Projects
»Projects
Developing a Penrith Valley Economic Corridor
The promotion and development of a Penrith Valley economic corridor has the potential to play an important role in facilitating income generation and employment growth in the Penrith area, and so contribute significantly in addressing NSW government job targets as outlined in the NSW Government’s Metropolitan Plan Vision for Sydney.
Funded by the Penrith Business Alliance, this study had three key objectives: first, to explore characteristics of a successful economic corridor within a regional city; second, to devise arguments for the development of a Penrith Valley economic corridor; and, third, to develop the broad spatial dimensions of the Penrith Valley economic corridor.
» Download the Developing a Penrith Valley Economic Report 2011
Contact:
Professor Phillip O'Neill
Bridging the gap in infrastructure decision making
Professor Phillip O’Neill is investigating how the languages and technologies we use to design and assess urban infrastructure projects can affect how they are built. This research has been funded by the Australian Research Council Discovery Program for the period 2010 to 2012. The project involves an investigation of the commissioning, financing and operation of large infrastructure in Australia over the last twenty years. The investigation will enable an assessment of the various pathways and strategies which have been used to create urban infrastructure, including private ownership, public-private partnerships and traditional public ownership formats. A key question underpinning the research asks whether contemporary infrastructure delivery modes are capable of delivering long term, sustainable systems of infrastructure provision that generate specific urban efficiencies as well as widespread positive externalities. Professor O'Neill is assisted in the project by Dr Alexandra Wong.
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Professor Phillip O'Neill
The production and contestation of airport territory
This is an ARC Discovery project, led by Professor Donald McNeill, and running from 2008-2010. Drawing on case studies of London Heathrow, Hong Kong, JFK, and Sydney, the project examines the airport platform within a broad political economy of city development, and with a cross-cutting examination of global processes of airport management, design and ownership. The case studies of terminal design and real estate development are combined with interviews with airport workers and communities opposed to airport development. These include detailed studies of how globalised airport management groups fencing with city and national governments, determine the spatial form of contemporary airports.
» Fact sheet
Contact:
Professor Donald McNeill
Innovation in retail policy and the restructuring of central business districts
Funded by a UWS research grant, the aim of this project, led by Professor Donald McNeill, is to examine transnational retailing and street design in Sydney and Melbourne. There is now a growing interest in issues such as ‘brandscaping’, boutique retailing, and public space innovation as producing globally competitive central business districts, as key components of a mix between office, residential and retail space. This trend is underpinned by recent policy initiatives emanating from Sydney and Melbourne city councils. By locating these shifts within an Asia-Pacific – rather than exclusively Australian – frame of reference, the project will conceptualise the retail sectors of Melbourne and Sydney central business districts within the literature on global urban restructuring.
Contact:
Professor Donald McNeill
Enabling inter-agency data sharing to support the spatial analysis of social vulnerability
This is an ARC Linkage Project conducted in collaboration with Professor Pauline McGuirk and others from The University of Newcastle with the external partner the NSW Department of Premier and Cabinet. The project is funded 2008 to 2010.
Addressing social vulnerability requires early identification of vulnerable communities and whole-of-government intervention. This depends upon the availability of meaningful indicators which in turn demands inter-agency data sharing. To date a host of constraints—legal, ethical, organisational—have prevented such data sharing. The primary focus of this research is resolution of these constraints. The project to date has developed protocols to overcome constraints and enable agency data to be shared and incorporated into production of enriched indicators.
The project has three key objectives: first, development of robust spatial methodologies for analysing multiple data-sets to produce enriched metrics of social vulnerability; second, construction of reproducible protocols to address legal, ethical and IT-security regulatory requirements so as to enable government agency data to be incorporated into socio-spatial analyses of vulnerability; third, design of procedures to overcome institutional constraints to more comprehensive government agency data sharing to underpin whole-of-government responses to social vulnerability.
Contact:
Professor Phillip O’Neill
Mortgage Distress Project
This project aims to explore the processes that lead to mortgage distress from the perspective of the borrower in the mortgage hotspots of Sydney. More specifically, the impact of labour market vulnerability, loss of income, change of household circumstances, and house prices in relation to mortgage distress will be analysed.
The research design involves a mixed method approach composed of two parts: a self administered survey delivered online and by mail (paper questionnaire) and in depth interviews. The survey is anonymous and the interviews are voluntary and confidential. The eMortgage Survey aims to gather general context information to generate a snapshot of the main issues and be able to draw comparative aspects for analysis and discussion. We expect to recruit 200 participants who have experienced mortgage distress in the last four years on a residential property situated in Greater Western Sydney. We invite them to complete the 10 minute online (or paper) survey. The recruitment of potential participants will be by newspaper advertisement in a number of Fairfax Community Newspapers with distribution in Western Sydney.
» Download the Experience of Mortgage Distress in Western Sydney
Contact:
Professor Phillip O'Neill
Western Sydney Employment Study
The Urban Research Centre's report on employment in Western Sydney provides a comprehensive account of the challenges the region faces in generating jobs for its residents. The report finds that employment growth is struggling due to poor infrastructure, a shortage of quality employment sites, and from ongoing neglect of the region's key urban centres. The economic crisis comes at a difficult time. The report details strategies for positive ways to address the region's urgent jobs needs.
» Download the Western Sydney Employment Study
Contact:
Professor Phillip O’Neill
A Land Use Audit of the Sydney Basin Using Remote Sensing Techniques
Within the Feeding Sydney project the interaction between urban development and agricultural land on Sydney's fringe is a core concern. Sustainability planning requires an understanding of the evolution and usage of land and the nature and extent of land resources. There currently exist gaps in land-use (LU) data for the Sydney Basin.
Contact:
Professor Phillip O'Neill
Community land trusts: innovation in perpetually affordable housing
Community land trusts have developed in the United States of America over the past 30 years as a housing model aiming to balance individual equity gain with the broader social goal of retaining affordable housing over time and across resales.
This project aims to document the model and its usefulness in the USA, to assess the feasibility of translating the model to an Australian context and to assist emerging community land trusts in Australia. In March 2009, Dr Louise Crabtree hosted a visit to Australia by Dr John Emmeus Davis, a leading global researcher on community land trusts. In September 2009, Dr Crabtree will be visiting the Champlain Housing Trust in Burlington, Vermont with the support of the United Nations Building and Social Housing Foundation. An Australian CLT Network Google Group has been established as a forum for sharing ideas and resources about the model.
Visit the Australian CLT Network Google Group
The Urban Research Centre and ShelterNSW hosted an introductory seminar by Dr John E Davis which can be viewed by clicking on the image below.
