Evelyn Reynolds

La Trobe University has unveiled the latest update in a $5 billion masterplan to transform its 225-hectare Bundoora campus in Melbourne’s north, with their aim to provide housing for 15,000 people, including 15 percent affordable housing, and facilities for 40,000 students – a 45 percent increase on current student numbers.
The “University City” project has been ongoing for some time, with a proposal to accommodate 12,000 staff and students, along with a mix of commercial, retail and cultural facilities, in 2018.
Parts of this plan have since been realised, including Jackson Clements Burrows Architects’ design for a pair of student accommodation buildings housing 624 beds in total, and the La Trobe Sports Park – described in a media communique from the university as a “world-class sports precinct for teaching, research, community participation and elite sport” – designed by Warren and Mahoney.

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The updated 30-year vision, as detailed in the media statement, includes three distinct villages and the growth of the campus’s city centre, which is intended to transform the Bundoora site into “a dynamic centre of innovation, knowledge and sustainability.” The project has been developed through consultation with stakeholders, community and the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung Cultural Heritage Aboriginal Corporation.
Located adjacent to existing homes, the campus’s north village will have a residential focus, while the east village, the closest to Macleod Train Station, will be a mixed-use neighbourhood built on student accommodation, and the south village will have a research, innovation and commercial focus. At the campus’s core, the existing city centre will grow westward with new commercial, retail and academic developments.
The plans also encompass more than 1 million square metres of “regenerative, climate-resilient open space,” including the enhancement and protection of the Nangak Tamboree eco-corridor, as a way to “[connect] the city to the wider environment and bringing its inhabitants closer to nature.”
An improved transport network with expanded pedestrian and cycling links, new streets, laneways and roads, alongside a proposed Suburban Rail Loop train station, is also part of the masterplan.

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Chancellor John Brumby said University City reimagined La Trobe’s place in the broader community.
“University City could boost Gross Regional Product (GRP) in Melbourne’s north-east by an estimated $440 million each year by the completion of the project, while additional interstate and international students could spend around $202 million per annum in the Victorian economy,” he said.
“La Trobe University City will not only transform our campus, it will create a thriving community that drives innovation and economic prosperity.”
La Trobe vice-chancellor professor Theo Farrell added that the initiative would enhance the quality of life for students and staff, and contribute significantly to the social fabric of Melbourne’s north.
“University City is a bold, purpose-built innovation city where education drives everything – and sparks so much more,” he said, describing the proposal as “a connected ecosystem of industry, health, housing, culture, sport and green space,” and “a new model of how knowledge, place and imagination [can] come together.”
Construction is currently underway on the campus’s $82 million University Health Clinic, designed by Woods Bagot. The building is expected to be complete by mid-2026. More

Houses, buildings and spaces can now be registered to be featured in the Open House Melbourne 2026 line-up, taking place from Friday 24 July to Sunday 26 July 2026.
The theme for the 2026 program, “Generous City,” invites submissions that explore how generosity and a culture of openness can be reflected in design. This may be demonstrated in multigenerational homes, community gardens, cultural hubs, inclusive and accessible environments and other shared or community-focused spaces.
In a statement, Open House Melbourne said: “We’re looking for submissions that consider how design decisions shape the way generosity is expressed in architecture that prioritises inclusion, in infrastructure that supports care and in public projects that strengthen community.”
The 2025 program featured an assortment of residential projects, including Naples Street House by Edition Office, which earned the Australian Institute of Architects 2024 Robin Boyd Award for Residential Architecture – Houses (New); Echo.1 by C Street Projects with Neil Architecture; No Rezzavations House by Sarah Lake Architects; the Merri House by EME Design; Northcote House by LLDS Architects; and Bills Street Social and Affordable Housing by Hayball in collaboration with Tract Landscape Architects.
Other program highlights included Kangan Institute’s Health and Community Centre of Excellence by Architectus and a tour of Balam Balam Place by Kennedy Nolan, Openwork and Finding Infinity.
The online Expressions of Interest portal will close 22 February 2026. All applications will be reviewed by the Open House Melbourne Building Council together with the programming team. More

