What’s Happened to Medium Density Housing?

Anecdotally it seems delivery of housing in Sydney has been polarised; detached houses in suburbs at the periphery of metropolitan Sydney (sprawl) entrenched with inequitable access to public transport and opportunities for work, and at the polar opposite; high rise apartments within dense metropolitan centres with immediate proximity to railway stations, in urban contexts without the necessary preconditions for high density living.

But is this a fair assessment of what’s going on?

The story is told through ABS dwelling approvals data spanning 3 decades, while seeking to explain ‘Why?’