Headline Targets

Ten headline targets have been selected as highlights from the many Future Melbourne targets set to help us measure progress towards these goals for the municipality by 2020.

Progress toward these targets can be regularly reported on and will show our progress toward achieving our vision of not only a liveable but also a sustainable city. Targets may relate to multiple goals and together present an overall indication of our success.

1. All visitors and residents feel welcome and safe in the city

This target contains three separate components: welcome, safe and engaged. To effectively monitor this target it is recommended that each of the three components are monitored separately.

Welcome

To measure the degree to which people feel welcome it is recommended that a question be inserted into the City Users Survey, which is held biennially and will capture the perception of workers, residents and visitors. In addition, the Anholt Brands Survey includes the following question on individuals perception of how welcome they think people in a city would be, the exact question is: "Think about how people in general would behave towards you - about whether for example they might be warm and friendly, cold or show prejudice towards you - How welcome do you think people in general would make you feel in the city?" Of the 60 cities surveyed, Melbourne was ranked 4th (the top 3 cities were Sydney, Rio De Janeiro and Barcelona).(Source: Anholt City Brands Index 2006, Frequency: Annual Report)

Safety

The City of Melbourne has a strategy for a Safer City 2007-2010. This strategy aims to ensure that the municipality of Melbourne continues to be a safe and welcoming place for people to live, work and visit. To effectively monitor the strategy, a detail survey titled Perceptions of Safety within the City of Melbourne has been conducted every 2-3 years. The results of this survey are outlined in Table 1.

Table 1: Perceptions of Safety in the City of Melbourne

A second source of data on safety is the Community Indicators Victoria survey (further information on this survey are available from Appendix 1). The community indicators are collected for residents only.

In this survey, respondents were asked to rate how safe they felt when walking alone in their local area during the day and at night. The 2007 results from this survey are as follows:

• When walking alone in their local area during the day 95.2 per cent of residents from the municipality of Melbourne felt safe or very safe
• When walking alone at night 66.8 per cent of residents from the municipality of Melbourne felt safe or very safe.

(Source: http://www.communityindicators.net.au/wellbeing_reports/melbourne, Frequency: Biennial)

Engaged

Engaged can be defined as " busy or occupied; involved" or "to occupy the attention or efforts of" (The Macquarie dictionary).

It is recommended that the City Users Survey include a question to ask people if they are engaged in the city.

Other indicators related to the engagement are collected in the Community Indicators Victoria survey and focus on two elements of engagement school leavers and community participation, as outlined below.

Destination of school leavers

The activities of young people who have left school have been sourced from customised 2006 Census tables obtained from the Australian Bureau of Statistics. This data describes the level of engagement in work and study activities of 15-19 year-olds who are not attending school. This population can be categorised into three major groups: fully engaged school leavers are defined as those who are involved in work and/or non-school study (including university, TAFE and vocational training) on a full-time basis; disengaged school leavers are defined as those who are not involved in any work or study activities at all; and the remaining school leavers are defined as partly engaged. The percentage of fully engaged and disengaged school leavers are presented below.

Engaged or disengaged: In the municipality of Melbourne, 95.0 per cent of 15-19 year-old school leavers were fully engaged in work or non-school study, compared to 74.1 per cent in the Northern & Western Metro Region and the Victorian State average of 71.9 per cent. Furthermore, 2.8 per cent were disengaged, compared to 15.3 per cent in the Northern and Western Metro Region and the Victorian State average of 15.4 per cent. (Community Indicators Victoria)

Participation in citizen engagement

Data on the participation of Victorians in selected forms of citizen engagement were collected in the 2007 Community Indicators Victoria Survey. Respondents were asked if they had attended a town meeting or public hearing, met, called or written to a local politician, joined a protest or signed a petition in the previous 12 months.

46.7 per cent of people in the municipality had engaged in at least one of the selected activities in the previous year, compared to 47.9 per cent in the Northern and Western Metro Region and the Victorian State average of 53.8 per cent.

2. All residents, businesses and visitors have easy access to electronic information

To monitor this target it is recommended that a number of indicators are monitored, these include home internet access for residents. Library facilities and wireless access is one way the City of Melbourne can directly influence access to electronic information in the municipality.

Residents

Home internet access was measured in the 2007 Community Indicators Victoria Survey. Respondents were asked to indicate if the internet could be accessed from their dwelling, and if so, whether access was via a dial up or broadband connection.

In the municipality, 91.6 per cent of persons lived in households that had internet access of any form at their dwelling.

Of the total population of the municipality, 80.0 per cent lived in households that had home internet access via a broadband connection.

(Source: http://www.communityindicators.net.au/wellbeing_reports/melbourne, Frequency: Every two years)

Residents/visitors/businesses - City of Melbourne website access

Libraries provide free access: City Library has 28 computers, North Melbourne has five computers and East Melbourne eight computers.

Melbourne Library Service now has wireless access at all three of its libraries. We encourage customers to bring in their wireless-enabled laptops so that you can enjoy the convenience of wireless web access. Access is free and is available from when the libraries are open until 7pm each evening.

The City of Melbourne web design standards facilitate access to the site. These standards facilitate the use of the website on different computer environments such as Windows PCs (98 through to XP), Apple/Mac Computers and Linux based computers.

The website can be accessed using the most popular websites created over the past four years: Internet Explorer, Netscape, Firefox, Opera and Safari (Mac).

The website is usable by people with visual impairments and is designed to work with JAWS screen reader product.

3. The municipality is home to at least 140,000 people

Current estimate for the municipality of Melbourne (2008): 86,000 (Source: ABS Estimated Residential Population, Frequency: Annual Updates). A projected population of 115,000 is the 'business as usual' to 2020 based on current growth trends. This would give the municipality a residential density of 30.9 people per hectare. By world city standards this is a very low density.