A research project into inclusive public toilet design has been awarded more than $700,000 in Australian Research Council (ARC) funding.
The project, led by professor Nicole Kalms from Monash Art, Design and Architecture (MADA) in collaboration with professor Emily Potter from Deakin University, was awarded a 2026 Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Project Grant valued at $712,282.
Titled Designing Dignity: Civic equity through public bathroom architecture, the project will examine how Australia’s public toilets can be reimagined as inclusive, multipurpose spaces that meet the needs of diverse communities. The study will consider accessibility, sanitation, and the needs of parents, carers and people experiencing homelessness, as well as cultural, faith-based and transit-related requirements.
The project summary highlights that public toilets in Australia, “once a celebrated public health initiative that promoted civility and mobility, is in disrepair and rapid decline,” with toilets increasingly located only in shopping centres, cafes and other commercial spaces. The summary adds that limited access to public restrooms negatively impacts the health and wellbeing of vulnerable groups such as people with disabilities, people experiencing homelessness and people with mobility challenges.
Kalms said the research project will take a place-based, co-designed approach across cities, suburbs and regions. “The project findings will serve as a blueprint for individuals, communities, practitioners and governments to ensure that public bathrooms are valued civic assets which promote diverse and equitable communities,” she said.
Kalms is the associate dean (Research) and founding director of the XYX Lab at Monash University, which leads national and international research in gender and place. She is also the 2025 recipient of the Paula Whitman Leadership in Gender Equity Prize.
Potter is professor of Literary Studies, with a portfolio of work exploring climate change, place-making, urban design, the biopolitics of water and consumption, and settler colonial environments. More

Australia’s peak architecture, planning, and landscape institutes have met with the Parliamentary Friends for Australian Urban Design at Parliament House in Canberra to promote the value of good design and planning, and present shared priorities for national policy action.
The Parliamentary Friends of Australian Urban Design – a bipartisan group of federal parliamentarians that advocates for the value of good design in shaping Australia’s cities and regions – first launched at the 2024 Australian Urban Design Awards ceremony held at Parliament House.
On 5 November 2025, the Parliamentary Friends for Australian Urban Design co-chairs – Elizabeth Watson-Brown MP, Cameron Caldwell MP and Lisa Chesters MP – met with the Speaker of the House Milton Dick and the presidents of Australia’s three peak design and planning bodies: Adam Haddow of the Australian Institute of Architects; Heath Gledhill of the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects; and Emma Riley of the Planning Institute of Australia.
The event was an opportunity for the three bodies to discuss their shared priorities for federal action, identifying areas where national leadership could drive meaningful change. According to a communique from the Australian Institute of Architects, these include:

“A stronger national urban policy: championing a coordinated, spatially informed national vision for cities, regions and communities
Leadership in ‘Density Done Well’: supporting more diverse, affordable and sustainable housing through design excellence
Investment in sustainable, well-designed communities: driving federal leadership and place-based investment to create climate-resilient, liveable communities.”

The Parliamentary Friends of Australian Urban Design will reconvene at the Australian Urban Design Awards on 24 March 2026, for which entries are now open until 30 January 2026.
The group has also committed to hosting a mid-year forum that explores case studies on “Density Done Well,” and a November event that will examine design-led responses to climate change, and pathways to net zero across precincts, housing and infrastructure. More

