More Australians will retire from work in 2011 than will set out on their work-life journey.
 |
| CEO of the Committee for Melbourne, Andrew McLeod. |
Both matters will shape our towns and cities and are just two critical demographics being considered by the Committee for Melbourne.
The committee arose some 25 years ago from what was then a seemingly directionless city and since has been actively working to make the whole geographic organism that is Greater Melbourne a better place in which to live.
The idea that became the City for Melbourne was driven by who were then some of the city’s leading businessmen backed by some of Australia’s pre-eminent companies.
Those same ideas have spread to several regional Victoria centres and recently the committee’s Chief Executive Office, Andrew McLeod, said he and another from his team would happily visit Shepparton to discuss, and initiate the groundwork, for the establishment of a Committee for Shepparton.
Asked why such a committee would be different than an existing chamber of commerce, Mr McLeod, said such organisations have a primary interest in the commercial wellbeing and health of a town or city, while a Committee for Shepparton would have a more sweeping mandate.
Such committees consider all aspects of a city’s liveability, transport, the placement of residential areas and their density, services available in and to the city, access to and availability of leisure and recreation, and the creation of public spaces.
Considering the demographics of Melbourne, Mr McLeod said his committee anticipates Melbourne’s population growing to about eight million by 2060.
Melbourne had about two million in 1960 and according to Mr McLeod those of his parent’s generation had overseen the doubling of that number to recently see it voted as the world’s most liveable city. “Why”, he asked, “can’t we do that again”.
Talking recently with a group of architects, planners, urban designers and others involved in shaping our cities, Mr McLeod said it was critical to get people excited about the future and heighten their optimism.
Supported by business, the committee obviously leans toward projects and ideas that improve the city’s commercial life, but that is softened through membership and involvement by academia and a number of welfare organizations.
Such organizations, Mr McLeod points out, are free from the rigours of democracy in that the effectiveness of those involved is not time restricted and do not depend on fanciful populist impressions of those who elect them.
“Committees for” concern themselves with many things, among them social cohesion, which Mr McLeod says, is a rare and fragile commodity.
