TEITR421 (Caroline Pidcock)

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Veronica: [00:00:00] In this episode, we explore where architecture, as it's commonly practiced today, is actually fit for a world facing climate, stress, housing pressure, and environmental limits. We are joined by Caroline Pitcock, an Australian architect whose work sits squarely at the intersection of design, climate action, and regenerative thinking, and who has spent.

Veronica: Decades inside the profession rather than commenting from the sidelines. And today, we seek to unpack three big ideas why sustainable design may no longer be enough, where the profession is falling short of its responsibilities, and what a genuinely regenerative approach would demand of architects, clients, and regulators alike.

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Veronica: [00:01:00] Our guest today is Caroline Peacock. A leading Australian architect, advocate and change maker, adjunct professor of practice at the University of Newcastle and longstanding leader within Australian Institute of Architects and other national bodies, deeply inspired by the lands, waters and skies. She's lived and worked within.

Veronica: ~Uh, ~Carolyn is committed to architecture that restores and regenerates people place and planet, and we are very much looking forward to what we can learn about this space today. Thank you for joining us today, Caroline.

Caroline: Pleasure. Great to be here. Thank you.

CB: Caroline, thanks so much for coming on. ~Um, ~we've obviously been doing it such a long time and ~um, ~there's always conversations we haven't covered. Right. And, you know, I guess rethinking about reusing our. Already existing buildings and retrofitting potentially older commercial buildings is a topic that we've thought about, we haven't actually covered in detail.

CB: And [00:02:00] um,~ um, ~we read your SMH article, a little while ago and,~ um,~ yeah, it was really fascinating. 'cause you know, obviously there's also things happening in the US and in New York where they're doing this. And so what's your thoughts when people talk about, Hey, we've got all these b, c, d grade office towers.

CB: No one wants to work in them anymore. Why don't we just flip 'em all to apartments? Is that really like a possibility or is that really, um, we're still thinking.~ um, ~

Caroline: ~Uh, ~not all of them, uh,~ uh,~ can be or should be turned into apartment buildings, but I do think we are at a point in time when all of our existing buildings should be kept because. ~Uh, ~we have actually signed up to the Paris Agreement and the Paris Agreement sets targets on how much carbon we should emit, if we wanna have any hope of reaching the 1.5 degree change, which we've already got to and beyond this, we are just gonna have more and more climatic.

Caroline: You know, disasters. so if we are committed to that, then we go, okay, well then every country really has got a budget of [00:03:00] carbon and every car country then takes their budget and looks at where they, where that can be spent in transport, in electricity and whatever. And you get down to the building sector and we haven't got very much left.

Caroline: So if we actually wanna house everyone, if we wanna have hospitals, if we wanna have,~ um,~ you know, schools, if we wanna, if we wanna keep doing well, we won't be doing what we're doing. We've gotta do things differently. And that's the point. And so I think that in every building in creating every building, you create all this, what they call embodied carbon.

Caroline: And that is the carbon that takes, That is used or expended to make a building, and it's from harvesting the materials, processing them, transporting them, constructing them, et cetera. And before you even move into a building, the amount of carbon used is significant. Really significant.

Caroline: So right at this time when we're trying to reduce the amount of carbon, we've got every single ton counts and there's a [00:04:00] heap of tons of carbon in buildings. And so just to wantonly demolish them and just start afresh. We, we can't do that in the uk. They're really adamant about this. ~Um, ~also in New York, but people who actually understand what we're doing to the planet go, we, we can't be doing this.

Caroline: We've gotta do things differently.

CB: Sorry, is our lifestyle needs are too high though. Because, you know, people don't want those old buildings, right? They want floor to ceiling windows. They want higher ceilings. They want open plan. Like, you know, they Our

Caroline: Yeah. I want a planet I

Caroline: well, I don't think, I don't think it's either or. I just think that people, you know, we really do need, need to take a good, hard look at ourselves and say, what do we actually really need as opposed to think we want or are being told we need, which is quite different to what we actually need, and also often quite different to what makes us happy.

Caroline: So, you know, floor to ceiling glass. Who wants to live in a place where everyone can see every minuscule bit of you? I don't, I mean, you know, it's just, [00:05:00] it is a joke. We do need windows. We do need light. We do need sunshine, but we don't need floor to ceiling glass everywhere.

Veronica: just on that one, one of the things that actually, it infuriates me and I look around office buildings and, you know, we, are told. Residentially speaking. That external window shading is a great thing to do because it really does help control the, the heat and the, the cool heat inside the h well actually helps control the heat within the house.

Veronica: But you see entire office buildings with a west facing wall of glass, like I, it does astound me where I know we're going off piece here. We were talking about retrofitting buildings, but now how is that loud?

Caroline: Well, it, it shouldn't be. And people go, oh, but I achieved Section J. It's okay because I've got super high performing glass. Super high performing glass facades are so heavy in embodied carbon. So what you're doing is you're creating a problem by doing huge west facing facades Blazed. And then you've gotta spend even [00:06:00] more carbon to make it work so that it's tolerable and it probably wouldn't even be tolerable unless you've got a big air conditioning system sitting behind you.

Caroline: And even those shading devices, you know, ~um, ~that can come out, a lot of them are,~ um,~ aluminum or steel. Huge amounts of embodied carbon. but then you go, okay, well can't we do that? So you go back to say, Harry Seidler was a genius at doing buildings where you've got, you've actually got some solid bits at the bottom that hide your desk and all your mess.

Caroline: Great, great place to start. And then you've got a depth in the window in the wall that gives you a bit of shading over. Great and say if you go to grow from a place, they've got,~ um,~ sunshades that tilt and change direction as you go around it in response to where you are. So you can actually read the building and understand it where it's,~ um,~ its orientation.

Caroline: So there's an intelligence as well as a much reduced amount of problem in overheating. So you know it, and you've got views, you've [00:07:00] got great views, and people can't see your messy desk. I mean, it's fine.

