Towards Australian Regional Turnaround: Insights into Sustainably Accommodating Post-Pandemic Urban Growth in Regional Towns and Cities

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has made many urban policymakers, planners, and scholars, all around the globe, rethink conventional, neoliberal growth strategies of cities. The trend of rapid urbanization, particularly around capital cities, has been questioned, and alternative growth models and locations have been the subjects of countless discussions. This is particularly the case for the Australian context: The COVID-19 pandemic heightened the debates in urban circles on post-pandemic urban growth strategies and boosting the growth of towns and cities across regional Australia is a popular alternative strategy. While some scholars argue that regional Australia poses an invaluable opportunity for post-pandemic growth by ‘taking off the pressure from the capital cities’; others warn us about the risks of growing regional towns and cities without carefully designed national, regional, and local planning, design, and development strategies. Superimposing planning and development policies meant for metropolitan cities could simply result in transferring the ills of capital cities to regions and exacerbate unsustainable development and heightened socioeconomic inequalities. This opinion piece, by keeping both of these perspectives in mind, explores approaches to regional community and economic development of Australia’s towns and cities, along with identifying sustainable urban growth locations in the post-pandemic era. It also offers new insights that could help re-shape the policy debate on regional growth and development.

Saudi Arabian Administrative Areas and Neighborhoods in COVID-19 Infections: An Application of 3 X 3 Model

“…Thus, there arises a need for rethinking beyond conventional growth strategies of cities in line with growth models and urbanization in the emergency preparedness and epidemic spread accounting for planning, design, and development strategies (Guaralda et al, 2020). One way, COVID − 19 enlightened the development community with the planners and policy makers on transformative actions towards creating resilient and sustainable cities (Shari and Khavarian-Garmsir, 2020.).…”

“…The initial rapid rise, peak, and erratic behavior of the epidemic with geographic variations depend heavily on super-spreaders and heterogeneous population characteristics (Eilersen and Sneppen, 2021). Highly populated industrial cities, the epic centres demand epidemic compartmental models to policy interventions distinguishing early implementation, later interventions, and mild interventions to pave way for post-pandemic urban growth strategies to boosting urban potential (Tian et al, 2021;Guaralda, et al, 2020). Such urban units are commonly found everywhere including Saudi Arabia, where spatial architecture, urban inequalities, and local governance patterns differ, which add up to the precarious conditions challenging protection measures (Ziccardi, 2020).…”

“…Such urban units are commonly found everywhere including Saudi Arabia, where spatial architecture, urban inequalities, and local governance patterns differ, which add up to the precarious conditions challenging protection measures (Ziccardi, 2020). Besides, regional comparisons on COVID-19 including mortality are determined by health services delivery, community-level healthcare, testing approaches, and characteristics of surveillance systems enabling opportunities and dynamics of balancing regional development (Signorelli et al, 2020;Guaralda, et al, 2020).…”

“…As a result, the metropolises and future cities are seriously affected despite availability of essential health services (Jdaitawi et al, 2020). Thus, the rapid urbanization, particularly around capital cities undergo rethinking beyond conventional, neoliberal growth strategies to reduce risks of urban growth within national, regional, and local planning, design, and development strategies (Guaralda, et al,2020).…”

Cities on the Coast and Patterns of Movement between Population Growth and Diffusion

“…If the U.S. coastal counties were an individual country, it would rank third in the world in gross domestic product, surpassed only by the United States as a whole and China [4], producing more than $9.0 trillion in goods and services, employing more than 57.5 million people, and paying $3.6 trillion in wages annually (statistics are for 2016) [5]. The COVID-19 pandemic heightened the debates in urban circles on post-pandemic urban growth strategies and boosting the growth of towns and cities in coastal areas, taking pressure off the capital cities [6].…”