Yesterday’s release of the ACT Greens’ 2024 election planning policy represents another important step towards legalising missing middle housing across Canberra. Last year, Greater Canberra was proud to stand with 15 partner organisations to endorse the Missing Middle Canberra platform, calling for more homes in the places people want to live. The Greens policy endorses key elements of this platform, including by:

  • Enabling townhouses and low-rise apartments on the 80% of residential land currently zoned RZ1, by upzoning it to the RZ2 standard
  • Upzoning land near to local shops, public transport routes, and the future Light Rail Stage 2B corridor to allow for more high-quality apartments and mixed-use housing development
  • Reforming costly parking mandates, to create more housing choices for the growing number of Canberra households with only one car, or no cars, especially near public transport.

We will continue to push for all parties to support the full Missing Middle Canberra platform, including reforms to reduce the number of undemocratic and time-wasting nuisance lawsuits that hold up much-needed new homes and constrain the ACT Government’s ambitions for new social housing developments. 

The potential of missing middle housing is underlined by the Property Council of Australia’s recent Residential Zone Uplift report, which estimates that upzoning larger RZ1 and RZ2 blocks would lead to 60,000 new, well-located homes by 2060, all while providing up to $300 million per year in additional revenue to the ACT Government and alleviating the need for up to 3,000 hectares of new greenfield development.

With Labor and the Greens siding with both community and industry organisations on the urgent need for reform, the ball is now in the court of the Liberals and independents. 

The above statement is attributable to Howard Maclean, Convenor, Greater Canberra.

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About Greater Canberra

Greater Canberra is a community advocacy group committed to affordable and high-quality housing in Canberra. We believe in a future where housing is abundant, and where everyone can enjoy a more sustainable and liveable city. For more information, see https://greatercanberra.org.