Evidence shows that becoming bigger and denser can assist a city to become more resource efficient, more innovative and more prosperous. If the municipality is to become both more sustainable and more liveable in the next ten to twenty years, it should aim for a far higher residential population.

One of the most sustainable and liveable cities in the world and a model for Melbourne to emulate is Barcelona. Barcelona has a residential population of about 200 people per hectare. Paris has 250 people per hectare. Central London and New York have 105 people per hectare. These are all cities with which Melbourne compares itself from various perspectives and all of theses cities have high urban heritage values and controls (these are sometimes cited as limiters of development).

As a capital city municipality, Melbourne might eventually aim for a density at least comparable to Central London, that is about 100 people per hectare. At this density, the population of the municipality would be about 350,000. This is less than half as dense as Barcelona but four times the current level. Even over twenty years, high growth rates would be needed to reach this target. Therefore, a proposed interim target for 2020 is a population of 140,000 an increase from 2008 of 54,000 which would bring the population density of the municipality to 37 people per hectare.

Increasing the population of the municipality by 54,000 will require adding about 27,000 dwellings from 2008 to 2020 (average of 2,250 per annum). This target also assumes that household size is increased from 1.9 to 2 people per dwelling.

4. At least 20 per cent of new housing is affordable or social housing

The measure of housing affordability has been calculated through customised 2006 Census tables obtained from the Australian Bureau of Statistics. The data show the percentage of households in the lowest income quartile spending 30 per cent or more of their gross household income on rent or mortgage payments.

Based on the 2006 ABS Census there is one per cent of affordable housing stock and five per cent public housing stock

(Source: ABS Basic Community Profile, frequency: Every 5 years ie. 2006, 2011, 2016, 2021)

5. City employment exceeds 400,000

The measure of employment in the municipality is based on the Census of Land Use and Employment (CLUE) undertaken biennially by the City of Melbourne. This is the total employment for the municipality and includes full time, part time, casual, contractor (volunteers are not included). In 2006 CLUE, 365,904 people where employed in the municipality. This measure has been chosen because of the frequency of updates.

Please note, the ABS also reports employment figures for the municipality. For 2006, the ABS recorded 300,250 workers. This is different from the CLUE figure because it records only those people who went to work or worked from home on the census day - in reality there is a high level of contract and part-time workers in the city. In an effort to reconcile the two sets of figures, we have developed the following coefficients.

Table 2: The relationship between daily employment and total employment in the municipality.

6. Per capita greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 have reduced by 35 per cent per resident and 59 per cent per worker from 2006 levels

This target relies on the municipality significantly reducing its greenhouse emissions. It also allows for the projected residential and worker growth within the municipality. Details of how we will achieve these reductions and the methodology for measuring progress towards these targets is outlined in the City of Melbourne Zero Net Emissions by 2020 Update 2008.

7. Per capita drinking water use by 2020 has reduced by 40 per cent per resident and 50 per cent per worker compared to 2000 levels

Refer to The city as a catchment

This target relies on the municipality significantly reducing its mains water consumption. It also allows for the projected residential and worker growth in the municipality.

Implicit in these targets are that we will use alternative sources of water and that by 2020 we will reduce pollution entering our waterway by 20 per cent. Details of these targets are outlined in the City of Melbourne Total Watermark - City as a Catchment.

8. Melbourne will be one of the world's top five university cities

Global University City Index

The Global University City Index has been developed by RMIT as a contribution to the work of the Committee for Melbourne Higher Education Taskforce. The Global University City Index highlights those cities where there is confluence between their size; liveability and connectedness; the number of excellent universities within their bounds; and their sustained investment in education and research. These cities are home to knowledge workers and research clusters that make them a significant driving force of the knowledge economy. The index is based on five individually weighted factors:

1. Size of city is an absolute threshold. Cities with a population less than two million are excluded.
2. City liveability and amenity (30%).
3. The number of global universities and their degree of internationalisation (30%).
4. Educational inputs and performance (20%).
5. Research inputs and performance (20%).

   Rank	City	Country
   1	London	UK
   2	Boston	US
   3	Paris	France
   4	Tokyo	Japan
   5	Melbourne	Australia
   6	Sydney	Australia
   7	New York	US
   8	Chicago	US
   9	Baltimore	US
   10	St Louis	US

   Table 3: 2007 Top 10 city rankings further information: Speech by Professor Margaret Gardner AO, Vice-Chancellor and President, RMIT University, 20 August 2007 and Living proof our cities are tops, August 15, 2007 It should be noted that this was an inaugural survey in 2007 and the longevity and frequency of the survey is unknown. There are a number of surveys which rank individual universities in a global context. For example, the Shanhai Jiao Tong University and the Times Higher Education Rankings of Universities. Details of these surveys are included in Appendix 1. 2007 results are below:

   Institution*	World Rank
   Australian Nat Univ	57
   Univ Melbourne	79
   Univ Queensland	102-150
   Univ Sydney	102-150
   Univ Western Australia	102-150

   Table 4: 2007 Rankings of Australian Institutions (Top Australian Institutions NOTE: University not city ranking)

   9. Melbourne will be in the top 10 most innovative global cities

   An example source of data on innovation is the 2thinknow Global Innovation Review. In 2007 Melbourne was ranked 8th out of 95 global cities for innovation.¹

   10. At least 90 per cent of people walk, cycle or take public transport to work in the CBD

   In 2006, 72 per cent of people travelled to work in the CBD by walking, bike riding and public transport.

References

1 : 2ThinkNow Global Innovation Review 2007 Innovation City Rankings