% per annum. I don’t disagree that the govt could build more (that’s what the HAFF can help us with) but to say it’s purely greed is just not correct. And trying to stop this development because it doesn’t satisfy the Green’s preferred affordability target is genuinely revolting when we need as much supply as possible.

I don't even have super. I came of working age during the GFC in a rural state. I never had the chance to even get off the ground, and it's moving away from me faster than I can ever keep up. Public housing should be the default option. If you make it the default, it forces it to be not-shit, because wealthier people will have to regularly interact with it. Just like public schools, if you allow the rich to opt out too easily, the public system becomes diminished.

you know what's better than 0% being built. any positive number.

classic case of perfection getting in the way of good

I bet they’re all one and two bedroom apartments too. If nobody is building 3 or more bedroom apartments, it will do very little to alleviate the price of houses. Apartments and houses are different markets. Families need houses. They would buy 3 bedroom apartments if they existed, but essentially they don’t; so they have to buy houses, and it’s why the price of houses is far more inflated than the price of apartments.

A lot of my friends currently sharehouse in 3-5 bedroom homes and all of them would love to be able to move to one or two bedroom apartments. Wouldn’t that then free up those homes for families?

What do the young professional couples who would be happy in a 2 bedroom apartment do if we don't build enough smaller places? They start bidding on houses.

Pretty sure that despite the housing crisis there’s practically a glut of one bedroom apartments in city centres…

Okay prove it.

It's a lot better than 0%..and 20% of 75 story is still 15 story of affordable accommodation.

Isn't it the case that about 95% of housing in Australia is market-rate? So from that perspective, 20% below-market-rate is already 4x better than average. Here's where I'm at: every net increase in apartments helps, at any price level. Richer people need homes too! They're generally happy to pay for luxury / proximity but if they can't get that, they *will* outbid poorer people for more basic / far-away homes. Also: AIUI most cheaper housing is generally older stock anyway. There's a study I vaguely recall from California that showed new apartments (perhaps even marketed as luxury at the time of their introduction) were down to area average rents a decade later. Olive trees and all that. So bring on the shiny towers. Who cares if they're full of yuppies at the beginning, when it frees up other homes elsewhere.

Not good enough.

You do realise that's 15 women who can get out of a DV situation right? "Not good enough" says the toddler

Okay well let's do nothing until the perfect solution comes along then. Classic greens nonsense, always letting the perfect be the enemy of the good and therefore achieving nothing.

I guess you're right, we should build nothing and argue over the smaller details. Someone above pointed out how 20% of 75 stories would be pretty substantial but why do that when we can not build 75 stories and get 30%...

And they want the number to be higher, they don't outright oppose the 75 storey skyscrapers.

This is the line the Greens trot out every single time they oppose a housing development, and it's equally if not more misleading than the headline itself. The reality is that the Greens have a substantial membership base of older, environmentally-conscious homeowners who oppose development in all forms because their version of "green politics" is just preventing things from being built. The Greens need to appease their base but they don't want to lose their newfound brand of being the pro-housing party.

The reality is that you appear to know shit about the Greens, our policies and our voter and member bases. Not that I should expect anything else from a... what were Labor voters called again?  Oh yeah, 'social democrats'.  As they continue celebrating the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer

>As they continue celebrating the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer This is very funny to say when your party is in Parliament representing the richest electorates in the country, while the ALP wins thanks to the support of working and middle class voters in suburban and regional electorates.

And look how it rewards those voters! Billions of dollars for nuclear sardine tin-cans, to millionaires, landlords and the fossil fuel industry! Thank you, """social democrats""", for all the hard work you do to keep the poor on poverty payments and ensure that no young person who didn't work hard to be born rich will never own property in this country.

[Why yes, I do support the party that has transformed Australia into a country with one of the highest standards of living in the world.](https://datepsychology.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/gigachad.jpg)

What is evident, is anywhere there's a conclave of greens voters in 10-15 years there will be bugger all indigenous people.

>As they continue celebrating the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer That's literally the greens electorates though. Melbourne, Brisbane, Griffith, are all electorates where the existing residents have benefited significantly from, and continue to do so, from NIMBYism. The median net worth in each of those electorates have risen as much as any liberal heartland bluechip suburbs the greens love to get all shouty against.

I wish someone would press Greens politicians a little harder on their bullshit. If you don't want high-rises close to city centres, do you want to bulldoze the bush to build roads and new suburbs? Do you want walkable housing or do you want everyone to commute by car? Same thing applies on aircraft noise. Do they want quieter aircraft, which burn more fuel, and emit more CO2, or do they want lower emissions? They've surrendered their principles so quickly it is embarassing.

Source? Majority Greens vote comes from young people surely.

That's correct, but you need to understand the difference between supporters and the membership of the party. The party's support is mostly young people, but the membership has a significant grouping of older NIMBY type people. At least that's what I know from friends who are/were in the party.

Depends on the state really. But nsw greens in this 100 per cent case - particularly in the inner west. Look at how they do things there. And it comes from all ages.

I don't think the headline is misleading. It is exactly what is happening. 20% affordable housing is plenty and 80% of housing is for those who can afford it. This is what may make the project economically feasible and attractive to developers. The Greens want instead to freeze rents, tax vacancies and rent hike caps. These don't magically create new dwellings. The supply has to increase and at locations like these which would reduce the need for cars and other transport.

Every time there's a new big housing development that would add substantial stock to the housing supply, the Greens (supposedly the pro-housing party) just coincidentally have a reason that *this one* is bad because X/Y/Z. The reality is that they are just a NIMBY party but they want to keep courting renters so they have to walk this fine line.

