[Aliantha]

lush, I think you could be right except for the fact that very few of these 'little boxes' are unoccupied which posits that they were required anyway.

The other alternative is to build more high rises closer to the city, but in general, the rents in those have traditionally priced most average income earners out of the market. Not to mention Australias fascination with family pets making inner city apartment living simply not feasible.

I think the real reason our urban sprawl is sprawling is our growing population. People need homes to live in and our cities till now have been comparitively small when you consider other capital cities around the world.

Also, times have changed. People are much more mobile and jobs require people to move much more than in previous generations. As John Howard once said, "Australians have never had it so good", and to a point he was right, although I think Johnny might have had his blinkers on at the time. Unfortunately, those good times are proving to be very tough times now, but we all know there's going to be hangover if you party too hard in the first place. (at least, the responsible ones among us do)