Suburb planning with the census
James McIlhenny, Senior Development Planner, believes that Census KeyData is "a valuable input into the assessment of demand for additional development and the needs of local residents."
Planning for the future development of a city - especially when there are concerns about urban encroachment on bushland - is a difficult process. However, the Hobart City Council has found that they can use Census KeyData to give them the population detail they require.
The Hobart City Council is in the process of reviewing parts of its Planning Scheme by preparing a series of Local Area Plans for suburbs on the bushland fringes of Hobart.
The Local Area Plans provide a series of strategies to guide the future development of these suburbs. Issues covered in the strategies include: open space, recreation, transport and access, environmental protection, community services, infrastructure and visual landscape management (the protection of significant landscapes such as the wooded hills which form a backdrop to the suburbs on the bushland fringe).
Part of the detailed background studies for these plans involved an assessment of the population growth patterns, household composition and a socio-economic profile of the area. Understanding the composition of the population allows an assessment of their likely needs for facilities to be undertaken. A population with a high proportion of aged persons, for example, is more likely to require a community meeting facility and access to a good bus service than a new sports oval.
To find this information, Basic Community Profile Data at Collection District level was extracted from Census KeyData and then loaded into Microsoft Excel. This data was then aggregated into the various suburbs under review.
This population and housing information combined with the results of detailed surveys of community values and issues enabled future needs to be identified.
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