Julian Bolleter

• Phd
• Co-director of the Australian Urban Design Research Centre at The University of Western Australia

Since 1996, migration-related schemes have directed new immigrants and refugees to regional Australia to mitigate the need for skills and people in these locations. Therefore, the long-term settlement of immigrants and refugees in regional Australia is an important issue. Existing research has examined settlement patterns, processes, and internal d...

This paper establishes a novel typology of communal outdoor space within apartment buildings. • The paper then systematically accounts for their respective green space provision and usage by residents. • Dominant communal outdoor space typologies on podiums and rooftops deliver poor access to green space. • Dominant communal outdoor space typologie...

Since 1996, migration‐related schemes have directed new immigrants, refugees and humanitarian entrants to regional Australia to mitigate the need for skills and declining population growth in these locations. However, a key concern of these schemes is the uncertainty of long‐term immigrant retention in regional locations beyond the stipulated visa...

Transit Oriented Development (TOD) within existing urban areas often confronts entrenched community resistance. This paper documents the results of an Australian survey systematically evaluating the level of community support of densification strategies around a central train station in a greyfield suburban setting-based on theories in planning suc...

Background: Housing quality is a crucial determinant of mental health. While the construction of high-rise buildings is a popular policy strategy for accommodating population growth in cities, there is considerable debate about the health consequences of living in poorly designed apartments. Drawing on three Australian state government apartment d...

The dominance of capital cities (urban primacy) is an enduring characteristic of Australian states. There has been limited empirical research examining the drivers of primacy in states despite some being extreme examples of the phenomenon, both in magnitude and scale. In light of institutional theories of settlement patterns, we developed a profile...

Background Communal open spaces (COS) in apartment developments can be an important resource for residents, but little is known about the implementation of COS policy design requirements and its impact on residents’ use of these spaces. Methods Apartment design policies across three Australian states (NSW, Victoria and Western Australia) were scre...

Projections for the number of people displaced by climate change globally are startling and vary from 100 million to 1 billion; however, a widely repeated prediction is for 200 million by the mid-twenty-first century. Although difficult to estimate, some proportion of these people will cross borders and end up in Global North countries. This paper...

This paper introduces a comprehensive method to measure the implementation of residential apartment design policies in Australia. It describes a protocol for extracting and measuring potentially health-enhancing policy-specific design requirements derived from three current residential apartment design policies in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. These...

Institutional theories of urban primacy suggest centralized urbanization can be decentralized through political reform. Despite this potential, rectifying primacy and its attendant inefficiencies attracts sporadic interest. Perhaps this is because the disruption of primacy is rarely observed, rendering the potential of decentralization a nebulous c...

A global challenge concerns reconciling population growth and increasing built infrastructure with foreshore ecosystems that are ‘squeezed’ against a rising sea levels, hampering their ability to deliver life-sustaining ecosystem services. This paper tests established sea-level rise strategies – fortification, accommodation, and retreat – using a c...

Australian non-capital cities are overshadowed by their state capitals. High state-level urban primacy is especially true of Western Australia. Various theories in economic geography might explain the west Australian settlement pattern. Few are grounded in the experience of those with power over and/or knowledge of development. To study this experi...

There is growing consensus that planning professionals need clearer guidance on features of the built environment that promote health benefits. Concomitantly, the smart city movement has created renewed opportunity and interest in data-driven urban modelling to support land use planning. Planning Support Systems (PSS) are spatially enabled computer...

This paper presents findings from a national survey of Australian planning experts examining future settlement patterns and locations at the continental scale. Collective judgement supported efforts to achieve population decentralisation and favoured three possible scenarios-Satellite Cities, Boosted Secondary Capital Cities, and East West Megaregi...

Despite the long-term application of Transit Oriented Development (TOD) policy in Australian cities full implementation has proven a challenge. Indeed, in the Western Australian state capital of Perth, residential densities across most train station precincts remain typically low. Moreover, the use of public transport has declined over the last dec...

The projected long-term growth of Australia’s population to over 50 million people raises significant implications for infrastructure planning and liveability. Concomitantly, support for population growth through immigration is, according to some measures, waning. This paper presents findings from a national survey, Plan My Australia, measuring sup...