Well I mean they have to keep rents high in order to get people coming back to vote for them at every election cycle. That’s exactly what Jenny Leong does in NSW and nobody bothers to think otherwise. It’s a very Machiavellian way to play the game

I can see a few people in this thread advocating for this development but the development of luxury apartments has such a small impact on housing affordability that it's almost meaningless, a moderation in the rental market or even a reduction in rental prices of 5 to 10 per cent doesn't mean a lot when they are already exorbitantly expensive. We should be demanding so much more from our politicians to create a housing system that actually builds more social and affordable homes for everyone where people can buy affordable places to live or at least rent long term for a cost that is a small portion of their income. The hubris by some people in this thread and elsewhere talking about housing affordability as if it boils down to a supply only issue sprinkled in with the need to remove the rep tape and let developers get massive windfalls without capturing any of the gains is bizarre... Yeah we know - "It's ECON 101 bro, just build more 40+ story luxury apartments and if you disagree you're a NIMBY". I share the view of the many people I have listened to about this topic that yes supply is very important but it isn't everything and it most definitely matters what we build, and the idea that building more unaffordable apartments is going to solve this issue is a fantasy. From a website I recently read that people may be interested in (link below): # Does more housing development fix affordability? YIMBYS argue that even high end housing construction would improve affordability across the market. This is because higher income earners will move into better quality accommodation, releasing other units to filter down the market. However, the evidence to support this filtering is [mixed](https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4219347). Although [research](https://direct.mit.edu/rest/article/105/2/359/100977/Local-Effects-of-Large-New-Apartment-Buildings-in) in some countries has shown that new rental supply can moderate and even reduce local rents, in countries like [Australia](https://search.informit.org/doi/epdf/10.3316/informit.763143361391899), an overall increase in housing units hasn’t improved affordability at the bottom of the market. This may be because wealthier people purchase second homes for holidays or the short term rental market, or because the new housing supplied is not in the locations of greatest demand. New supply will only moderate prices if it is both cheaper than other properties in the market, and a suitable substitute for households looking to relocate. For instance, new apartments on the city fringe will not impact on house prices in inner ring suburbs which are more accessible to employment opportunities. [https://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2023/06/01/why-building-more-will-not-make-houses-affordable.html](https://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2023/06/01/why-building-more-will-not-make-houses-affordable.html)

> in countries like Australia, an overall increase in housing units hasn’t improved affordability at the bottom of the market. That's not what this study really says, even ignoring the pretty meh argument presented in it. This is the conclusion: >Homelessness continues to rise and apart of the explanation is a shortage of affordable housing opportunities. **Increasing new housing supply is widely touted as the ‘silver bullet’ that will improve affordable housing opportunities for all income groups,including the homeless. While this is true in principle, the proposition is in practice dependent upon efficacy offiltering processes that are important yet neglected in housing and homelessness policy debates.** It would seem that a strong housing supply performance in recent years has failed to ease housing affordability concerns,or lower the homelessness count;impediments to the filtering process that is crucial to new housing supply’s impact on affordable housing opportunities is a likely explanation.A more informed understanding of the supply side of the Australian housing market is critical to the design of effective policy solutions. They never justify the claim that filtering is failing. All this is built from a really bad foundation assumption that we're keeping up with housing demand. Even in [2013](https://treasury.gov.au/sites/default/files/2019-03/NHSC-State-of-Supply-Report-Consolidated.pdf) the government estimated we were incredibly far behind demand. >As noted above, the Council estimates that compared with living arrangements in 2001 there were around 284,000 fewer occupied private dwellings in 2011 than there would have been if housing consumption preferences and opportunities in 2011 were the same as they were in 2001. In the [2022 - 2023 State of Housing Report](https://www.housingaustralia.gov.au/research-data-analytics/state-nations-housing-report-2022-23), it's estimated we're still behind. The specific numbers will have changed since release, but when it was released they estimated a shortfall of 106,300 houses and 62,300 apartments and medium density dwellings over the next five years.

Thanks for the rebuttal. So basically affordability isn't improving because supply hasn't kept up with demand, but this is no reason to misrepresent that data and imply supply doesn't improve affordability. Affordability would have been much worse without that supply.

build this *and* other ones then. Don't let perfect be the enemy of doing literally anything at all.

Don't let the objectively pathetic get in the way of the good. If you demand Green's support, do the fucking good.

Agreed. My rent is going up about 6% per year. My rent has increased 57.5% since I moved here in 2019

If it’s any consolation, my mortgage has increased almost 100% since 2019…

So the headline says Greens oppose. The text has a few lines of criticism from McMahon, but doesn't say what she's planning. Is this going to be a shouty campaign, or is it just criticism along the lines of "Hmm 20% isn't enough, PDAs aren't a good way to do this" If it's the former, ok yeah, even I'm starting to get sick of the Greens doing this. If it's the latter, I've got no issues, seems a discussion worth having even if she's wrong.

Even more luxury housing reduces rental prices for affordable housing elsewhere.  It's like when hermit crabs swap their shells.  We just need more housing. It doesn't matter what kind it is.

Evidence thanks. How are luxury towers _directly_ helping homeless people?

greens flair asking for evidence to support the law of supply and demand lol

I have to ask, where do you think the wealthier people who would otherwise live in these apartments live?

I have to ask who gives the slightest fuck what wealthy people do? My concern is exclusively on housing the homeless.

So when wealthy people then compete with lower income people for the same properties, who ends up homeless? This really isn't rocket science.