CB: but how, um,~ um,~ you know, obviously you gotta a take down. I mean, I did,~ uh,~ the Q quarter in Sydney,~ um,~ you know, won lots of designer worlds around the,~ uh,~ and they didn't knock down the core of that sort of, you know, the big tower, the a and p tower in Sydney. ~Um, ~they kept the core, basically had to,

Caroline: Well, they, they kept all the slabs, the slabs and the, I mean, two thirds of it, and the core, and then added onto the front of it. they saved a year, construction time. They saved a million dollars and they saved 12,000 tons of carbon.

CB: So is that the, is that sort of the, a good model for us to think about? It's like it's not keeping the same facades or it's not, it's.

Caroline: I mean, it's, it's intelligently working with what they've got and creating something beautiful and spectacular. And guess what? It's because it's well designed. They've got good designers. Like you can't just do this with,~ um,~ you know, value engineering, where you take out all the good stuff. It's, it actually requires an investment in [00:08:00] good design to make that work.

Caroline: And then when you do that, then you can save all this money, time, and energy. It's fantastic.

Veronica: Because it's this common sort of belief. It's cheaper to knock something down and build from scratch than it is to renovate or retrofit. Where did that come from?

Caroline: Oh look, in some instances, and I think some,~ um,~ some places that might be the truth, but it's not always the truth and it's not the truth for a whole building. So if you're thinking houses. Often there's a really solid section that really is quite good and should be kept and some, a bit of shitty stuff on the back that could be,~ um,~ knocked over and redone.

Caroline: So it's not either or. It's and both. And I think that it's about also if you are keeping an existing building and it's a brick building, for example, don't go and put in huge openings for glass because then you gotta put in all this structure to make it work. ~Um. ~And again, we don't need that much glass in our world.

Caroline: We just don't. And you know, in the heating climate, when it's getting hotter and [00:09:00] hotter, like today, I dunno where I am, it's 36 degrees, it's hot. ~Um, ~and any solid facade will be eight times minimum, eight times more efficient than even a really good glass facade.

Caroline: So you go, oh, but I've got, you know, I've got zero carbon energy 'cause it's all renewable and I've got all this air conditioning. So what happens when the grid breaks down? What happens when you can't, when it doesn't work, which in times ahead. I, I anticipate there'll be,~ um,~ pressure on that because everyone's designing that way.

Caroline: And when there's too much, demand on a really, really hot day, things break down. And then what do you do? If your building relies entirely on that, you know.

CB: I mean, definitely. I think there's been cases of that even just in recent years, wasn't with the fires and there was batteries, you know, and I think it was multiple places. You know, the grid did go down, right? And

Veronica: Adelaide's famous for it.

CB: So, but I mean where like obviously there's the New York have sort of done, I don't think there's been too many.

CB: I mean I think you also, did you own one or you designed one where

Caroline: So my husband came [00:10:00] up to Sydney in 1991 to be the city planet for Sydney. And one of his key KPIs was to get more people to live in the city. And so he then developed incentives for, to turn office buildings into apartments and the building we ended up living in much later, like many years later,~ um,~ nearly 30 years later.

Caroline: ~Um. ~Was the first one to do that. And it was the old it, yeah, it's Highgate and it's the old Esso building. so they added another, I don't know, it was 14 stories high. They added another 14 stories converted in, into apartments across the road. The IBM building at the end of the, the freeway got converted into Observatory Tower.

Caroline: So there were a couple that happened and you know, I think there was some, um. interesting developers who did the work, like I know our building, the first person who did a renovation, fortunately it was very early on,~ um,~ found the workmanship was really crap. And so, ~um, ~the people who'd bought early got together and create a really strong body.

Caroline: Corporate, made the builder fix everything up and have [00:11:00] since then retained. A really strong body corporate and a really well run building. But you know, you do get some cowboys around doing some, but that happens in new buildings as well. So it's not just

Veronica: Famously. So,

Caroline: famously. So,

Veronica: yeah. So what, so the pa, the rate of that happening, that re rejuve rejuvenation, if you wanna call it through Sydney, seems to have slowed. ~Um, ~obviously not all buildings are retrofittable. If you, that's even a word. you know, how do you turn a commercial building or an office building into a residential building?~ ~

Caroline: ~Um, ~Um, well, there are many different ways. Like with, with our one, um,~ um,~ they added some balconies onto the edges, and,~ um,~ sometimes you can cut the balconies into corners and other places that also bring a bit more ventilation and light into the apartments. There are some that just have. The floor plates are just too big that it's just impossible to convert.

Caroline: Particularly say the Barangaroo Towers. They are, they are the most ginormous floor plates and they're unconvertible. I mean, [00:12:00] and really I think planning laws that were really fit for purpose would be saying, you've gotta design buildings so they can be adaptable in the future because we dunno what's coming down the line.

Caroline: And massive floor pipes are not adaptable.

CB: So small floor plates, good, structural, sort of, you know, and what potentially, you either take off the whole brick and then you just go back to the corner and you rebuild out, or you just basically keep the lift and redesign the floor plan and then bring all the materials in and

Caroline: Yeah, it depends on the building and where it's located. You know, I think key quarter they were able to scaffold around it and bring all the materials up on the outside. ~Um, ~stitching together old concrete and new concrete is not without its, um, challenges.~ um,~ So you need some really good engineers on board to help do that.

Caroline: But all of these are problems that have solutions. If you engage really good designers to work that out.

CB: I mean, some of the most,~ uh,~ uh, impressive like apartments in Sydney though are the. These, you know, if you think about, um,~ um,~ there's a t building in [00:13:00] Sur Hill. There's another, like a lot of these warehouse conversions. There's one down in up Mont that, you know, sold ridiculously well. And obviously there, there's lots of these warehouse sort of cooler, you know, buildings that have been converted to modern apartments.

