tggy2

Apologies — what I meant by economic hub was in the sense that a city is a central point for business, trade and finance. Not that cities are necessarily more economical.

Though I would argue that while costs can be higher, the ROI is also realised faster, whereas the costs to service rural areas will take longer to achieve its benefit-cost ratio — and in fact it may never.

And that's not to say rural areas aren't important. They are! But we need to think more cleverly and collectively for how we can service them better for the social and economic benefit of all within a given region. No one needs to lose out at the expense of someone else, I don't believe it's a zero sum game.

And I hear you re cost of housing. The thing is at some stage there can be critical mass in that there's enough housing on the market that it negates huge inflation due to supply outpacing (not outstripping) demand. The thing is, this is one lever, and if we keep the emigration (domestic and foreign) faucet turned on and we don't mitigate it with other measures, housing costs go up. And we've got to ask, who is winning in that situation? It's not the people, but it is the speculators and investors...

Spreading out is bad. It adds significant fiscal burden supporting essential services infrastructure such as water and sewerage, as you lose the economies of scale that more dense/compact cities have. Worse, spreading out only adds to induced demand when you have greater numbers of people commuting at the same time of day twice a day.

Housing is a false equivalency in this equation, and there are other levers that need to be pulled to address construction costs, etc.

Further, if you had better and reliable rapid transport links servicing spread out communities, it would negate the need to drive in many cases when commuting to economic hubs. But this requires a mindset shift.

Overall, it's nuanced, and that complexity is why voters (and NIMBYs) are reticent to embrace how we need to be living for now, and not how we used to live.