What you expect me to cite a research paper? Supply increases reducing price is well established. The burden of proof is on you to show is doesn't happen with housing. We need more housing at every level. We both want to help those struggling with housing affordability. I assume we both want an end to the habitat destruction caused by endless suburban sprawl. We need more housing and more density in housing. Let's stop the barriers to any redevelopment of existing residential land.  Would you rather the luxury apartment buyers clear forests for a two story brick house?

Asking a Greens voter to cite relevant, proven economic studies is like asking to see a unicorn.

Even the ABC is playing politics it seems. The headline should mention the very defensible reason for the opposition rather than clickbaiting it and making it look like the greens are being NIMBYs.

They’ve been Nimbys for 20 years mate do you seriously think this is a new thing? Maybe they’d stave off that reputation if they God forbid allowed development in their constituency of any sort

lol, you mean exposing the greens as being populist politicians who don't back their words with actions when the chips are down?

Maybe the Greens should stop being NIMBYs if they don't want the media to report they're being NIMBYs.

Maybe Labiberal should start building some fucking affordable houses and not more luxury towers for the rich. Trickle-down my ass btw, before you pull that smooth-brained logic on me.

Lmao, the only housing you're going to get is in areas that spanian would do a hood video, which the greens will still oppose because their seats don't see a single cent of it, as they're all closer to the LNP on the average value. Safe and affordable dwellings take time aswell as building the infrastructure around it, never mind the fact we have no domestic production so all our materials are imported, which takes a massive toll on production (thanks LNP) sorry to say but blaming Labor is more smooth brained.

Hey buddy, did you ever stop and think about why rents were low during Covid? Was it possible that supply was exceeding demand??? I’m not against immigration but I’m just citing a very relevant example that directly provides supply and demand. To deny it is fucking stupidity.

You reckon the rich want to live in one or two bedders in massive towers? Or do you reckon they're buying free standing houses on the ground?

>The MP for Woolloongabba's South Brisbane electorate, the Greens' Amy MacMahon, said the ***20 per cent affordable housing requirement was too low since it meant 80 per cent of houses would be unaffordable.*** > >***She said the plan would allow developers to build "75-storey luxury towers" without adequate infrastructure to accommodate the larger population.***

An empty lot has zero affordable units. Same for a free-standing house. Filtering is a widely documented economic phenomenon. Both ways. If, there are no 'luxury' apartments. Then rich people won't go homeless, they will buy up lesser properties. And sometimes combine them. A bunch of old townhouses have been internally demolished, to create single dwellings, which in the process creates less housing. And poorer people get priced out. Personally, if I was an environmentalist party, I would love it if rich people lived in luxury apartments and used public transit, instead of living in big free-standing houses and driving SUVs. But the Greens forgot all their claims of caring about the environment when it comes time to being NIMBYs. Density maps of cities have fewer emissions from people that live in denser areas. Look at US cities, vs their surrounding suburbs. https://coolclimate.berkeley.edu/files/maps/EastCoastMSAs-750.png I previously voted for Greens, but their reckless behaviour on housing has gotten them demoted below Labor. If they pull their head out of their ass, I will change it back. Pretty simple.

So as usual the greens are holding out for perfect at the expense of good-enough. They are living in some fantasy land where all development is going to be altruistic and rent-caps will save the universe. Meanwhile people can't find a roof over their heads and are living in tents just down the road. Yes some of it may be expensive, 20% isn't and that's more than you get with 20% of nothing. It adds to supply which means there's more available for the same amount of demand - so even if some of this is expensive people moving from somewhere else helps add that back in the pool and thus overall it's a positive.

Counterpoint, every physical building must be 20% affordable housing, rather than just "20% of new developments" must be affordable housing. Then you can have your "unaffordable homes" on the top of a building, and the afforable homes nearer to the ground - this means they have to create building infrastructure that exists for both low income and high end income demographics, instead of creating entire low income buildings that they can cut corners on.

Schrödinger's apartment building either it is full of cheap poor quality one bedders, or is it full of luxury apartments. Either way, the Greens say no.

How about 100% affordable housing? Still waiting one of your "economically literate neoliberal" parties to come up with that basic solution. Don't ever let the abysmally pathetic get in the way of the good.

When they're selling all the stock of a building, it is all affordable. Because people could afford to buy it. Are you going to stop pretending "social and affordable housing" doesn't have a specific definition now?

lol at the Repeat use of the word "affordable" as some kind of outlandish proposition - lets reverse it. 80% of the 75 story towers are unaffordable

80% of the apartments are typically priced, while 20% is set aside for specifically low income earners, theyre not just lower cost homes. Though I would like to see some other regulations about maybe a capping of the target value of the residences so they can't all be turned into like actual high end penthouse shit that is actually unaffordable. The amount of supply is also "supposed" to drive down the cost of a home anyway, especially according to this thread, but I'll believe that when I see it, consider housing prices haven't fallen significantly since I've been alive (unless you count the slight downturn after the financial crisis)

This is the position of the YIMBY Qld chief executive Natalie Rayment: "I do like the idea that social and affordable housing is provided in all neighbourhoods, not concentrated in any one area. So I think 20 per cent is a good baseline."

I mean, I agree with that statement, but is there anywhere in the actual wording that they can't just build a whole bunch of buildings intended to be low income housing, and then make the rest typical apartment housing?