CB: But if something's visually not that appealing and then, and it's on really good high value of land, is it really hard for the developer, the person who owns that land to say. Why would I retrofit when I could potentially go much higher and build something that I could sell for a much more higher price?

Caroline: it's gotta work from a business point of view. But what's a business point of view? What's a reasonable rate of return? You know? I mean, if you can't make 25%, if you can make 15%, is that okay? I reckon it is. I mean, if we're, if we're talking about a livable planet, I reckon that's okay.

Veronica: We're not gonna disagree with you on that, but a developer who's taking the risk and owns the site is gonna disagree with you on that. If I can make

Caroline: That's why you have planning rules and that's why [00:14:00] you have, you know, you wanna build here. These are the rules.

CB: But I think we're going the other direction. We're planning though, aren't we?

Caroline: Absolutely. At the moment. Which is not good, which is, which actually devalues all the property because strong planning rules bring rigor and, people feel much more secure and people know what will happen and that is a good thing. So, yeah.

CB: But then isn't there a social issue with like not having enough housing and homelessness and affordability of rents and you know, isn't there a

Caroline: I wish those developers were doing lots of affordable housing, but they're not. And a lot of them are knocking down existing apartment buildings, say particularly up in,~ um,~ I don't know, Kings Cross. ~Um, ~and Manley like smaller, you know, older. Affordable part. Not really affordable, but vaguely affordable apartments and building much bigger, totally unaffordable apartments.

Caroline: Less of, so, you know, if we're talking social issues, do, let's talk that way and let's talk about how, how we can help,~ um,~ um, do something. There was a guy out recently called, um,~ um,~ [00:15:00] Rasmus, s Norgaard from Copenhagen, he's a property developer with a business called earth.com and he's developing affordable.

Caroline: Zero carbon housing and he's making a profit and he's doing a great job. I mean, it can be done, but you've gotta have the right team and you've gotta, you know, do it well.

Veronica: We gotta have the will to

Caroline: You gotta have the will.

Veronica: will, right,

CB: I mean, Nightingale is a pretty, uh, you know, we've had, um,~ uh, um,~ oh my God, I got his name Breathe after architecture. Um,~ Um, ~Jeremy. Jeremy Cleod. Sorry Jeremy, I know you love, I know you listen to our podcast, so I do know who you are. Um, and, uh, I can see your face, can see your hat. ~ Um, uh, Um, um. ~but, um. That they, I mean, that, that model is, you know, ridiculous demand.

CB: They can't build them fast enough. And you know, you're right, it's smart design, keeping it, removing things that you don't really need that, you know, aren't

Caroline: Like the marketing bill and like the, um,~ um,~ you know, the pro the developer's profit, which is a huge amount of cost of apartments.

CB: [00:16:00] Yeah, just things internally that you don't need. Like even the exposing piping or do we need parking or do we need to really do that? Like, is that really. You know, adding value or is it adding cost? And I think you

Caroline: Well, it's also adding great social interaction. You know, like not having the laundries and having one on top of the roof. That's a great way of helping people connect. ~Um, ~if you just start thinking a bit more about it. And about what is possible, not just what the potential of this is.

Caroline: Not just how do I get out of here faster and, uh,~ uh,~ you know, supposedly for money. There's a lot of great things.

CB: Really when you obviously,~ um,~ have you, I don't know if you've looked at this in a lot of detail within our cities, right? Because a lot of these are bigger buildings. I mean, I guess when people are doing renos, yes, definitely happen to knock it down and put on a kit home,~ um,~ is, you know, seen as a much simpler and lower risk option, potentially.

CB: Also with the unknowns of, you know, what problems are you gonna find if you start doing a reno? Like there is that perception, which I don't agree, but if we think about just the way that we're, you know, our capital cities and where our [00:17:00] older, bigger towers are. What percentage of them, you know, can be retrofitted or is it really high?

CB: It's just there's no real legislation or there's no pressure on developers to, to consider retrofitting first, and if they can't make that work, then they can knock it down. Like there's just

Caroline: Yeah. What's interesting is that, um.~ um. ~The governments around. So the federal government, and I know for sure New South Wales government and other state governments are very aware of this embodied carbon and nabs, which is the National Australian Building Energy Rating System, it has been,~ um,~ for the last couple of years, setting up a whole way of, they are setting the direction in embodied carbon.

Caroline: So they're defining, you know, what do we measure? What are the boundaries that we measure? And what are the values that you use to measure and how do you do this? And they're intro doing it slowly. So they've kind of done all of that. And now in New South Wales, there's a sustainable,~ um,~ building set. And all buildings, both commercial and residential now have to measure how many [00:18:00] materials they're using.

Caroline: So what they're doing is they're actually doing research on, you know, what, how much materials people are using, and then they will be setting targets for how much you're allowed to. How much in body carbon you're allowed to use in a building, and they'll be reducing that going forward. So the people who are going, oh, that's all rubbish.

Caroline: That's not gonna impact me. It doesn't matter me, it will, it's coming. and the sooner you get up on it, and the sooner all the consultants who are working on those projects get skilled up on it so they can help people do this in really creative and good ways, the better.

Veronica: Because you do see, you know, in commercial leasing signs, you see the neighbors rating. So it's obviously part and parcel in that side. In, certainly in commercial it is coming in residential as well, that we're aware of. Of, ~um. ~So it's being mandated and legislated throughout the whole country. my question that I did forget earlier, but now I've remembered what it was.

Veronica: It's around pattern building. You know, I know that Victorian, um,~ um,~ government, in fact, we interviewed the chief architect from Victoria, um,~ um,~ [00:19:00] Jill Garner. ~Uh, ~we've seen that talk and we discussed with many things, but we talked about patterns,~ uh,~ for infill sites and for. Middle ring. ~Um, ~we've had the patent book released in New South Wales for middle ring development to supposedly encourage and make it easy to build.

Veronica: What are your thoughts on that as an approach?

