Ahead of a ‘tsunami’ of population growth hitting south-east Queensland, the region's mayors are trying to get one step ahead, be efficient and plan and deliver infrastructure.
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The race is on for councils to use technology and increasingly available public data to get ahead of the projected growth.
At a Property Council of Australia event on Friday, four south-east Queensland mayors were questioned about how they were going to deliver smart cities for the future.
Redland City Council mayor Karen Williams said being a smart city was about looking 20 or 30 years ahead.
“Being a smart city is just about not being dumb,” she said,
Logan mayor Luke Smith said the key to being smart was learning from others.
“What we’ve been doing is unashamedly searching the globe for what are the trends that we should be looking at that are probably about eight years ahead of where Australia is going to be,” he said.
“We have a tsunami of growth coming our way and what we have to think through is not think in a period of time or your election term, but force the council to say what are we going to look like 20 years from now.”
Cr Smith said the M1 was the best example.
“You sit on that M1 when people come into the city and you think if those bastards had thought that through 30 years ago I wouldn’t be sitting on this M1 if they had actually planned this properly,” he said.
“Are we actually going to use the data that we have now, knowing the growth patterns that we’ve got and knowing where it’s going to happen to ensure that infrastructure goes ahead of the growth.”
Moreton Bay deputy mayor Mike Charlton agreed that being smart was about knowing what was coming.
“I think one of the challenges we have in local government currently is that there is so much coming so fast and we get to know what that is, but how do we then get that knowledge out to our community and start to have a sensible, mature debate,” he said.
Cr Williams argued residents did not care if councils were smart, they cared if they were efficient.
“They want us to make the right decisions, that cost the right amount of money at the right time,” she said.
Cr Smith said the first step in planning ahead and delivering what the south-east needed was creating a sense of urgency.
“I have always found the most innovative cities around the world, and in Australia, are innovative because they need to be,” he said.
“The growth is coming so quick and so fast ... thinking smart really means focusing on data and making sure infrastructure goes ahead of that growth.”
Sunshine Coast Council mayor Mark Jamieson said the best mix of funding to create smart cities was to think like a team.
“For every dollar you pay to tax we get to spend about three cents of it,” he said.
“Part of the secret for us is not thinking like individual councils but thinking like south-east Queensland, which is one of the big advantages of the council of mayors.”