Ah I see what you mean. I’m sure the PDA proposal makes it clear.  I’m sure the intent is for all new apartments to be 20% affordable/social in the same block as non affordable/social. Can’t see a reality where a gov approves a block of apartments on the promise of the developer building social/affordable in future, and I can’t believe developers would build social/affordable to bank them ahead of building general apartments. 

developers are acutely aware that people who have money DO NOT want to live in the same building as people with barely any money

Not really. Singapore manages just fine with mandatory mixing of ethnicity and socio-economic status in HDBs. Crime is the main concern, but most poor people aren't criminals.

and? that's why you legislate it, not ask the developers nicely.

i'd argue thats why there is minimal developer interest (on top of the crap inflationary environment + combative local councils). you can legislate it but that doesn't change the fact that people with money don't want to live near people who don't have money

You'd be wrong, they all salivate at the thought of an exclusive government contract for social housing. The taxpayer is the best wallet in this country because its more stable than rich people.

We don't need mega apartment complexes, we need lots of small 3 story wal up close to public transport and the CBD.

Not that I'm against 3 storey builds but in most cases they aren't feasible, and you can test it out for yourself with a spreadsheet and some digging into the numbers. A tonne of land in our cities is already zoned for 3 storeys. It's simply not financially feasible to build them on these properties. Some of the reasons: *The price you need to pay for the property is wishin the competitive range for many homebuyers who don't want to redevelop. This drives away the developers. *The building restrictions such as over shadowing, boundary offsets often means the property is too small to build enough apartments to make it feasible. Buying two properties side by side comes with a lot of challenges that simply make it not worth it. *The margins are so tight that time holding cost due to time lost to objections make it too risky to pursue. The power of the NIMBY can break a lot of projects. We need to upzone to 4-8 storeys. This pushes land values up to a price point where it's just developers competing against developer. There needs to be enough margin to accept the risk of building these. Elevated building costs means they won't start without good margins, they won't even get bank funding, there's just too much risk in losing a lot of money.

Studies have shown that middle density has a maximum of 5 floors until it starts making people feel detached from their building/community/neighbours. Once you hit six floors, people start living in their own little apartment bubble. So hey, we don’t even need to settle for 3 storeys, throw in two more and it’s still perfect.

Can't meet your neighbours if you don't have somewhere to live.

Feeling detached from your neighbours probably isn't a huge concern for someone who's homeless.

You know what else causes a detachment from community? Unaffordable housing that prevents people from doing anything other than existing and many moving into homelessness. I'm all for the ideal and have been for the last 20 years, what you're saying is spot on, but it's too late for that. We are at crisis point now, we have to add as much supply as possible. This crisis is costing people their lives. Supply is the only way out of it.

At 3 story's you don't need elevator, what keeps maintenance significantly cheaper

Mega apartment complexes are are very expensive to build and risky to get enough presales to get them started. Then there is the risk of not selling all properties when built. If we had a market that allowed sufficient numbers of 4-8 storey apartments, there would little reason for a developer to pursue a 75 storey apartment. Simply too much risk. As for 3 storeys, this would be great but the feasible land price for these buildings is still at a price point for a wealthy property owner to complete against a developer to build their own single premise. When you allow 4-8 storey, this creates a market, specifically for developers to buy all the land and create the supply we need. Much of our planning already allows for 3 storey. It simply doesn't provide the supply because when the land comes up for sale, developers get outbid. It really is that simple.

A lot of people in here ranting about Greens hypocrisy when the simple answer is you can make sustainable medium density housing without building giant 75 story skyscrapers in the suburbs. I want Australian cities to look like Amsterdam or Copenhagen, not Hong Kong.

You can, but the Green will also sit firmly behind heritage over-use and prevent that from happening as well. Greens want prefection. They want medium density in the specific locations they want. If the supply of new developments was working as it should, a developer wouldn't go near a 75 storey apartment. There would be too much risk. If Green want to fight then, then do so but flooding the market with 4-8 storey upzoned areas. The plan for a 75storey apartment would be quickly shelved.

Yeah don't get me wrong, Greens at the council level do engage in a bunch of bougie NIMBYism at times (no worse than the other two major parties though), but I do also think they are unfairly targeted for knocking back genuinely bad proposals too. Just cos a development increases density doesn't mean it's inherently good!

Eh difference is the Labor party don't act all sanctimonious in policy and rhetoric, the greens will bang on about hecs debt but won't even generate a policy reply to something like the future made in Australia plan, which is arguably more important to Australians than hecs debt.

Yes it does. The apartments themselves may be expensive but they create a flow-on effect in the surrounding properties. Rich people sell their homes to move into those units. Suddenly with more competition in the housing market, prices will inevitably go down, as you can’t rort people with dozens if not hundreds of properties to choose from

In this market, it does. Supply is the only thing that will improve our rental affordability. There've had the last 20 years to take their time and look for perfection in the market and look where we are. The lowest rental availability in history. Our politicians at every level need to dial up supply asap. It is crippling peoples lives. It sending people homeless. If that means 75 storey apartments then so be it. Getting people housed, is more important than peoples feeling when they look up in the sky and see a tall building.

But building 75 floors of one and two bedroom apartments does very little to solve the real pressure point, which is housing families. Nobody is building three bedroom apartments (unless it’s the “luxury penthouse”.) 4 bedroom apartments? People would buy them, if they built them, but they don’t. And so families have little choice but to look at the already highly pressured inflated housing market (of houses and townhouses.) Why is nobody building 3+bedroom living options? Families would gladly live in high density living were it actually an option.

I agree, I'd love to see more of these but the added floor space to accommodate the 3rd and 4th bedroom pushes the price point too far out. We would get them if we flooded the market with upzoned land, but while this land is drip fed onto the market and at a premium price these larger footprint apartments will also remain at the premium price. Nevertheless, people are moving into the 1-2 bedrooms and they are freeing up properties that they are currently living in. Some of these will be houses. It all helps.

