Energy security is receiving increasing attention from governments and scholars at the global and national scale. Petroleum security and rising fuel prices are a challenge for cities whose housing systems are highly dependent on automobile transport. This study assesses transport and socio-tenurial patterns within Australian cities to identify how the combined present and future effects of rising fuel costs, mortgage interest rates and general inflation will be spatially distributed. Using an 'oil vulnerability' assessment methodology based on Australian Census data, the study reveals broad-scale mortgage and oil vulnerability across the outer suburbs of Australian cities. The paper concludes with some observations about spatially equitable policy responses to ameliorate the housing and urban impacts of rising petroleum costs.

Global oil prices have risen markedly over the past 18 months, generating considerable speculation regarding their economic and social impacts. Cities that are highly dependent on petroleum for urban transport are likely to be most adversely affected by rising oil prices. Yet there has been little recent scholarly engagement with the socioeconomic implications of increasing oil prices. This paper develops a basic framework and methodology for assessing the socioeconomic 'oil vulnerability' of Australian cities. The paper demonstrates that there is wide spatial variability in the vulnerability of Australia's urban populations to rising fuel costs which may compound existing socio-spatial divisions and speculates on some underlying causal factors. The paper calls for better data and new methods to understand the issue.

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Urban freight transport is essential to the functioning of cities, but is also an activity that affects the urban environment and communities. Yet, freight is often overlooked in discussions of urban transport, in contrast to passenger modes. Much freight research emphasises questions of operations and network management but is less attentive to the links between freight transport and urban development. New efforts are needed to improve understanding of the link between urban freight and cities. This paper presents a broad discussion of the links between urban freight transport and urban planning through an overview of the literature in the field. The paper discusses key problems confronting planning and policies for urban freight transport in relation to its importance, impacts, interrelationship between stakeholders, institutions, influencing factors and challenges. The paper proposes a revitalised agenda for planning for urban freight and identifies key directions for further research, particularly around the land-use, environmental and institutional dimensions of urban freight management. By identifying major underdeveloped areas of urban freight research, the paper offers guidance as to key issues that will need to be addressed as freight grows as a proportion of the urban transport task.

This paper argues that a recent resurgence in Australian spatial planning has been superseded by a resort to infrastructure to address urban problems. The paper uses case studies of the Melbourne and South East Queensland (Brisbane) metropolitan regions to chart the renewal of new spatial planning, after a period of neglect. This paper then shows this spatial planning renewal has given way to a new emphasis on urban infrastructure planning as the primary mode of intervention in these cities. The infrastructure turn raises important questions about the spatial planning and infrastructure of cities within a new era of global strategic challenges.