Caroline: Look, I, I know all of that is kind of a knockdown rebuild kind of approach. ~Um, ~On the stratfield local planning panel, and they engaged some consultants to do some reviews on how can they get more density, what are, what are the options, what are the different ways, and what does that deliver?

Caroline: And importantly, because Stratfield is a, is a particular suburb, as there are many that have got a fantastic ~um, ~landscape. Part as part of their suburb. And people have moved there because they like that landscape. And that landscape is really important in helping provide biodiversity, keep the place cool, like tree streets are so critical for,~ um,~ in hot weather.

Caroline: And so [00:20:00] they looked at a number of different ones and I think the one that was the most,~ um,~ achieved some of the best density. As well as the best landscape retention was converting some of the existing huge houses into 2, 3, 4 apartments or little, little dwellings and then a dwelling or two out in the backyard.

Caroline: So you can kind of get some density there without knocking down and destroying the landscape and keeping all of that. ~Um, ~I think there's many ways of. housing people and we just have to have a number of different solutions. So where you have got empty sites or ~um, ~other things happening, the pattern book is, can be really good because it can make really good design, affordable for more people.

Caroline: And I think that is important as well.~ ~

CB: ~um, ~Well, I get your answers gonna be, but ~um, ~obviously, you know, we are growing our population and you know, we've got a housing shortage and obviously it's also not just a housing shortage, but I mean, it's also the way that we've [00:21:00] got it structured, right. You know, people living in two spare bedrooms.

CB: There's, there's more of a, making sure it matches what we actually need as a society, but

Caroline: It's a distribution problem more than a just a supply problem.

CB: Yeah, exactly. And then also like lots of reasons for that. You know, whether it's tax, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. We can go for, you know, hours, but obviously we need to build more, right? We need to create more dwellings and a retrofitting part of it, but there is a build part to it.

CB: Where are we going? So wrong there. Obviously these new apartments, you've sort of highlighted some issues there, but. Often, we're often building greenfield estates and you know, turning farmland to houses. Like how do you feel about that? Like how bad is that problem?

Caroline: is really bad. We shouldn't be doing any more greenfield sites. We just should not, because we need every bit of Greenfield site for either biodiversity or food growing. we have trashed so many suburbs. There's so many gray or brownfield sites. All around and what we should be doing is saying, go and build there and fix up the place while you do it.

Caroline: And,~ um,~ you know, [00:22:00] because just to sort of, kind of trash this place and then move on and trash more is not okay. it is so not okay. And this is part of that whole regenerative design idea that rather than just sort of a, a take, make, break and move on, it's about saying, how can. How can I use this project to really restore and regenerate a place and do good is for a wider group than just the developer or just the people living in there.

Caroline: How can it help make the whole suburb and the whole of nature in that area better?

CB: Can you give an example of where we've done that though? Like where's like a pocket or a part of Australia where. We've regenerated part of the biodiversity together with housing and you know, we've trying to ramp or is it just, we just don't go there? We just go, well, we want to just build off the fringes of a capital city and we just go, next farm.

CB: Next farm, next farm.

Caroline: I mean, I suppose if you, if you think about,~ uh,~ uh, Sydney Olympic Park, there's a whole area that was,~ um,~ you know, there was some natural biodiversity, but there was a whole lot of area that was really trashed. And, [00:23:00] um,~ um,~ they did remediate and then they did restore a number of the wetlands and they did sort of use that whole project of the Olympics to restore and improve that area.

Caroline: I mean, you know, it's a work in progress and there's still more to come. And I think when the metro goes there, I think that the solution to the train at that time probably wasn't the right one, ~ um,~ but the Metro is gonna make that, super fabulous.

CB: I guess Barangaroo maybe, or those sort of things, or you don't really like Barangaroo story.

Caroline: no. Barangaroo is just a story of, greed. ~Um. ~You know, like them, they've already got double the FSR they were meant to have, and they haven't even started on Central Barangaroo. And all the time they were building Southern Barangaroo, they said, well, we'll keep Central Barangaroo low to, so that the views to ~um, ~observatory Hill will be respected.

Caroline: They've already gone above that and. Who knows whether they'll go further. And it's just, you know, the whole crown building was built on what was meant to be Parkland and it just,~ um,~ anyway, there's so [00:24:00] many problems, things, everything about, there's so much about Barangaroo that speaks of all that's wrong in the property development industry that I, I think is wrong.

Caroline: It's about greed and, um,~ um,~ my needs are more important than anything else and stuff, everyone else.~ ~

Veronica: ~Uh, ~Uh, and, and in particular on that site because it's such a prominent site and it's really had the impact of changing Sydney forever. ~Um, ~and I've always wondered how they got away with so much there.

Caroline: Good question. I think property developers like Lendlease have got very expensive lawyers and people who just push their way through. I thought of another site that's done really well is Green Square, which City of Sydney has been really instrumental in keeping a number of existing buildings.

Caroline: Building new ones well, but really,~ um,~ making the streets beautiful places, you know, with lots of biodiversity in trees and,~ um,~ careful water design and making it a place that people wanna go to. And it was all, [00:25:00] it wasn't, it was great.

Veronica: I'm on a personal mission to help more people make better property decisions. You know, most people don't realize that they can cost themselves hundreds of thousands of dollars over the medium to long term when they make property decisions without all of the information that they need. And what I do is help people with tricky real estate problems, which offer masqueraders simple questions like, should I sell my investment property because the interest re payments are hurting, or should I buy before I sell?

Veronica: Or the other way around. You could connect with me and access all of the tools that I've created to help you make better property decisions at Veronica Morgan dot com au. And there you'll find resources for first home buyers, details about my buyer's agent mentoring program. You could connect with my Sydney based property management and buyer's agency teams, Australia wide vendor advocacy.

Veronica: Or ask me for introduction to the small group of buyer agents that I would personally recommend across the country. That's Veronica Morgan dot com au.