A project to create a next-generation thermal comfort index that recognises individual differences and supports fairer workplaces has been launched by the University of Sydney in partnership with Mitsubishi Electric Corporation, Waseda University in Japan and the Technical University of Denmark.
According to a media release from the University of Sydney, “The collaboration will combine large-scale field studies, human-subject experiments, and advanced data modelling to move beyond the outdated ‘average person’ model that underpins today’s comfort standards. The goal: a modern, inclusive index that reflects how people feel in real offices, [aimed at] improving comfort, wellbeing and productivity while cutting energy waste.”
“For forty years, buildings have been tuned to suit an average person who doesn’t really exist,” said professor emeritus Richard de Dear from the School of Architecture, Design and Planning at the University of Sydney. “This collaboration is about measuring real people, in real workplaces, and building an index that recognises individual differences. It’s good for people and good for the planet.”
The communique notes that the new index is intended to provide an evidence-based standard that champions fairness among diverse individuals, integrating physical conditions, such as temperature, humidity and airflow, with personal factors, including clothing, activity and physiology, to predict how individuals behave in a space.
Research lead at the University of Sydney’s Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) Lab Dr Thomas Parkinson said that rather than hard-coding separate temperature targets for men and women, the team is striving for an inclusive system.
“Our goal is a single, adaptive index that learns from context – what the person is doing, what the room is doing – and predicts how they’ll feel. That’s how we make comfort fairer and smarter at scale,” he said.
The result is intended to promote personal environmental control through fittings such as desk fans, foot-warmers, task chairs with local conditioning and small radiant panels, as well as smart zoning to create cooler and warmer micro-areas, and flexible clothing norms.
The project aims to deliver a globally consistent model, with shared criteria for multinational organisations; clear rules for certification and compliance; and energy efficiency, with less wasted energy. The index is intended to be adopted by designers, engineers and regulators worldwide.
Over time, feedback data is intended to refine predictions to enhance comfort and efficiency. According to the communique, the research period will be extended annually as required by the study design and international standards process. More

Plans for a $1.6 billion redevelopment the Perth Convention and Exhibition Centre (PCEC) have been shelved by the Western Australian government, who have instead decided to divert $1.5 billion into a new Building Hospitals Fund.
The current PCEC building, designed by Cox Architecture, dates from 2004. A concept proposal for the redevelopment, which planned to expand the building’s event capacity and open it up to the Swan River, was lodged by the property’s leaseholders, Wyllie Group and Brookfield Properties, in January last year.
At that time, Premier Roger Cook commented that the “proposal would deliver an iconic new precinct that opens up major tourism and hospitality opportunities for WA, helping to diversify our economy and create local jobs.”
“Our city deserves better than a shed on the river,” he said.

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Now, the state government has said that “the significant investment decision cannot be justified at this time.” They have reasoned that more than $500 million in road and rail infrastructure works would be needed before construction on the building redevelopment could commence, and that the total project cost would come in higher than the anticipated $1.6 billion, “with the state government likely to carry the entire cost on its balance sheet.”
They also cited the “negative impact [that would result from] the disruption of [the PCEC’s future] events” as a contributor to the decision. In a media statement, Cook commented, “We want to expand our major conference capacity, but it needs to occur in a way that delivers value for taxpayers and doesn’t interrupt the impressive forward program of business events activity,” he said.
The government has so far invested $35 million in design, engineering, geotechnical and business case works. According to their media communique, “The results of this work will be available to the government into the future, as it looks to work with both the leaseholders and the broader business events and tourism sectors on a new path forward.”

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Cook commented, “Our existing business events and tourism program is an important part of our government’s strategy to diversify the economy and ensure it remains the strongest in the nation. This is an important focus for my government; however, I refuse to compromise on major projects that will deliver better health outcomes for Western Australians.”
The $1.5 billion Building Hospitals Fund newly pledged by the WA government is in addition to $3.2 billion already committed under the state’s existing health infrastructure program.
Development approval has been recently granted to two projects benefiting from this fund: a six-storey new building at Royal Perth Hospital, and a new hospital on a greenfield site, replacing the Peel Health Campus adjacent. The WA government has also newly purchased the St John of God Mount Lawley hospital, with future plans to expand the hospital and aged care facilities.
Construction is also currently underway on the $1.8 billion Women and Babies Hospital, designed by Hassell, and the $471.5 million Bunbury Health Campus redevelopment, managed by Multiplex and Perkins. More

