When looking at Victorian Premiers through the lens of planning, Daniel Andrews will likely be known as the Victorian Premier who upgraded Melbourne’s rail system, including skyrail and instigating the suburban rail loop. Victoria’s current Premier, Jacinta Allan, may go down in history as the instigator of some of the most significant planning reforms to facilitate new housing in the middle ring suburbs of Melbourne.

These planning reforms seek to create more housing in areas well serviced by public transport, be accessible for those who grew up in these suburbs but cannot afford most of the currently available housing stock and to curb some of the pressure for more residential development on the fringes of Melbourne.

We recently reported on the strategy to unlock underutilised Council land for housing development. On Sunday, Premier Allan revealed a far more impactful and controversial scheme, which is to amend the planning controls around a number of stations, with an emphasis on affluent south and eastern suburbs, so that residential towers of up to 20 storeys will be able to be built in close proximity to these stations, with medium rise apartment buildings (up to six storeys) surrounding them. Land surrounding stations such as Toorak, Hawthorn and Blackburn will be among 25 new Activity Centres focused on delivering over 30,000 new homes (shown on purple in the public transport map below). 25 more locations will be announced by the end of the year.

We can certainly understand the planning merit in facilitating additional housing in these locations. We also note that these suburbs are home to well-loved fine grain residential and commercial precincts as well as residents who are vocal and willing to organise and use their platform to protest these changes. We have already seen protests in Brighton, another suburb set to receive a new Activity Centre around the railway station, whilst Premier Allen made her announcement.

We will be looking with interest at how the new planning controls will be crafted to facilitate much needed affordable housing in these areas whilst protecting the valued characteristics of these precincts. It will also be interesting to see how much of the Allan Government’s bold plans hold up to what will no doubt be strident opposition during the public consultation period, which is planned to take place throughout 2025.