Suburbamania: Choking Australia

Posted by Kevin Rennie

The Victorian Sustainability Commisioner was stating the bleeding obvious:

A DAMNING report on Victoria’s environmental health has called for a halt to urban sprawl and dramatic changes to the “unsustainable” materialism and consumption of the state’s citizens. 

Just two days after the Brumby Government announced an extension of Melbourne’s urban boundaries, the state-appointed Sustainability Commissioner has warned of serious environmental damage on the city fringes and called for the boundaries to be fixed.
Brumby told to halt the sprawl (The Age 5 December 2008)

We have travelled extensively throughout Australia during the last 20 years, mostly by car. Two clear messages stand out about how we are choking our continent. Our obsession with living in suburbia is strangling our cities and regional towns and destroying the surrounding environment. Flowing out of these is an endless traffic grid-lock.

Never Mind The Frolykz, here’s Weekend Wonderland!

Hello!

And welcome to Weekend Wonderland, the place where we get to wonder and wander. I wonder a lot sometimes. Other times I don’t.

Next week the Federal government will be throwing cash around like there’s no tomorrow.

From Monday, pensioners, carers, seniors and veterans will receive one-off payments of up to $1400 over a two-week period. About 3.9 million families will also receive payments of $1000 for each child in their care.

Me? I won’t get one red cent.