Two big submissions for Streets People Love Hobart

The Southern Tasmania Regional Land Use Strategy and Macquarie Point Northern Access Road

I'm blown away by the volunteer effort put in to two great submissions championing people-centric design and active transport this past weekend! Each one took tens of person hours to complete on top of the writers' prior knowledge of good design and government policies built over years of engagement in advocacy.

Streets People Love Hobart made comprehensive submissions to the government consultations for the Draft Southern Tasmania Regional Land Use Strategy and the Macquarie Point Northern Access Road. You can find out what they said on the Streets People Love Hobart website.

2021 saw the announcement of plans for medium density development at Macquarie Point.

Southern Tasmania Regional Land Use Strategy

The STRLUS will shape how southern Tasmania grows through to 2050. Our submission, prepared by Ben and Penelope Clark, argued that the strategy needs to back up its own rhetoric. It talks about compact settlements and reducing car dependence — but the previous Planning Minister's decision to extend the Urban Growth Boundary for up to 9,700 new lots in places like Margate, Brighton and Sorell pulls in the opposite direction. That's sprawl, not infill, and it locks in the car-dependent development pattern the strategy says it wants to avoid.

The Greater Hobart Cycling Plan seemed to have been forgotten in the draft STRLUS.

We pushed for urban consolidation to be elevated as a priority, not listed as the last option. We called out the massive funding imbalance — $2.2 billion for roads over the past decade versus $17.5 million for active transport — and argued the STRLUS should require capital projects to be assessed against its own objectives. If the government is serious about the vision in the Wellbeing Framework, the Walk Wheel Ride Strategy, and the Preventive Health Strategy, the land use strategy needs to actually deliver on it.

Find out more about the STRLUS submission!

Macquarie Point Northern Access Road

The Northern Access Road will service the Port of Hobart and provide a bus plaza for the new stadium precinct. It also cuts right through the Intercity Cycleway — the busiest walking and cycling route in the city. We made two submissions on this project, prepared by Dominic Lang and other SPLH members, as well as a submission and in-person evidence to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works.

Our key concern is that the concept design treats active transport as an afterthought. We used satellite imagery to show desire lines worn into the grass where people are already taking shortcuts the design ignores. We called for separated paths for walking and riding, safer intersection designs, 30 km/h traffic speeds, and proper connections between the cycleway, the Domain, and the future ferry terminal. The stadium's own transport study expects 25% of patrons to walk or ride — the road design needs to reflect that reality.