Heat stress, resulting from elevated heat and absolute humidity associated with climate change, will increasingly occur in the tropics and parts of the mid-latitudes and could threaten the liveability and viability of many regions. Concomitant with predictions of increased heat stress in northern Australia, the Australian Government seeks to boost...

With Australia’s population set to triple in the twenty-first century, its federal government is investing in decentralization. This is because Australian states exhibit high urban primacy, where one city is dominantly large. Institutional perspectives of primacy suggest political factors are usually significant drivers. For example, strong localis...

Apartment development has proliferated around the world; however concern about design quality has prompted the introduction of comprehensive apartment design policies. Effective implementation of these policies promises to improve design outcomes and create apartments conducive to good health. This study benchmarked whether design requirements link...

Uganda has one of Africa’s fastest urban growth rates, compounding urban challenges, including urban sprawl, the proliferation of informal settlements, decrepit housing, and the privatization of urban development without providing public open space and transport connectivity. In response, this paper tests generic models of urbanization that could b...

Background There is consensus that planning professionals need clearer guidance on the features that are likely to produce optimal community-wide health benefits. However, much of this evidence resides in academic literature and not in tools accessible to the diverse group of professionals shaping our cities. Incorporating health-related metrics in...

Background: There is consensus that planning professionals need clearer guidance on the features that are likely to produce optimal community-wide health benefits. However, much of this evidence resides in academic literature and not in tools accessible to the diverse group of professionals shaping our cities. This paper explores the role of planni...

By the end of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic had exceeded 83 million cases worldwide. Given the shared origins of planning and public health, new living and social conditions have prompted an interest in how urban planning could respond to the pandemic’s associated implications. In 2020, a national online survey Plan My Australia was conducted among p...

Australia’s population is projected to triple by 2101, yet the nation lacks coordinated planning based on systematic regional analysis. This paper documents a novel national-scale suitability analysis of Australia which identifies the most appropriate regions for future urban development. The central research question is ‘Where should Australian fe...

Increased heat stress and sea-level rise, associated with climate change could threaten the viability of some cities by the latter part of this century. This paper reviews urban development patterns in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, in the United Arab Emirates, and concludes these cities are highly vulnerable to elevated wet-bulb temperatures and sea level r...

The rapid expansion of urban areas worldwide is leading to native habitat loss and ecosystem fragmentation and degradation. Although the study of urbanisation’s impact on biodiversity is gaining increasing interest globally, there is still a disconnect between research recommendations and urbanisation strategies. Expansion of the Perth metropolitan...

From 1973 to 1975 a new Australian Government led by Gough Whitlam actively pursued plans to develop regional and sub-metropolitan Growth Centres with significantly boosted populations following a national strategy published in June 1973 which mapped a national coverage of prospective locations. The intention was for these centres to alleviate pres...

The Egyptian government has touted the new Administrative Capital City near Cairo as a flagship for ‘Smart City’ developments across Africa. Despite its association with the UN Sustainable Development Goals, critics argue that the project will be highly detrimental to existing cities, their inhabitants and the natural environment. Using a normative...

The rapid expansion of urban areas worldwide is leading to native habitat loss and ecosystem fragmentation and degradation. Although the study of urbanisation's impact on biodiversity is gaining increasing interest globally, there is still a disconnect between research recommendations and urbanisation strategies. Expansion of the Perth metropolitan...

In Australia, empirical analyses of municipal populations are uncommon given its cities are usually conceived of as metropolitan areas. Widespread usage of metropolitan statistics is practical; however, municipal perspectives engage with the machinery of government and can reveal complementary insights about cities as institutions. To develop such...

Australian cities rarely meet their targets for infill development and experience a ‘missing middle’ in terms of urban density. This paper surveys the barriers to medium-density projects on infill sites in the Western Australian city of Perth and subsequently ventures strategies to alleviate these impediments. The findings indicate that the princip...

Urban forests provide numerous benefits to human health and wellbeing, the local urban environment and biodiversity. Despite this, many suburban areas are experiencing declining urban forests due to urban consolidation. In response, this paper proposes scenarios for improving canopy coverage using an Australian middle ring suburb as a case study. T...