Veronica: If you're considering a property move, which is buying your first time, upgrading, renovating, or [00:26:00] investing, the team here at Alcove would love to help you think through your decision and get the finance right.

Veronica: Please go to cove.com au to reach out.

CB: It's funny you say that 'cause on the weekend I actually saw my sister and she lives in Maruba and we went to the Newland, to the swim park there. And ~um, ~I was looking around the streets and obviously the design I feel gets better every year. Like the less of those,~ uh,~ the, you know, highrise hell, you know, we used to have 10 years ago of just, you know, cheap, get it up as quick as you can and who knows what we cares, what we build it with.

CB: It's just selling it to foreign investors. Like that was definitely the. 2015, boom. But the last boom's been driven by a occupied, so the design element, and I don't know whether it's carbon ~uh, ~uh, efficient or not, but a lot of, you're right, a lot of the, the green is really greening up there. The trees are really rising and it's gr and I was kind of like shocked with how green it was.

CB: So it's funny that you said

Caroline: I think they started with smaller trees, which enabled them to grow much more strongly and um,~ um, ~better. But you know, the [00:27:00] school they did there was fantastic. So they, city of Sydney went badged the state government for so long and finally they went, yeah, maybe with 40,000 born people here in do need school.

Caroline: And so they built a school. But the city said, you know, was really strong on saying this should be a school that integrates with the community. So there's a number of spaces in there that are just for the community. There's a number of spaces that are just for the school, and then there's a whole bunch of them that vacillate between the two, depending on usage.

Caroline: And in a tight urban place. It's really great to see that better utilization of really good resources that can then be, you know, loved and appreciated by more people.

Veronica: So it doesn't have to high density then doesn't have to be hell holes as you know, you're talking about if it has been designed well and you know, we see lots of examples where it hasn't been designed well. And I think, you know, if we, if we look to Melbourne for a moment, 'cause we are talking about,~ um,~ Their patent book before, but before then the,~ uh,~ apartment oversupply problems, you know, Docklands in Melbourne,~ uh,~ south [00:28:00] Bank, all those sorts of areas. They are not very pleasant places to be. I don't think, personally, I know some people will argue with me on that, but I don't find them that pleasant. I find when their wind tunnels and.

Veronica: Just pretty ugly buildings around. Whereas Victorian architecture, it often is a lot more attractive. They're more brave, I guess, with some of their buildings and structures than we are in Sydney. Have you got any examples outside of Sydney of where it has been done well and when it is done well? Who is driving it?

Veronica: who has enabled it? You, you said the Sydney City. City council. Does it have to be at that level or where else can the

Caroline: Well, I, I think, ~ um,~ really good regulations, really good councils. Can, can ensure and enable really good developments. ~Um, ~when you've got that, that isn't strong, then bad. Or people who don't know better can come along and do crap and not be held to account, and not to be encouraged and urged on to do better.

Caroline: So you [00:29:00] need good systems, you need good,~ um,~ councils. You need good architects and engineers and landscape architects. You need good developers. Because,~ um,~ um, ultimately they're paying the bills. But, ~ um,~ you know, regulation is, is really there to, when there's market failure and clearly there's market failure in this whole area.

Caroline: ~Um, ~you know, down in Victoria they used to, they didn't have apartment. ~Um, ~in Sydney we had the apartment design guide, which after I think Bob Car bought it in, it was called, um,~ um,~ CEP 65, and now it's the apartment design Guide. And that was bought in because there were some really ugly buildings. And whilst it can be improved, it's fantastic.

Caroline: I sit on a number of panels where we are able to hold SCIA developers. Sorry, you can't do that because look here, it's written and you can't do that. ~Um, ~in Victoria they were do developing apartments where bedrooms didn't have to have windows. I mean, this is one of the reasons there was a glut of apartments that were underutilized there because they were pretty dreadful.

Caroline: ~Um, ~and I think that in Docklands in [00:30:00] particular, the public spaces, which are the streets, which are the, ~um. ~The roads weren't designed well, and they're the public spaces, and so, you know, the, government should be designing them first and then,~ um,~ developers building around them, not sort of the other way around.

Veronica: And it's not really good for I, I'm not sure. I don't have any evidence on this, but resale in Docklands in terms of apartments is terrible. People are still selling for less money than they bought. 10 years ago. ~Um, ~so it, it, and I don't know whether the developers made a huge amount of money 'cause I also knew that there was massive incentives to sell some of these apartments as well, you know, when they were new because they weren't selling fantastically.

Veronica: 'cause they weren't well designed. So there, there are issues there. it's interesting that you say that about Sydney though, except 65 or the apartment design, which say the department design guide, because I, I think about Princess Highway, when you're coming outta the international airport and you're driving towards the city, there's some shockers there and they're built since then.

Veronica: Canterbury, you know, campsie, the places, um,~ um,~ along the lewisham. some staff [00:31:00] has clearly got through, you know, got through the keeper.

Caroline: and it's not foolproof, but I reckon that the quality of those apartments is better than if it wasn't there.

CB: So I wasn't gonna go here because, you know, obviously they're retrofitting, but I, I just, obviously you're very good at giving your opinion. I love it. So I'm wanting to keep, 'cause I'm really trying to understand the challenges that we've, you know, how do we tackle this? 'cause it's like there is a challenge here for a Society of Sydney and, you know, and other cities around the country that are struggling from the bottom end, you know?

CB: And I agree that, um,~ um,~ and we need to come up with some better solutions, right? We can't do the Greenfield states 'cause we've spoken about that. ~Um, ~infield's quite hard.

Caroline: another idea which, okay. ~Um, ~and I think Westpac just announced something the other day about getting a million more people to live in the regions. and guess what? Just this week, just today, in fact, my husband and I have settled on a new, very old house, Ingo, which is a little town

Veronica: very pretty.

