The City of Melbourne has released a proposal to implement a $1,000 to $3,000 levy on new CBD apartments in a bid to raise money to pay for additional green space in the inner city. From The AFR:
The Australian Financial Review can reveal a move to extend a developer contribution introduced last year on residential towers built across the Yarra River in Southbank…
Extra funds are needed for the city to develop open and green spaces as the population of the inner city grows…
In the Sydney CBD, all residential, commercial and retail developments are charged 1 per cent of the construction cost…
“In Brisbane, residential and non-residential developments in the CBD are subject to infrastructure charges. The per-apartment change for residential apartments varies between $19,000 and $27,000”…
This year alone, 8111 new CBD apartments in 34 projects have been released to the market…
This proposal is perverse. If the council wants to raise raise additional funds to pay for open space, surely a general increase in rates on all CBD homes is more appropriate, given all residents would benefit from the new spaces?
Charging new developments only, whilst allowing pre-existing developments to free-ride, is both inequitable and illogical, and could reasonably be viewed as a blatant tax grab by the City of Melbourne. It also has similarities with the ‘first-user-pays-all’ approach to housing-related infrastructure, which has become a feature of Australian urban planning since the 1990s, to the detriment of overall equity and affordability.
