Thank you to everyone who contributed to the conversation. We're now considering your feedback.

The City of Maribyrnong's population is growing and changing. Over the next 30 years our community is expected to increase by 60,000 people. This means we will need up to 30,000 new homes.

We need a new plan to accommodate this growth and ensure:

• we have a mix of different housing types
• new housing is delivered in the right locations
• new housing is well designed, environmentally efficient and resilient
• new housing responds to its surrounding area and helps enhance the character of our suburbs.

We know, from previous conversations, our residents value open space, trees, greener spaces, the character of their neighbourhoods and high-quality design.

We understand that managing growth and development pressures, while maintaining what people love about living in their neighbourhood, will be a key challenge.

To help inform our planning, we're starting an initial conversation to understand:

• your ideas and priorities on how we can accommodate everyone’s housing needs
• the key things you love about where you live, how we might protect those features and what you want to see more of in the future.

The Housing Strategy and Neighbourhood Character Study will help plan Maribyrnong’s housing to best meet the needs of our diverse community over the next 30 years. It will consider the following key questions:

• Housing capacity – how much new housing do we need?
• Housing location – where should new housing be located to create liveable and sustainable neighbourhoods?
• Housing diversity – what types of new housing would best meet the needs of our community?
• Housing quality – how should housing be designed to be more liveable and consider the changing environment?
• Housing character – how do we maintain and enhance the things you love about where you live? How do we ensure future housing collectively contributes to your preferred neighbourhood character?
• Housing affordability – how can we help facilitate more affordable housing options?

Along with your feedback, we will be considering State Government policy directions, population and demographic information, land and development data, environmental sustainability and resilience, and affordability.

The City of Maribyrnong is currently home to around 95,000 residents. It is expected our population will grow to around 155,000 people by 2051 (63% increase). Our preliminary information shows average household sizes are expected to fall to 2.29 people per home and we will see a 60% increase in population of retirement aged persons.

As Maribyrnong grows, we want to make sure there is the right amount and variety of housing available for our existing and future community.

We also need to make sure new housing is appropriately located with access to shops, transport, and services and not in areas where there are environmental or health and safety concerns - for example, close to heavy industry.

The Housing Strategy and Neighbourhood Character Study will help us respond to this challenge, informing future delivery to best meet the needs of our diverse community over the next 30 years.

Along with your feedback, we need to undertake research to further understand Maribyrnong’s changing demographics and housing needs.

You can learn more about our population forecasts by visiting Maribyrnong's Population Forecast page.

Neighbourhood character is shaped by the combination of the public and private areas within a neighbourhood including all buildings, gardens, street trees and public infrastructure. It is about what makes one area distinctive from another.

We will be undertaking a Neighbourhood Character Study to identify the existing and preferred neighbourhood character of our residential areas. We need to ensure we have clear guidelines on building, landscaping and design for new housing development.

We're keen hear what you value about your particular neighbourhood to help prepare draft building, landscaping and design guidelines.

download the State Government's 'Understanding Neighbourhood Character' planning note from the document library.