Caroline: [00:32:00] Yeah, and we chose there because it's on train line, but there's a lot of, um,~ um,~ there's a lot of regional towns that have a whole lot of buildings that aren't being well utilized and could benefit from a few more people being in town and living there. But to make that work, you need to have jobs and you need to have those places really well connected to other places or sort of other centers, which means investing in,~ um,~ trains, investing in really good internet.

Caroline: And I think some of that, like, you know, I, I mentioned that we've just got onto our very fast NBN here in Dongo, which is fantastic, and we're on a train line. Some slightly less than slow trains would be really helpful. But,~ um,~ but I think that there's, I think what we've gotta do is just put everything on the table and go, it's not a one shot.

Caroline: Solution. There's gotta be a range of different solutions but the one thing I've gotta say is that we can't keep doing what we've been doing because it is so not working and it's killing our planet. I think everyone's just gotta go, okay, change is ahead. how do we be [00:33:00] part of this?

Caroline: how do we skill ourselves so that we can be contributors to this and stay relevant and be a part of,~ um,~ a really great future.

Veronica: So, where's the leadership here? Where does this get driven from? You know, like it's great for people to stand up, like you are standing up, you are doing your bit, individuals are doing their bit. There's some associations and collaborations and all the rest of it. But in terms of the driving force impetus here, because we can, we can continue doing the same thing and continue to screw things up and just under underperform and, and under house people and do more damage to the climate.

Veronica: We can, we can, and we have been, you know,

Caroline: Well, I think, yeah, I think often it is individual, some individuals who start doing some really great things and other people go, gosh, I wanna be part of that. ~Um, ~and they need to be the ecosystems within which they work. Need to be supportive and, and work out how to be supportive. Industry organizations have gotta stop fighting against change and start going, how do I help?

Caroline: How do we help our members embrace this [00:34:00] and really do well in it? ~ um,~ you know, and then, and local governments and councils need to probably,~ um,~ sort of incentivize good behavior rather than making it as hard as bad behavior or even harder sometimes. And I think we've all gotta, and as clients, as people who are asking for this, there's a responsibility that we all look at our own asks and need needs and desires and say, what do I really need?

Caroline: What do I really, what is really important and how can I perhaps shape my ask to be a bit less, um, damaging.~ um,~

Veronica: Should I say? A lot of people don't know. They don't know what they don't know. From a client point of view, I mean, I've done three renovations, I've lived in two of them, and I live in this house. I've had architects involved in all of them. ~Um, ~and you know, my brief to my architect was very much around, I.

Veronica: I don't want to be spending a lot of money on heating and cooling. I want a comfortable house to live in. I love my house and it has been very well designed and it's cool and it, today's a very hot day and I don't have [00:35:00] air conditioning on. I don't need it. ~Um, ~so, so it works, you know, so in winter it's warm.

Veronica: In summer, it's cool. It absolutely works as a house. ~Um, ~Um, very rarely do I have to either heat or cool it. ~Um, ~actually I shouldn't say that about heating, but anyway, that's side, side issue. The, the point though,~ uh,~ because I'd done two other renovations, I knew exactly what to ask for. ~Um, ~and also things changed 'cause I, when I say I lied about the heating, 'cause I do have heated floors.

Veronica: ~Um, ~but sadly I got gas and I got hydro hydronic. Heated floors before I knew what I know now about gas, things change, you know, and I've invested in that infrastructure. But as a, client, I knew what to ask for and I had an architect that was able to deal with those, those requests. And so I think a lot of people don't understand, the choices that they make, like glazing, like the big windows, the floor to ceiling glass, you know, they know what that

Caroline: There's a, there's a fantastic resource called Your Home, for example, which is put out by the federal government. Well, it's, it's also online and there's enormous amount of information there. There's also [00:36:00] some great, um,~ um,~ you know, there's a com organization called Renew, and they do sustainable House stay and put out Sanctuary Magazine and a magazine called Renew.

Caroline: ~ um,~ um, renews, got all the, that's all for the tech heads. You know, all the equipment that you might want and other things. It's fantastic. These, these are magazines where I read the ads because I know that they, they're good things. And Sanctuary, sanctuary just highlights really good, sustainable homes and then goes into deep descriptions about what systems they use, what materials, what paints, what, what everything.

Caroline: ~Um, ~and Green Magazine is another one as well. I think what we need to do is actually,~ um,~ be having a television show. Like rather than,~ um,~ you know, those shows that just deny what the whole thing is about. Or just, I mean, even grand Designs just kind of highlights massive big houses and too much money and they all, they all go for drama 'cause that's what television

Veronica: Of course it's

Caroline: What we need is, yeah. What we need is a [00:37:00] program that just shows really great, good things that

Veronica: And no one will watch it.

CB: I think Jamie Drew is

Caroline: Oh, I don't know.

CB: you say that he is doing some prefab thing in Byron that he's. You know, try on this journey. ~Uh, ~Uh, he is, you know, obviously got a history in tv, so he is, he's probably the only one who's been able to pitch it to a channel. ~Uh, ~Uh, and it, 'cause he is doing it, he's been able to get it through.

CB: But I mean, I think on this, this rezoning and densification of our cities, I'm just personally trying to get, you know, you know, a feeling on it. ~Um, ~part of me feels that we need to be, you know, it just not, can't leave it all up to the greenfield. You can't leave it up to all these high-rise locations. Why should this we, you know, keep everyone out and be anti-development close to the capital, you know, close to the city where most people work.

CB: And why do we force people to have to commute? Because we don't want to change any suburbs. So there's this fight of keeping status quo,

Caroline: yeah, I mean, it's about doing it well. Like yeah. I think what the part of the problem is people just wanna come up with a, [00:38:00] tick box solution. What do I need to do? Do this, do this, do this. And. What you're describing is about doing really sensitive and clever in feel into the suburbs.