A proposal to build Australia’s tallest building in Southport on the Gold Coast has received approval from the City of Gold Coast.
Named One Park Lane, the project comprises a 101-storey, 197-apartment residential tower that is set to reach nearly 400 metres in height and a neighbouring 60-storey commercial office tower with more than 11,600 square metres of office space.
The initial concept design for One Park Lane was prepared in 2022 by BKK Architects and further developed by Cottee Parker for a development application lodged in June 2025. Landscape architecture practice TCL undertook the landscape design for the project.
The towers rise from an elevated, splayed podium, supported by root-like columns inspired by the Moreton Bay fig tree. A landscaped forecourt beneath the podium canopy will provide public amenity and link the ground-floor entry atriums of both buildings.
The towers will also be linked via a fully glazed skybridge on the twenty-second floor. The bridge is proposed to contain within it a hospitality offering, landscaped areas, seating and 360-degree views of the city. Inside the skybridge and residential amenity levels, sculptural columns echo the organic form of the external root-like columns rising from the ground plane.
Described on the One Park Lane website as “harmonious in colour,” the towers are set to be clad in high-performance glazing in a dark shade of grey. Transparent glass wrapping the communal areas of the residential tower and the skybridge punctuates the facade, creating a delineation between public and private spaces.
Construction on the project is anticipated to commence in early 2026. More

In a recently released report, the Grattan Institute has recommended that three-storey townhouses and apartments should be permitted on all residential-zoned land in all capital cities, and that housing developments of six storeys or more should be allowed as-of-right near major transit hubs and commercial centres.
According to a communique from the Grattan Institute, the report, titled More homes, better cities: Letting more people live where they want, argues for these changes as part of “a concerted policy assault on Australia’s housing crisis.”
The report found that housing in Australia’s capital cities is among the least affordable in the world as a result of “restrictive” planning controls limiting supply. According to the media communique, about 80 percent of all residential land within 30 kilometres of Sydney’s centre, and 87 percent in Melbourne, is zoned for housing of three storeys or fewer, and three quarters or more of residential land in Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide is zoned for two storeys or fewer.
The Grattan Institute’s media release states, “We have a housing affordability crisis that is dividing families and communities and robbing young Australians of their best chance in life. The key problem is that state and territory land-use planning systems say ‘no’ to new housing by default, and ‘yes’ only by exception.”
“Allowing more housing in established suburbs would mean cheaper housing in all suburbs,” the release reads.
According to modelling from the Grattan Institute, the proposed reforms could enable the construction of 67,000 new homes across Australia every year, which, over the course of a decade, would cut rents by 12 percent and reduce the cost of a median-priced home by $100,000.
The Planning Institute of Australia (PIA) has responded to the report with concern, noting in a communique that while the country needs more well-located homes and faster approvals, “the Grattan Institute’s proposal for blanket upzoning is the wrong tool for the job, [as] it risks more congestion, stretched services and less liveable cities.”
“Simply rezoning more land won’t deliver more homes if the construction industry can’t build them and if the infrastructure isn’t in place,” PIA CEO Matt Collins said. “Simpler processes and better planning systems are essential, but weakening planning just adds pressure to infrastructure, increases congestion, and makes communities worse off.”
The PIA supports greater housing density in well-located areas, but argues that sequenced planning is key to directing growth to areas with capacity to support it, making housing delivery sustainable, more efficient and cost-effective for both developers and government.
“If we upzone everywhere, we create infrastructure pressures everywhere,” the PIA’s release reads. “Governments can’t upgrade roads, schools and pipes in every suburb all at once. Communities will wait longer for the services that make neighbourhoods liveable.”
Collins cautioned that, in his opinion, “the real challenge to housing production is the construction sector’s ability to deliver.”
“Our construction sector is stretched and builders are struggling to deliver existing approvals, with labour shortages, material delays and cost pressures,” he said. “Adding another 67,000 homes a year on top of that isn’t realistic without serious investment in workforce, supply chains and infrastructure coordination.”
According to the PIA, close to 100,000 lots in Queensland held active planning approvals but had not been developed as of December 2024. In Victoria, the number of undeveloped approved dwellings, including houses, townhouses and units, was just shy of 120,000 in 2023.
“Good planning enables more housing and creates predictability, transparency and confidence for the community, developers and governments alike. The Grattan Institute’s approach risks doing the opposite,” Collins said.
The Grattan Institute’s report can be accessed online. More