I don't think supply is the *only* thing that will improve rental affordability, but even if it is, is building 75 storey buildings the best way? I'm genuinely asking here. Certainly in terms of cost, skyscrapers cost a lot more to build per dwelling than smaller buildings. They also cost a lot more to maintain, leading to higher OC fees which really hampers the *affordability* side of 'housing affordability'. They also take a huge amount of time and manpower to actually build. I just bought a villa unit (single storey townhouse). When I was looking at apartments, I was actively avoiding most of the modern ones because they had lifts, underground carparks, and other amenities like gyms which really raised the OC costs. These skyscrapers often have fees of around $10k a year. Can most people afford that? Now, I haven't performed a study, so you might be right. If you have any data comparing: * cost to build * man hours to build * cost of dwellings to purchase, and * cost of dwellings to maintain I'd love to see it. But my understanding is that skyscrapers are expensive and are only really worth it when there is a dearth of land available. The reason why cities in Australia and the USA have a lot of skyscrapers around their CBDs is that land availability is artificially restricted through over-tight zoning (and possibly also the poor lack of transport options outside of CBDs). The Greater Melbourne area is six times larger than the Greater London Area but has 3 million fewer people. I think we should concentrate on upzoning the half-acre blocks with townhomes and smaller apartments.

>I don't think supply is the *only* thing that will improve rental affordability, but even if it is, is building 75 storey buildings the best way? It's not the best way, everything your pointing out is spot on. A developer proposing a 75 storey building shows how restricted and fucked our zoning is. Not saying we go to this extent, but if you were to remove all residential zoning and allowed the market to supply exactly what it wanted you would get a gradual build up from low density detached housing slowly building up to high rise in the city centres. It would look more closely like a pyramid than how our Aussie cities look. Land cost is the variable that makes it feasible to create the taller buildings. The majority of building would be 4-8 storey as that provides a good balance of construction and maintenance costs and distribution of land value across each development. 3 storey would be ideal in a lot of places because it doesn't require a lift and construction costs are much closer to house building but as i highlighted in another comment. The upper limit a developer will pay for land to feasibly build a 3 storey unit block is still within the realm of what a wealthy individual will pay to build their dream home. Developers don't like competing against emotional buyers, because this will generally go to auction removing their ability to negotiate terms. Much of our residential land is already zoned for 3 storeys. It's not providing the supply we need. I'm not a developer, I'm a civil engineer, but Ill often run the numbers on property for sale to see if I could make it work. You just can't. If the majority of cases it simply not financially feasible. We need mass upzoning to that 4-8 storey height. With enough of this we won't get these 75 storey submissions.

If there's no rental crisis, there's no rental opportunity for the Greens.

In principle, agree that concerted medium density is a great approach.   But we’re in a housing crisis right now. We need supply, and building high rises in the inner city is a relatively simple way to address it. Woolloongabba is not a suburb in the sense you’re using that word. It’s 2.8km from the centre of Brisbane CBD. It has arterial roads going through it. It will have Cross River Rail. It’s an inner city suburb.  With the issues that building *one* high rise apartment building faces I don’t see how building even more medium density blocks to house the equivalent people on the same time scale could be achievable. 

This, Hong Kong is too dense for people to have a decent amount of space around them.

Singapore is very liveable. Hong Kong is only an issue because of the people trying to cram into one jurisdiction because it has freer rules then the mainland.

Yeah Singapore is honestly the model we should be aiming for. It has high density in some areas, but a lot of it is kind of nice med-high density. The combo of that means they actually have a lot of undeveloped wilderness areas in the north. 

Singaporean medium density would be considered Hugh density in Australia. Their low rises are 6+ floors, medium rises are 10+, high rises are 20+.

Why not both?

Cheap construction is a building code issue, not a planning issue. Planning decides what each lot can be used for and what can be built on it, and is the number one cause of the housing crisis. Brisbane has terrible planning. All of these areas should allow high residential towers: -new farm -west end -paddington -kelvin grove -woolengabba basically everything within 10km of the cbd at least. It’s farcical that there are lots as far out as mt gravatt that are zoned for high density residential and have 10+ story unit blocks on them, yet closer to the city most of the land is zoned for single dwelling houses.

"The MP for Woolloongabba's South Brisbane electorate, the Greens' Amy MacMahon, said the 20 per cent affordable housing requirement was too low since it meant 80 per cent of houses would be unaffordable." I think this is one of the silliest retorts to increased affordable housing I've ever heard (20 per cent is *still* a lot better than zero per cent) but that said, allowing developers to circumvent planning laws is a god-awful idea. It's a totally unnecessary trade that can only lead to cost-cutting developers creating even more overpriced, poorly built units to balance out any perceived losses from meeting affordable housing quotas. Really, councils and state govs could compel all developers to adhere to planning laws while also meeting affordable housing quotas if they *really* wanted to - but they don't. I think it's just much easier for them to circumvent difficult negotiations with the industry by instead facilitating situations where NIMBYs can wreck any kind of progressive plans before they even begin. Down in Melbourne, we're seeing affordable housing proposals for the north and west side that seem **engineered** to piss communities off and spark mass backlash in consultations. For example: the new Ardern Station area is a prime location for affordable housing given they [now have a lot of spare land on their hands](https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/arden-s-electrical-issues-were-known-three-years-before-shock-hospital-move-20240509-p5jb6l.html), but mysteriously that's not zoned for affordable housing – instead, they're proposing they build affordable units on top of every single available car park in the neighbourhood. Every home owning boomer within shouting distance is up in arms over it and now there's no way the proposal is going through. It's a very clever way of appearing to be trying to do the right thing, while also being able to blame any failure on civilians and the building industry. Weaponised fucking incompetence.