Caroline: To give, bring more density in places where people want, is a really good idea. And it requires both a bit of people not,~ um,~ getting too upset about things, but also really good regulations to make sure horrible things aren't foisted upon them and they don't get a three story building overshadowing their north facing living room because that is not neighborly, that is not good.

Veronica: No, but it could happen and it could easily happen. ~Um, ~you know, for example, ly art in Sydney, and so this, this is sort of, at the moment it's sort of a Sydney, Melbourne thing. 'cause this is happening in both cities. But like Art in is a suburban inner Sydney, it's sort of within eight Ks.

Veronica: It's probably six Ks of the CBD. ~Um, ~it's. nearly all of the suburb has actually got, has been rezoned. And there's the average lots size in like a, something like 186 square meters, right? Ain't big. So you gotta stitch together [00:39:00] a few, few houses, knock 'em all down in order to build your units, right?

Veronica: And I just think, how long is that gonna take? So, you know, some people argue it's inevitable. I I sort of, it may be, but you've gotta bandi together with your neighbors to, to get a site big enough to build something. Right? So it's gonna be a, a decades potentially of this mishmash mess, you know, the suburb turning from being sort of.

Veronica: I don't know. You call it medium density, lots of workers', cottages and terraces and things like that to, you know, to a unit, a suburb of units. But in that transition period, how can that be sensitive? You know what I mean? There's just gonna be a lot of dis, just a lot of ugliness for a long time.

Caroline: and also when you rezone, like I've, I've been on the Liverpool design,~ uh,~ Liverpool Design Excellence panel, and also the Liverpool planning panel. Gosh, you should try going out there and seeing sort of farmland and then, oops, there's a 10 story block of units. 'cause it's been rezoned and it's a difficult transition [00:40:00] period.

Caroline: ~Um, ~and you know, personally, I, wish we'd kept more of that food bowl out there because I think some of that's a really important thing. and I think that what would be really great would be is if a few governments had a few scenario planning of going to, getting people, treating people as the intelligent human beings they are, and going Okay.

Caroline: We've gotta house people. Here are the options. Here's option one, here's option two, here's option three, here's option four, and this is what they all mean. So let's talk about that and help people understand why they might go for an option that they personally wasn't thinking was a good option. But you can kind of at least understand why they might go down that way, but also then making sure that when you put planning rules in place, they stick.

Caroline: They don't get beaten down and they people don't get,~ um,~ you know, lose the things that they thought were really important.

Veronica: Yeah, I really actually feel. Quite deeply. I know we need to fix things in many ways and we need to bring more housing in [00:41:00] closer to where people wanna work. And ~uh, ~uh, I know we need to in, in create more diversity of housing stock in, in lots of our suburbs. I know that we need to do all of that, but I actually feel very.

Veronica: I feel very keenly for the people that are impacted by this sort of wholesale rezoning that they're stuck in the middle of. And often their lives just go into limbo because it's like no one's gonna buy that house anymore. ~Um, ~if they wanna sell, and if the neighbors don't wanna bandy up and create development site, they can't sell, they can't upgrade, they can't renovate, they can't, you know what I mean?

Veronica: There's, there's this sort of horrible limbo and there's certain, I've, I've spoken, spoken to a number of people who are caught in this dilemma. ~Um. ~and through no fault of their own, they just happen to live in, you know, proximity to the transport hub or whatever the, the government's designed. So it is a bit difficult, and I know there's not a lot of sympathy when you talk to ym.

Veronica: The Yms, they're not at all sympathetic. In fact, they're quite callous around that. And I think

Caroline: mean some, some of those people though, 'cause I, again, on these council things that I'm on, you see that,~ um,~ there are people who hold out for too much money. then [00:42:00] the opportunity goes, and then they're landlocked, and then they're kind of going, what do I do with this? So I don't know.

Caroline: and another, a friend of mine,~ um,~ lives right near the, the

Veronica: I'm not that sym I should say. I'm sorry I'm not that sympathetic to those people. 'cause that's, you know, like, so the, the house in Lewisham, you've probably seen it, it's a semi-detached house and it is now attached to a five story apartment block. I kid you not and it is the most ridiculous looking thing and talk about stubborn and, you know, go, I've got no sympathy for that person.

Veronica: 'cause like they had the opportunity and they probably had a good opportunity to sell it. ~Um, ~but sorry, go on.

Caroline: But a friend of mine lives near the new, ~um. ~Station and she lives in an apartment building of eight apartments and it's like right there. And there's a couple of other apartment buildings as well. And there are lawyers who are now helping people. Work as a team to sort of say, okay, here's some, here's some guidelines, here's some, let's all be transparent.

Caroline: Let's all blah, blah. Look, I, I'm not sure of the detail, but I thought, [00:43:00] well, that's good because then it kind of helps people understand the potential scenarios for what might happen to their thing But again, that's probably on take. ~Um, ~years and years and years and years because to get, to get a development site with, I don't know how many strata and company title apartments is no,~ um,~ mean feat.

Veronica: Well, you gotta get 75% of the owner in, strata anyway, 75% of the owners to agree to it. Company title, I'm not quite sure how that works. ~Um, ~but yes, this stuff's gonna take a long time and so there's gonna be some,

Caroline: yeah, I think we've all gotta be reasonable and start going well. Okay. ~Um, ~what is fair, I mean, you know, like one development site up in Castle Craig at the shopping center, the community finally worked with the developer and come up with A scheme that built over these one story shops built up to three to five stories, and then the developers sold the site and then the new developers come back with,~ uh,~ no, 11 to 13 stories,

CB: Is that at,~ uh,~ uh, castle? Yeah. On the corner of Blues Road or

Caroline: Craig [00:44:00] on. Yeah.

CB: I know exactly when I drive

Caroline: And I mean, like, that is just so totally unreasonable and not right for that location. ~Um.~

Veronica: The Balmain Leagues Club that's been going on for decades, nearly two, nearly 20 years now. It just, but yeah, so there's a lot of craziness that happens.