This book examines failed new city proposals in Australia to understand the hurdles – environmental, societal, and economic – that have curtailed such visions. The lessons from these relative failures are important because, if projections for Australia’s 21st century population growth are borne out, we will need to build new cities this century. Th...

The Wungong Landscape Structure Plan (LSP), currently under construction on the fringes of Perth, embodies a number of innovations with respect to Public Open Space (POS) provision. These include the proposition of a holistic, interconnected POS system that transcends individual property ownership, an integrated POS and stormwater management system...

In this chapter, we set out the ascendant ideology of TOD and review the barriers to its implementation in urban densification settings in suburban cities. These barriers can include land assembly and development feasibility issues, community resistance, lack of consumer demand and infrastructure provision challenges. As a result of these barriers,...

This chapter briefly summarizes the key points of the book. We then direct researchers to potentially fertile areas for future research. These include a systematic evaluation of community sentiment in relation to urban infill strategies, and the potential effects of emerging transport types on Transit-Oriented Development, amongst others. We then s...

While in the previous chapter we defined Greenspace-Oriented Development (GOD) and explained the multitude of benefits it offers, here we explain how practitioners can implement GOD. We suggest a step-by-step process that aims to guide GOD implementation. These steps are: (1) select parks for upgrading; (2) upgrade parks; (3) rezone the urban preci...

In this chapter, we set out a strategy for urban densification, which we name Greenspace-Oriented Development (GOD). While Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) co-locates urban densification with public transport hubs, GOD co-locates urban densification with significant, upgraded public green spaces (such as parks) that are relatively well served by...

Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) planning principles have informed Australian city planning for over two decades. As such, policy makers and planners often unquestioningly apply its principles. In contrast, this book critiques TOD and argues that while orientating development towards public transport hubs makes some sense, the application of TOD...

Exploring placemaking in Dubai and its role in legitimising the rule of Sheikh Mohammad

On the 20th of May 2019, the Ugandan government conferred city status upon Gulu, along with four other regional municipalities across the country (Mbarara, Jinja, Fort Portal and Arua). Gulu will formally become a city in July 2020. Two weeks after the Ugandan government’s announcement, a workshop was held with senior planning officers from Gulu, a...

Since 2011, the Western Australian State Government has spent $85 million on its SuperTowns project that aimed to boost the population and viability of subregional centres or ‘SuperTowns.’ Using the Wheatbelt SuperTowns of Northam, Morawa, Katanning and Boddington this paper explores how local governments have employed spatial design interventions...

Introduction The rapid increase in apartment construction in Australia has raised concerns about the impacts of poorly designed and located buildings on resident health and well-being. While apartment design policies exist, their content varies across jurisdictions and evidence on their impact on health and well-being is lacking. This cross-section...

The Australian federal government white paper ‘Our north, our future’ projects that northern Australia’s population could reach 5,000,000 by 2060. This represents an almost four-fold increase in population (an additional 3,700,000 people) all within the next 41 years. Given the ambiguities in the White paper about the distribution of this populatio...

This chapter summarizes the barriers to new or boosted city building experienced from Federation (1901) until today. The chapter concludes that, as a nation, we have failed to learn a number of the key lessons of history. We seem to have forgotten the limits that nature imposes, particularly in reference to population carrying capacity. We have dis...

There have been numerous recent proposals for new or boosted cities in northern Australia. These include new charter cities in the north proposed by World Bank Vice President Paul Romer. Other proposals include Western Australian state government plans to turn Pilbara mining company towns into bustling cities, and Northern Territory Government plan...

This chapter scopes the early to mid-twentieth century period (1901–1945) in which Australians strove to create a “rural civilization.” The fantasy that propelled this proposed civilization was that Australia might one day support a rural population of hundreds of millions. This, the proponents of the “garden city” model suggested, would deliver bo...

This chapter evaluates the potential barriers that could derail the delivery of the new or boosted city proposals for northern Australia, discussed in the previous chapter. These barriers are, to varying degrees, environmental, economic, societal, and governance-related and include carrying capacity issues, the cost of enabling infrastructure, and...