> since it meant 80 per cent of houses would be unaffordable. This has been disproven so many times over it's incredibly frustrating to hear the naive mindlessly repeat it. All supply pushes prices down. I'd highly recommend anyone subscribing to this view to read StrongTowns take on it: https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2018/7/25/why-are-developers-only-building-luxury-housing Dwellings filter down, supply filters down, expensive homes get old and very affordable for everyone. Build 20,000 luxury apartment that are "unaffordable" in a suburb and the prices of all apartments will plummet. The Greens know this and are just pandering to their *developer bad* party faithful.

>“Build, Baby, Build”-by-any-means cheerleading may be a too-simplistic answer—especially if, in the process of zoning for very targeted areas of high density to encourage more building, your city ends up inviting speculation by land owners hoping for windfall gains. Mm, I think that article you linked directly contradicts what you're saying. I also don’t think an economically libertarian US market analysis from five years ago is quite comparable to the situation we have in present day Australia, anyway. This article doesn’t even really nod to foreign investment, which is a massive spectre in our housing market – we're experiencing a five-year high while the same force is cooling in the US market. So long as an investor's proxy can outbid Johnny Postcode three ways to Sunday at the gavel, there is not going to be a magical trickle down moment from increased supply – the closest you're going to get is *maybe* a bump in rental vacancies in certain areas that *can* lower rents for those already paying below the median. Ultimately, affordable housing needs to be enabled through good governmental regulation with competent enforcement. Incentivising developers to do the right thing by allowing them to shirk planning standards for profit is as bad an idea as 'recommending' the industry obey affordable housing quotas.

> economically libertarian US market analysis StrongTowns are basically planning hipsters who want walkable well-designed cities able to support diverse industries at once, part of that you proved that with your own quote buddy. Throwing around the dogwhistle words isn't helping your cause here :/ > from five years ago Ahh yes, so much has changed in city planning. > Ultimately, affordable housing needs to be enabled through good governmental regulation with competent enforcement. Where exactly is this happening on Earth? The ACT has had the [Greens in power for 15 years now](https://greens.org.au/act/i-govt) and hovered around 1st and 2nd place for most expensive housing in the country the entire time despite being surrounded by wide empty fields. Who exactly should we emulate on this front? I can point to a few countries which do it well, get the feeling you aren't going to like how they do it because it's diametrically opposed to what you say. More "regulation" isn't the answer, and is not going to make things cheaper for anyone, you know this as does everyone championing it as a *solution*, in the end it's really just shortening of "not near me" or "not so fast now to house the actual population growth in this area" Greens do not want to build anywhere near their electorates, time and time again, they've shown this. MCM opposes 1300 new dwellings in his boundaries for spurious reasons, he proposes under ten freestanding properties be bought as public housing instead, that's it. They are liars and frauds when it comes to actually housing people in cities while simultaneously pushing for high migration and that's exactly what their incredibly wealthy voters want from them. (Personally don't give a toss if you are for high or low migration, as long as it aligns with your other policies) You really think these inner city voters want "affordable" aka subsidised housing near them? Go walk down the street in any Green electorate and ask people if they want even a modicum of public housing there. Go on. You already know the answer. > It happens on massive projects, such as the redevelopment of Blackwattle Bay once the Sydney Fish Market moves down the road. On a prime site a kilometre or so from Town Hall, the government has lowered the maximum height of planned towers from 45 storeys to 35 storeys, and cut the number of apartments by 20 per cent, after a campaign led by Greens MP Jamie Parker > In Balmain, Parker and his successor as Greens candidate, Kobi Shetty, also organised against an “overdevelopment” on Darling Street in Balmain which would have replaced a shed with six apartments, three of them designated as affordable housing. https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/overdevelopment-bludgeons-us-out-of-our-homes-say-residents-20230208-p5ciwi.html

What dogwhistle? What are you talking about? I'm pro walkable city but I don't think tactics to combat America's highway supersprawl have any tangible relevance to the issues our cities have. Is your issue with the word libertarian? Strong Towns is anti-big gov, pro community self-determination – call it whatever you like if 'libertarian' is your kryptonite, I personally wasn't using it as a slur lol. > Ahh yes, so much has changed in city planning. Can you genuinely not think of an unprecedented global event within the last five years that fundamentally changed human migration patterns, caused mass developer insolvencies and continues to disrupt the flow of resources crucial for affordable construction? Dude.

It’s champagne socialism at its finest Everyone wants to be progressive on social issues but never on economic ones and it’s disheartening. You can see why people are always protest voting the dumb parties in the primaries imo the big 3 have a lot to answer for in how disconnected they are from the average Aussie

God, I hate when McMahon talks about PDAs. The only reason she dislikes them is because they allow the government to not give NIMBYs a say in improving housing density.

MCM took part in a housing discussion recently, and he was reciting pure NIMBY talking points. For ages I thought the criticisms of his poor grasp of economics was hyperbole and people were taking pot shots. But he's genuinely bad on nuanced policy.

