@urbanizationist
Professor of Urban Policy, Melbourne, posting/following mostly academically on housing, transport, planning, infrastructure, energy, governance, geography, and climate. If I followed you it is probably via a starter pack (not personal). Also @ X, 🐘, 🪡
The Works Department point deserves further investigation given the extensive shortage of skilled labour, and the fact that the gendered construction sector tends to draw on only half the labour force.
Here's an incisive article in Fifth Estate by my RMIT University colleagues Professor Julie Lawson and Dr Liam Davies assessing the weaknesses of the Australian Government's Housing Affordability Future Fund and potential reforms to improve housing provision.
thefifthestate.com.au/columns/spin...
New paper on migration patterns, labour markets, housing and commuting, in Journal of Transport Geography, by Terry Li and me.
Tl;dr: Metropolitan expansion is driven by existing residents more than new migrants, and weakens housing-jobs connections.
O/A at: doi.org/10.1016/j.jt...
Not my area at all but Sam Dalrymple's 'Shattered Lands: Five Partitions and the Making of Modern Asia' (William Collins) might be a general start.
www.theguardian.com/books/2025/j...
Also by slowing traffic, speed limits potentially make PT and active modes relatively slightly more competitive, thus in turn generating emissions-reducing mode shift.
Congratulations to my cultural studies colleagues for one of the sharpest 'on trend' conference titles ever posed in any discipline.
Details and registration here: csaa.asn.au/csaa-confere...
The level of non-performing residential property loans with >90% loan-to-valuation ratios in Australia is rising but at less than $4bn is still very low in the context of the overall $2.2tn value of housing loans in Australia.
Data via AIHW dashboard: housingdata.gov.au
The TMK podcast partially addresses the overaccumulation question in discussion around 25:00 onwards.
podcastaddict.com/this-machine...
This is very sad news about the death of Professor Michael Burawoy in a hit and run car incident.
www.mercurynews.com/2025/02/04/o...
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Watching Canada and the US announce mutual tariffs portends a rapid divergence from the economic geography observed in Nth America during the last four decades.
Observers in the 1980s and 1990s described a 'sea change' in political economy in the 1970s. Is this a comparable such moment?
Has anyone done an analysis of the AI boom through the framework of Harvey's theory of overaccumulation?
I am hypothesising that the overaccumulation (crisis) of the technology sector has resulted in a capital switch to AI, chips and data centers as a form of built environment.
Even in car-loving cities the demand for #activetransport is there, once you provide low-risk routes and networks. Good news from #brisbane.
www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/que...
Request for help on accessing journals via OpenAthens.
My institution has moved to OpenAthens from EZproxy. In Zotero EZproxy would automatically login to publisher platforms to access articles. OpenAthens however requires platform-by-platform manual login for authentication.
Any suggested fixes?
Interesting. GS has become an essential and appreciated tool for researchers and academics but sadly doesn't see much development.
Welcome to 🦋! Do you have any involvement in the development of Google Scholar at all?
Unlike prestige federal domains such as economic or foreign policy, perhaps even social policy, urban affairs has until only recently been a sustained federal policy concern, and still very marginal, as the recent national urban policy process and ministerial portfolio allocations demonstrate.
There's almost no student demand for (traditionally interdisciplinary) urban studies programs in Australia (cf US/UK). Most students come to it via geography or urban planning programs. Content of the latter is shaped by the accreditation requirements of the professional institute.
A deep breath for the big end of year browser tab closedown...
I suspect editors are also grappling with greater time demands and maybe haven't the attention to attend to these nuances. Perhaps in your next revision you could emphasise the divergences of view in the literature so they appear as field-level issues rather than problems internal your work.
If R4 thinks the cites and R1/3 are wrong, but you think yourself, cites and R1/3 are correct, then that signals there is a debate in the field. That in turn deserves to be resolved through publication and exchange rather than being closed off at review stage. Journals usually encourage debates.
Image displaying four maps presenting the respective boundaries for the city of Geelong, Australia, represented via the Australian Bureau of Statistics Significant Urban Area, Statistical Area Level 4, Local Government Areas, and Urban Centres and Localities spatial definitions.
Found this useful DITRDCA summary info sheet on Australian urban and regional statistical geographies that is much easier to review than the ABS summaries.
Time to brush up on your GCCSAs, SUAs, UCLs, RAs and SAs?
[Not clear why UCLs dated 2020?]
www.infrastructure.gov.au/sites/defaul...
It's the time of the year to catch up on readings.
On my list is James Whitten's 2024 PhD thesis on high speed rail and regional governance in Australia.
As far as I'm aware it is the most substantial scholarly engagement with HSR so far in Australia.
minerva-access.unimelb.edu.au/items/fdf3a1...
Note to Australian universities*: a good moment to be recruiting talented NZ social scientists.
*at least those not abolishing social science departments - looking at you University of Wollongong.
Part of a government statement announcing its intent to abolish social science and humanities research funding.
The New Zealand government is abolishing funding for social sciences and humanities in favour of STEM, to support economic development.
It's a foolish and retrograde step that undervalues knowledge of society, both economically and as a public good.
beehive.govt.nz/release/marsde…
Planning scholars: go.bsky.app/TjRtmLR
Global urban history: go.bsky.app/3FUgYoE
Feel free to share any good (academic) starter packs you've found.
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Has your urban BlueSky following peaked? Here's some starter packs to boost your feed:
Aus/NZ urbanists: go.bsky.app/NrzWxjT
Regional and urban economics: go.bsky.app/LHQB6NW
Urban economists/geographers: go.bsky.app/DuTtmrV
Feel free to share any others you come across.
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Two permanent Assistant Professorships in Human Geography at Durham! With expertise in geographies of nature, climate change, & just and sustainable futures...
durham.taleo.net/careersectio...