Business View Oceania | March 2020

33 34 BUSINESS VIEW OCEANIA MARCH 2020 BUSINESS VIEW OCEANIA MARCH 2020 C I TY OF BUNBURY , WESTERN AUSTRAL I A land being taken up. We’re currently doing a housing strategy to see what capacity we have. With the current population around 35,000 we believe through that study that we have the capacity for around 90,000 people within our existing city and surrounding area.” Osborne: “A lot of residential growth is outside of our local government area. Our neighbouring communities have the urban sprawl, but Bunbury still acts as the key retail and commercial and industrial area for the region. Solar and renewables is an important element of our sustainability direction. The city is installing PV cells on some buildings and we’re up to tender now for another 6kw project at our depot which will be the second phase of our works administration area to be reliant on renewables. We also have a number of solar powered streetlights along our public walkways and cycleways. Mayor Brennan: “What is critical to our city is the lifestyle we enjoy today. We’re very future because we’re very keen to make Bunbury a centre for excellence in innovation and technology. So our Creative City Strategy covers more than the visual and performing arts, it covers the creative, innovative young and older minds to make our city better. As we know from research, if you can attract creatives into your community, they in turn attract other creatives. And that’s an amazing thing.” BVO: How are you addressing future growth in Bunbury? Barbour: “The population is steadily growing and we want that to increase. We have four greenfield areas of undeveloped land suitable for residential development – and that is currently underway. There has also been a lot of interest in redeveloping brownfield areas for housing. Last year we introduced a new town planning scheme which freed up a lot of areas for additional development that wasn’t previously being realised. And as the local economy improves, we’re starting to see that Call us now for a quote on our products (08) 9797 0999 www.mjbindustries.com Lot 102 Ditchingham Place, Australind WA 6230 Australia CONCRETE PIPES • REINFORCED CONCRETE BOX CULVERTS SPECIALTY PRECAST AND ANCILLARY PRODUCTS • LINERS PREFERRED VENDORS n Civilcon Construction www.civilcon.com.au n Geographe Civil www.geographecivil.com.au n MJB Industries www.mjbindustries.com proactive in trying to attract further investment to our city, more visitors to our city and more residents to our city. We want to grow our economy but we will not jeopardize what is important to the community – principally our natural environment. We’re surrounded by water, magnificent flora and fauna, wonderful geographic features that we’re keen to retain and respect into the future. There’s a real buzz about Bunbury at the moment. When you run through what we have on our plate at the moment compared to a year ago, it’s quite an exciting time we’re entering into. We don’t just sit back and let things happen – we really go out there and are as proactive as we can.”