This chapter covers the period between 1970 and 1975 when it appeared likely that Australia would begin a national-scale program of population decentralization and new city building under the Gough Whitlam Federal Labor Government. In 1972, the newly established Department of Urban and Regional Development actively pursued plans to develop three ef...

This book examines failed new city proposals in Australia to understand the hurdles – environmental, societal, and economic – that have curtailed such visions. The lessons from these relative failures are important because, if projections for Australia’s 21st century population growth are borne out, we will need to build new cities this century. Th...

Perth, the capital city of Western Australia, is a city which is urbanizing into seasonally waterlogged land on two major development fronts. One result of this is that many new greenfield developments are adopting Living Stream orientated Public Open Space systems to cope with the related drainage issues. With respect to this situation this paper...

Advanced tracking technologies are considered by smart city advocates to have the potential to transform how we study cities. This paper tests, one dimension of these broader claims, through analysing the potential contribution that Wi-Fi tracking data of Wi-Fi users in the public realm can contribute to conventional public space–public life survey...

This paper assesses suburban development on Perth’s fringes delivered since 2004; the year Perth’s first serious plan for urban consolidation was released. This assessment is conducted with reference to state government goals concerning facilitating access to the natural environment and delivering efficient transport connectivity. The paper conclud...

The arid interior of Australia has been conceptualized as the site of a barren wasteland in need of ‘improvement’, a place of symbolic sacrifice by European-Australian culture to the archetypal interior, a powerful symbol of the ‘other’, and a source of Australian authenticity. Since 2001, a number of key public projects located in Australia’s capi...

This chapter explores the potential of mega-regional scale planning for accommodating a tripling of Australia's population by 2101.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, architecture in mining settlements often acted as a measure of wealth, as if to arouse confidence and longevity in places with an infamously brief lifespan. Arguably, recent planning for upgraded town centres in the Pilbara region of Western Australia has similarly employed urban form to provide...

While Activity Centres and Activity Corridors are the flagships of Western Australian State Government urban infill policy, much of infill development which is being delivered is ‘background infill’ – the subdivision of suburban lots to create two to five new dwellings. This paper assesses this background infill with reference to the State Governme...

This paper proposes an alternative strategy for delivering urban infill development in suburban contexts. The paper contends that the combination of upgraded streetscapes and residential densification could result in positive synergies. These include the supply of open space amenity as an incentive for resident groups to support infill development...

This article audits Perth's public landscape for their potential to accomodate 1 million infill dwellings

This chapter explores alternate futures for Perth's foreshore.

Landscape Urbanism has been, to date, a theory emerging primarily from the Western world. This paper counters the Western focus by exploring the potential of Landscape Urbanism theory in Dubai. In a previous article published by the author, landscape architecture in Dubai has been identified as diverging from the tenets of the various charters of t...

The sprawling city of Perth has one of the lowest population densities in the world and is arguably poorly adapted to the emerging environmental and societal challenges of the twenty-first century. This book tackles this issue on two fronts. First, it audits Perth’s suburban core for infill development opportunities that may have been overlooked in...

Twenty-one years have elapsed between an international design competition held for the redesign of Perth's Swan River foreshore and the commencement of construction of a small, but significant, section of the this river's edge. This extended period of design proposition allows an opportunity to reflect on trends in waterfront design in Perth, and s...

This paper explores the potential of a strategy for achieving infill development in Australian greyfield suburbs in which redesigned, ecologically enhanced urban parks, in areas with reasonable access to public transport, are employed to encourage, catalyze, and ultimately support, residential densification. This process involves the upzoning of a...

The Australian population is increasing at a rate of one person every 84 seconds. All of Australia’s major cities; Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth are forecast to double in population by mid-century. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) forecasts that by 2101 there could be 62.2 million Australians [1]. Taking this figure serio...

This paper explores the role of landscape architecture in the city state of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) [1]. Landscape architecture in Dubai is generally regarded as a benign force, but is a nonetheless important component of constructing Dubai's global image and legitimising its socio-political hierarchy. Landscape, in broad terms, is...

This paper explores the role of landscape architecture in the city state of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) [1]. Landscape architecture in Dubai is generally regarded as a benign force, but is a nonetheless important component of constructing Dubai's global image and legitimising its socio-political hierarchy. Landscape, in broad terms, is...