The West Australian
Opinion Editorial by Tanya Steinbeck, UDIA WA CEO
Capability, confidence and courage. These are the key traits as a State we need to embrace as we look towards a diversified future economy supported by an innovative building and development sector.
At UDIA WA’s State Conference last week, our Chief Scientist Peter Klinken named the top three traits when speaking about the antidote to ‘Dutch Disease’ – an economic phenomenon that occurs when you put all your eggs in the mining and resources basket.
Hot on the heels of the Productivity Commission’s report into housing construction, it goes without saying that any impediments to innovation in construction methodology need to be rapidly removed if we are to solve our housing supply challenges.
The very first 3D printed house is about to hit Perth, where in Texas there are whole streets of homes being built with this technology. Good luck getting that approved at scale by our duplicative and overly excessive regulatory regime that espouses quality at the expense of commercial reality.
The National Construction Code needs to ensure our homes are well built, sustainable, durable and affordable to deliver. If this is achieved in close consultation with the sector that does the work, then other layers of state and local government regulation don’t need to jump on the bandwagon.
Modular and prefabricated construction is growing and evolving in WA, delivering new, quality homes in a matter of weeks rather than months or years. This is helpful for the delivery of homes in regional areas, on small lots, for social housing, as well as in the broader market.
It is not a matter of completely replacing traditional methods of construction but complementing existing methods with new ways to speed up processes, dramatically reduce site waste and keep costs down for new home buyers.
For Perth and Peel, a housing landscape dominated by infill and greater density is inevitable. Again, this requires a great deal of confidence and courage to bring the community along on that journey.
Chief Economist at Auckland City Council, Gary Blick, outlined at the conference how Auckland City implemented upzoning regulations to boost infill development and higher densities across the City. It was a brave move and is just one option that we could consider here as we face an uphill battle in delivering the level of infill and density needed to reach necessary new housing goals.
It’s not brick OR framed. It’s not greenfields OR infill. It’s both and it’s needed now.
This article first appeared in the Wednesday 5 March edition of The West Australian in the opinion section.