New research has identified a key to long-term affordable housing in regional Australia could be community partnerships to reflect each region's values.
The University of Melbourne-supported report, An Intergenerational Visioning of Affordable Housing in a Regional Context, used the Murray River border towns of Echuca-Moama as a case study.
Identifying tourism, population growth post-pandemic and increasing lease and house prices, Dr Jenny Weller-Newton completed a series of community consultations.
High school students, people experiencing homelessness and older people identified possible housing solutions, including "the need for growing medium density developments and repurposing some buildings that could be developed into smaller apartments".
"It's about ensuring there is a wider consultation across the communities so that a long-term affordable housing strategy is planned, developed and actually reflects the community needs," Dr Weller-Newton said.
Existing buildings key
According to the research, Echuca reported a markedly higher proportion of social housing of 22 per cent than regional Victoria's 11.9 per cent, while the share in Moama was strikingly low at 1.6 per cent.
Between 2011 and 2016, homelessness rates were estimated to have more than doubled in Echuca. In Echuca and Moama respectively, 9 per cent and 7 per cent of residents aged 15 years or older are estimated to be at risk of homelessness.
"Community participants in the project talked about ... some of the older historic buildings that were empty in Echuca," Dr Weller-Newton said.
"You've already got some of the infrastructure with water and electricity lines going into this area.
"And there's an extensive amount of land around by the end of the railway line that could be repurposed as a space to create a community.
"They have been doing this sort of work overseas in Europe, in Vienna, they've been very ahead of the game in creating these sorts of communal living areas and housing complexes where they have reclaimed disused railway land."
The next steps
The report was presented at a recent dinner with local and state government officials where Dr Weller-Newton highlighted medium density developments, affordable housing initiatives and repurposing buildings for residential use as potential housing solutions.
It is hoped the findings will become a blueprint for other regional communities looking to solve their own housing crises.
"Because the approach we used, which was termed as 'modified citizen science approach', hadn't really been used to look at affordable housing, we feel that we've perhaps developed a protocol that could be replicated in other regions," Dr Weller-Newton said.
