The debate over the costs and benefits of urban consolidation has perhaps never been more important given the rise in the importance of sustainability principles as a basis of planning, the growth of megacities and development pressure on countrysides.

Current approaches to safeguarding urban water quality can be largely ineffective as they focus on standard ‘end-of-pipe’ solutions. Problems of urban water pollution need do be dealt with at source rather than end of pipe and as such will only be remedied through innovative planning.

This paper explores the links between child-friendly cities and sustainable cities including sustainable transport systems.

Using the ADI St Mary’s site to explore long standing issues in the planning and management of urban development, this paper identifies the generic nature of issues such as constraining the scale of development and empowering people in specific contexts, resulting from a complex interplay of individuals, community groups, firms, local governments, state agencies

While globalisation and production chain unbundling is allowing Advanced Business Services to reach out to clients in distant regions and countries, the tendency towards consolidation of these firms into Australia’s biggest cities, in particular Sydney and Melbourne, is of policy concern.