b'APRIL 20252. BACKGROUNDThe essence of intellectual debate in the planning derives from academic conflict between marketFor the first time, there was economists and planners. Glaessers seminal tome, Triumph of the City 5 , asserts that competition, freean economic framework of over-regulation, allows cities (the greatest ofwhich put a price on supply-humanitys inventions) to change and evolve. Cities that fail to evolve, shrink. In some cases, they die. side constraints in housing markets. Planners were This is the antithesis of principles and maxims held dear by an industry of planners that havesuddenly being held dominated the policy space across Australia, particularly in NSW, for the last twenty years. to account for the cost of A cadre of planners, building regulators, utopiantheir decisions.designers, and increasingly, architects, have overseen the implementation of policies that haveRestrictive and overly prescriptive zoning artificially all but destroyed the prospects of the millennialconstrain optimal land use efficiency, and the type and younger generations from owning a home,and quantum of development. It demonstrable and for many, even renting a home. impacts housing inflation and affordability 8 . Zoning restrictions were once established toIn Greater Sydney specifically, RBA research 9separate non-compatible land uses. Today, theseestimates zoning restrictions add a 42% premium restrictions and land use separations are relics ofto housing costs relative to marginal production the industrial era when manufacturing was unsafe,costs - effectively functioning as an implicit tax on smelt, was loud and dirty. Mixed-use developmenturban development.is a common sense tool for establishing homes andThis results in the displacement of essential workers communities close to workplaces, retail centres andand young families to peri-urban fringes, or in transport nodes. the worst case, other capital cities. NSW loses its The concept of a "zoning tax", first articulated bybest and brightest through a centrifugal migration Glaeser and Gyo 6and subsequently used in anpattern that hollows-out skilled and essential Australian context by Tulip 7 , represents a centralworkers within the urban core, as municipalities challenge to planners. For the first time, thereexperience vital workforce depletion and was an economic framework which put a priceintergenerational wealth stratification.on supply-side constraints in housing markets.Reference to the lived experience of new home Planners were suddenly being held to account forbuyers, renters and property developers should the cost of their decisions. prompt pause to reflect on the role of the planning academic community in creating the present crisis.This will be examined throughout this paper.5 Glaeser, E. (2012) Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier,and Happier, Penguin Press6 Glaeser, E. and Gyourko, J, (2003) The Impact of Building Restrictions on Housing Affordability, FRBNY, EconomicPolicy Review7 Tulip, P (2024) Housing Affordability and Supply Restrictions, The Centre for Independent Studies, Policy Paper 55.8 Kendall, R. & Tulip, P. (2018). The Effect of Zoning on Housing Prices. RBA Research Discussion Paper.9 Ibid., Page 2.5'