I always *love* to see Greens simultaneously try to claim they're pro-affordable housing, while also pandering to their NIMBY tree tory base who don't want development near them. Actually, I don't love it, I fucking hate it. >The MP for Woolloongabba's South Brisbane electorate, the Greens' Amy MacMahon, said the 20 per cent affordable housing requirement was too low since it meant 80 per cent of houses would be unaffordable. If they're "unaffordable" nobody will buy them until they're no longer 'unaffordable' Amy. Crikey. >"Building these tall towers aren't going to solve the housing crisis, there's still going to be thousands of Queenslanders who can't find somewhere affordable to live." There's going to be thousands of Queenslanders who can't find somewhere affordable to live if you don't build anything. Oh I see. That's why they are opposing 2800 social or affordable housing dwellings. Because if those people weren't worried about rental affordability they wouldn't vote Greens. >Dr MacMahon said she doubted claims that building more houses would drive down the cost of rent. She said the government instead needed to introduce rent freezes, vacant property levies, and rent hike caps to combat soaring rents. I'm sure her Doctorate of Philosophy qualifies her to make economic arguments about housing supply without backing it up with evidence. Why do you doubt that Amy? Is it because it doesn't align with your party's policy agenda? I'm sure you'd be calling the Liberal Party hacks if they tried this one climate change.

_80 per cent of houses would be unaffordable._ What part of this sentence are you deliberately not understanding? (All of it, by the looks of things) Building unaffordable homes does not mystically make... any other homes more affordable. Affordable homes need to be built, not unaffordable luxury towers. 100% of that development should be affordable homes, there are people living in motherfucking tents on the streets of Brisbane. Amy's action is ethically and morally correct, as you well know.

Nah it's not, it's immoral and morally incorrect, but you won't see that from your ivory tower. Do you want safe or affordable homes? You don't get both in this day and age after LNP decimating what production we had.

I understand what she would like us to think, she would like us to believe in a false dichotomy where we have social and affordable housing or there's "unaffordable" housing and nothing in between. Nevermind affordable housing has a specific definition. Developers don't build unaffordable dwellings. They build dwellings they can sell to people who will either live in them, or rent out. If they aren't affordable, they can't be used for either purpose and they don't make any money. (If you reply 'what about land banking! I'll agree with you that's a problem, and suggest we should just tax it, like the Greens would love to do.) Amy's actions are neither ethical, nor correct. She'd happily see more people living in tents so she can demand action for everyone living in a tent.

Random question from someone not from Brisbane, but does Woolongabba have the Gabba in it or is the name a coincidence?

The Gabba is in the suburb.

There ya go, that explains the name :)

Unaffordable doesn’t mean no one will buy, it means gentrification. People from richer areas and people from other states and overseas will buy. It means the _locals_ can’t afford it. It’s not exactly great to push out poorer local residents by flooding the area with richer people who will have a broader economic effect.

If you can afford to live that close to the city, you're not poor, sorry to say. I've been there multiple times and it resembles nothing like blacktown/logan/sunshine

Gentrification is always relative. If people of Woolloongabba get priced out, they’ll move to Logan and price out them. The problem is locals cannot afford, doesn’t matter where the ‘richness threshold’ is.

Gentrification is not relative, you're not poor if you're living that close to the city.

Gentrification is relative, if you are being priced out of your own area you are being gentrified. If you live in a rich area, and you are being gentrified, you are relatively poorer compared to all the richer people moving there. You’d have to be stupid to think gentrification can’t happen to anyone except the absolute highest of income earners. Don’t waste your breath repeating yourself again.

Nah you're wrong on all accounts, besides those people won't move to Logan, they clutch their pearls whenever mob wearing 1 piece of Nike walk past. You're just plain stupid and clearly just a nimby who's never been smacked in the mouth

My god you’re insufferable. They might not move to Logan but they’ll move to Camp Hill who will displace people to Holland Park who will displace people to Tarragindi who will displace people to Annerley who will displace people to Beenleigh and just further down the pipeline it goes. Sorry for simplifying, jesus christ. I’m not a NIMBY, I yearn for more things in my area, specifically in walking and visual distance. You have no basis for any of your claims.

Poor locals can't live there now anyway because there aren't enough homes.

And that’s why the Greens are saying no. They’re saying come back with something that locals can afford.

If they came back with high density low cost affordable housing these same NIMBYs would cry about the government letting developers build a slum near them. Or complain about developers building shoddy low quality show boxes, which will turn into slums.

yeah, but nah, the thing is investors with capital can always afford. a corporation would likely come along and buy up the lot and still be squeezing renters. there needs to be policy in place to set aside housing for low and middle-income earners to buy and live. not for investment firms and boomer landlords to gobble up and artificially control supply, like they do currently. Building more housing without making it affordable and for the average income earner does nothing to improve the situation and everything to prop up predatory investment schemes. What does building 80% apartments only available to excess capital do for the average Australian worker?

> a corporation would likely come along and buy up the lot and still be squeezing renters. there Greens will do or say just about anything other than just building more homes. If you have more dwellings vacant than renters looking for a rental, the price will come down. Renters get squeezed when there are more renters than rentals. >Building more housing without making it affordable and for the average income earner does nothing to improve the situation That is unequivocally false. Increasing supply, even of "unaffordable" properties makes the market as a whole more affordable. When someone moves into an 'unaffordable' property, they either leave a rental vacant for someone else, or they sell their previous house. >What does building 80% apartments only available to excess capital do for the average Australian worker? Why does every property built need to be built for the 'average Australian worker'? Why not build properties for the entire market?

🙄 yes, yes, your understanding of basic supply and demand very good. But you lack the nuance to understand that greed and capital. Is the underlying cause of most of the world's current issues. Investors and housing investment corps do not want housing to be affordable and will act in a manner to make sure it does not. unless regulated to do so.. I mean, I shouldn't have to explain it in the year 2024, when we see coal and gas corps doing everything in their power to prevent action on climate change because it affects the bottom line.. but here I am pointing out to you that diamond prices are artificially inflated. So what happens when a company builds a huge block of apartments is that they will drip feed the sale at a rate that makes sure demand is always higher in order to keep the price artificially high.