CB: Yeah. Bondi, you know, like development gets approved eight stories. Bank, FSR put some affordable housing in their bank. We added three or four, so, so it's like there's a lot of this game playing going on, right. Is it, is it they just need to be,~ um,~ much more strict around sort of setback and green to, you know, floor space to nature ratios and like, don't let them like, 'cause if you put 'em back, you make build on less land and then, you know, make sure that they be private and they create more.

CB: Like, is that a solution? Rather than, hey, you build to the boundaries and don't put a footpath in. And that becomes like really mean, it's,

Caroline: it's hard because the rules are that you're meant to have x amount, X percentage of space as deep soil space for [00:45:00] vegetation. That's the rules. So often. ~Um, ~and there sometimes there's some really good reasons why you don't. And, but most often it isn't. But it's great to have the rule in there to try and at least to start with, and then you've gotta demonstrate that it's not reasonable.

Caroline: But,~ um,~ I don't know. I think that we as a, as a community need to just be really, ~um. ~Stop enabling developers to just have this right. But they, the government at the moment, the state government's just going, yeah, sure. Whatever you develop, you do some sites, you know, now, like say in, in the Northern Beaches area.

Caroline: ~Um, ~you know, now if you, if you're closer to, if you. ~Uh, ~400 meters from a shop shopping center or ~um, ~transport thing. Then oh, bingo. Up, up goes the height. And then if you add in a couple of affordable housing apartments that only have to be there for 10 or 15 years up, you get a 30% increase. And so then as someone assessing this, you can't go, oh, no, that's a bit over the top, isn't it? the state government has said yes. Off you go.

CB: That's it [00:46:00] because it overrules the council. Right. And especially if it's over a hundred million or state significant project, they can basically just railroad

Caroline: have to be stayed significant now.

Veronica: It is a problem, isn't it? Because then the councils get less agency in their own areas and you know, that's.

Caroline: get, people are getting really annoyed because,~ um,~ a lot of the councils put in a lot of work to work out what is the right development mix here, what is the right flaw, you know, heights and other things to enable everyone to have good solar access and to have good amenity.

Caroline: And then in comes this rule and bingo, none of that counts. And that is, that is not okay.

Veronica: I'd almost suggest that's gonna be your property, Dumbo. We do ask everyone to bring an example of a property number. Maybe that sounds pretty dumb.

Caroline: Well, it's, I find that I've just sat on a few of those last week and these people in, you know, one story in a residential zone, right next to a zone that's this, and suddenly they've got an 11 story apartment on their edge and council can do nothing about [00:47:00] it.

Veronica: It's awful and it's the sort of thing I feel really, really sorry for those individuals who own a house in that situation. and yeah, it just, some of the edges, the boundaries to me just seem so arbitrary with no thought about that either. It's just done on a map as opposed to really going out there and checking the sites and, and checking the impacts on surrounding homes.

Veronica: And, no, there's no compensation either.

Caroline: So it's not, it's not okay.

Veronica: That's a Dumbo. Do you have any other example of a

CB: Yeah. Is there any other dumbos you wanna hit us with as well? Any other story? Any other? You got a few, I'm sure.~ ~

Caroline: ~um,~ I think the planning streets without Trees as the very first thing and is, really dumb. Like, ~um, ~I just think that trees people go, oh, but then you've got leaves and you've got roots and it's like, ~uh, ~yeah. And you've got birds and you've got insects and you've got, um,~ um,~ you've

Veronica: got cool.

Veronica: You don't have urban heat islands like, you know,

Caroline: So people not liking trees is another my of my dumbo things. Not appreciating them for all the benefits they bring, you

Veronica: apart from that, they look nice when you walk into the [00:48:00] botanical gardens. I mean, and then walk into the canopy area. The difference in summer, the difference is so noticeable. Like, ~um, ~you know, for me, I, I'm always astounded that it's allowed that these new, new housing developments, they mow everything down and they plant some twigs, it's plant, some seedlings, you know, it's,

Caroline: if you're lucky, and then you don't have to keep them. Yeah,

Veronica: yeah.

Caroline: it's terrible.~ ~

Veronica: ~Uh, ~well, Caroline, that's been a really interesting chat. We do appreciate you coming onto the podcast and these are all issues that we need to be aware of. I think, um,~ um,~ you know, we've been a little bit lighthearted, a little bit rambling and, and wide ranging in terms of what we've covered. But,~ um,~ if you'd wanna sum up, I guess, the most important thing that you think we all need to be thinking about right now.

Veronica: Do you wanna leave us with a final note?

Caroline: Sure, look, we need a livable planet. The scientists have said for that to happen, we need to drastically reduce our carbon and we need to do that. We, and we need to all of us think about how we can do that. Smaller houses, we don't need [00:49:00] huge things, smaller houses, well designed, lots of, um,~ um,~ trees, lots of things.

Caroline: And just enough we need to be talking about sufficiency and,~ um,~ until we do. We're just gonna keep consuming at the rate that will not enable a livable planet. And I dunno how you talk to your kids and grandkids in the future when they say, well, so what did you do when you knew that this was an issue?

Caroline: What did you do?

Veronica: Yeah, I'm with you on that. Thank you, Caroline. Really appreciate your time today.

Caroline: Pleasure. Pleasure. Thanks for taking the time to talk to me.

Veronica Morgan: If you have a question that you'd like us to answer in an upcoming q and a episode, you can send us a voicemail or written question via the website. The elephant in the room.com au. Or you can email us directly at questions at the elephant in the room.com

Veronica Morgan: au.

Veronica Morgan: If you like what you're hearing, please share this episode with others you feel would benefit. And while you're at it, why not leave us an iTunes review? Five stars would be great. I know that sounds a bit cringey, but we have it on good old [00:50:00] authority that every review helps make it easier for other people to find out about us and hear what our amazing guests have to say.