Transport for Sustainable Cities forum - Report

Today at the Sustainable Living Festival there was a debate on the problem of Sustainable Transport. Fortunately Mary Drost was there to keep the speakers to the point.

The first speaker was Ross Garnaut, professor of Economics and author of a climate change review. He seemed very keen on a denser population, using more public transport and talked about cities with good public transport, giving Hong Kong and Tokyo as examples.

The second speaker was Greg Hunt MP, the Liberal Shadow Minister for Climate Action. In talking about transport, he pointed out that, in relation to measuring greenhouse emissions, it is consumption per head multiplied by population numbers. He said that the time is coming for a population debate.

He then took questions. Mary Drost of Planning Backlash said that she did not want to live in Hong Kong or Tokyo, but in Melbourne. She said she did not want to see Melbourne ruined and added that she agreed with Kelvin Thomson's ideas on population numbers for Australia. She asked Greg Hunt if he would work with Kelvin Thomson to get this population debate out into the public arena.

There was much clapping from the public for her comments.

Greg Hunt, who sounded a little surprised, replied that he would 'in a bipartisan way'.

Mary Drost asked Greg Hunt to "Tell Abbott" and she then said to Kelvin Thomson (the next speaker), "And you tell Rudd."

The third speaker was Kelvin Thomson.

Thomson said that ageing should not be seen as a burden because older people contribute, and as they retire young people get jobs. He said that we need more railways, the outer areas are being neglected. He commented that we have 2 million cars now, but by 2036 there will be 3 million cars. "We have to stop cramming people in," he stated. "Our biggest problem is rapid population growth." He advised people to say "No" to new suburbs and "no" to new high rise and infill."

Good to see some relevance at the Sustainable Living Festival, which sometimes looks as if it too is being taken over by the Housing Industry and the Recycling Industry along with the Spin Industry.