Andrew Heaton | Sourceable

Plans are underway to completely rebuild the Metro Center on Pacific Avenue in downtown Santa Cruz. (Dan Coyro -- Santa Cruz Sentinel)High density mixed use projects that are adjacent to or integrated with public transport hubs represent a significant growth area that will help transform and revitalise cities both around the world and in Australia, according to a new report.

In the research paper, international real-estate services firm CBRE said Australian cities faced challenges in coming decades as an expected population of between 35 million and 42 million by 2040 drove the need to provide between 4.4 million and 7.1 million new homes and traffic congestion is expected to cost $20 billion to $30 billion by 2020.

The paper says transit oriented development (TOD) – master-planned projects which are designed to interface with transport services and significant transport hubs – have enormous potential to revitalise underused spaces, provide more affordable housing closer to transport links and thus with greater accessibility to employment opportunities, create more widely distributed hubs of employment and reduce the strain on road infrastructure by allowing easier commuting by public transport.

“TOD projects have the capacity to address many of the challenges facing major cities in developed economies as a result of a rapid increase in urbanisation,” said CBRE regional director of structured transactions and advisory services Wayne Redman. Read more