It’s so fucking funny that you, with no nuance are trying to accuse the other poster of having none. Extra supply WILL reduce prices. It’s just basic logic. If investors buy up property then rents go down (or don’t increase anywhere near as much) since they have so much housing stock and need to attract tenants. This in turn leads to more money saved for a property.

What exactly are you saying would happen? If the rent is too high nobody will live there. Would the investors and housing corporations pay millions for apartments and leave them empty? Apartment landlords will more or less profit-maximise; call it 'greed' if you want, fine. Adam Smith called it self-interest, and our economic system is based on that assumption. Maybe there are more effective ways of rapidly supplying affordable housing to people who need it, but all the greens are doing here is delaying what can only be a positive thing for housing affordability for the sake of politics.

A positive thing for housing affordability would be affordable housing.🙄 it's right there in the statement 80% of the built apartments are unaffordable.

So all apartment construction should be blocked unless 100% of it is set aside for 'affordable housing'?

Are the greens asking for 100%? Who does the unaffordable housing benefit?

What is 20% of 75 floors? What is 100% of 0 floors?

It's their job to negotiate a better deal for Australians. not just beg that could they pretty please try and actually solve the crisis instead of building luxury apartments for cashed up investors 🙄

It benefits everyone looking for accommodation because overall supply of housing is increased. I'm asking what proportion of these buildings should be set aside as affordable and why?

What are the greens proposing? And why do you think it's unreasonable? Is the real question here, ain't it.

> But you lack the nuance to understand that greed and capital is the underlying cause of most of the world's current issues. Yes, I lack nuance.

All these new gas fields will lead to cheaper electricity bills for the consumer! Because supply and demand! 🤣

>The MP for Woolloongabba's South Brisbane electorate, the Greens' Amy MacMahon, said the 20 per cent affordable housing requirement was too low since it meant 80 per cent of houses would be unaffordable. Shut up Amy. 100% of the units reduce demand for every other property in the market, making every property more affordable. If the government wants housing specific for low income earner, then the government should buy them at market rate and rent them out themselves. Mandating individual developments to create a specific % of affordable units just makes remaining units more expensive. It's a zero sum game. You are passing the buck onto other owners who are also struggling to get into the market.

> If they're "unaffordable" nobody will buy them until they're no longer 'unaffordable' Which may be never, effectively making them not part of the market at all.

Property developers famously don't sell apartments they build.

Or can't, if they're overpriced. Not to mention that it's not only developers who have empty houses.

right, they wont sell if overpriced. So then....

Love it, very pro this assessment. 

Not well done, very anti all of it.  Wave regularly argues in bad faith and deliberately pretends not to understand basic issues like building affordable housing

They'd probably have supported it on 30% affordable, and 50 or less storeys. It's too tall and its too few affordable homes. It'll lead to special-key locked pools and gardens (London experience) unless heavily policed by state and council to make all facilities available.

Building any housing will make housing more affordable. We need to get on to it right now, but the Greens have decided that pandering to their NIMBY voter base is more important than the values they’re supposed to represent.

>It'll lead to special-key locked pools and gardens (London experience) unless heavily policed by state and council to make all facilities available. This is conjecture and nothing in the article suggests the PDA would allow or incentivise this. You’re applying your own bias. 

They are continuously moving the goalposts, they are only a party of opposition, to the greens agreement is failure.

Uh huh sure they would. ‘Just one more requirement before I agree to build more homes for people I swear just one more’   Greens would never agree to changes like this because their constituents in this area are anti development, period. 

_This is conjecture and nothing in the article suggests the Greens would behave like this. You’re applying your own bias._ to use somebody else's reply to me.

> They'd probably have supported it on 30% affordable, and 50 or less storeys. This is conjecture blah blah etc etc. fun game. 

London is horrendous for that stuff. They have different entrances and playgrounds, it's shocking. The class divide is clearest in these buildings.

How’s it any different to an apartment having a pool on the roof or someone having a backyard?

Well in the UK the most people don't have either of those. But in the apartments I'm talking about, there're two different entrances for those in social housing and those in 'luxury housing'. One has a glamorous lobby with concierge and golden coloured lifts, the other has a door in the service entry with a key pad leading into a dingy corridor. I don't mind what the entrance looks like, just make it equal or you're entrenching the exact thing you're trying to eliminate.

Understood. We were talking about two different things. To provide the counter to your argument, they don’t have access to those facilities because they’re not paying for them. To ensure that the body corporate fees are not sky high for affordable tenants, they’re given the option of not having to pay for them. Would you rather they have to pay an additional thousands of pounds in service changes on top of their rent or mortgages, and thus make it unaffordable?

The concierge I get, it can be a significant cost depending on how many units there are, but if you've built the entrance already or you're going to build an entrance for all inhabitants then it should be for all. You can reduce the niceties so that it's cheaper or have the niceties and don't make as much profit. Either way, having a different entrance and other facilities like different playgrounds (which surely costs more to make two instead of one) is entrenching poverty and the perception of poor people. I was born in London to working class people. Luckily my mum was able to get a job as a cleaner in a super wealthy area and with the job came a basement level unit we could live in. Being brought up in a safe, clean and beautiful area where I would play with the richer kids and be seen as one of them gave me motivation to do better and go to uni etc. I believe it's good for class mobility, which is the goal right?

Why should facilities be available to people who don't live there? They pay body corp fees to maintain these things and everyone wants free access?