Influences on Apartment Design: A History of the Spatial Layout of Apartment Buildings in Sydney and Implications for the Future
Author or co-authors: Philip Oldfield, Hazel Easthope, Hyungmo Yang
Keywords: Architecture, Design, Environment, Planning, Sustainability,
Summary:
This paper traces the history of apartment design with an emphasis on spatial layout. It charts the events that have influenced apartment design in Sydney, Australia and provides a framework for understanding how changes in society, the economy, regulations, and architectural paradigms have influenced apartment layouts over time. Through a review of historical and contemporary apartment plan drawings in Sydney, we identify four chronologically distinct eras.Condominium: A Transformative Innovation in Property and Local Government
Author or co-authors: Douglas Harris
Published: Douglas C Harris, “Condominium: A Transformative Innovation in Property and Local Government” in Nicole Graham, Margaret Davies, & Lee Godden, eds, The Routledge Handbook of Property, Law, and Society (Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2022) 113.
Keywords: Governance, Home ownership, Law,
Summary:
As one form of common interest community, condominium packages private property with a co-ownership interest in common property and rights to participate in the governing organisation. A statutory innovation, the condominium form has been adopted in jurisdictions around the world and has quickly become the dominant form of land ownership for new-build housing in many cities. As an increasingly prominent feature of urban real estate, condominium is changing the nature of ownership and of local government, and is one of the defining institutions of our time.A data-driven holistic understanding of strata insurance in Australia and New Zealand
Author or co-authors: Nicole Johnston
Published: Johnston, N., Lee, A., Mishra, S., Powell, K., Bowler- Smith, M and Zutshi, A. (2021) A data-driven holistic understanding of strata insurance in Australia and New Zealand. Deakin University
Keywords: Building management, Financial management, Insurance, Law,
Summary:
This report examines the complexities of strata insurance and the role of strata managers in this process. It highlights increased costs of strata insurance over the period 2016-2020 and the significant imposition of state and federal taxes. The legal complexities of strata and obligations imposed on owners corporations and bodies corporate to insure are outlined. The report recommends changes including a more transparent disclosure regime so that consumers are more informed about insurance processes and the fees imposed by management companies and others in the strata insurance supply chain.Creating better shared spaces in apartment complexes and their local areas
Author or co-authors: Sian Thompson
Published: Cities People Love
This paper has been peer reviewed
Keywords: Architecture, Building management, Community, Design, Development, Governance, Liveability, Planning, Public/private, Qualitative research/interviews, Quantitative research/statistics,
Summary:
This research, undertaken in 2019, investigated the social aspect of living in large apartment complexes, drawing on case studies in Sydney and asking what ‘good outcomes’ look like. To understand how we can improve spaces within and around apartment complexes to better support social connection and encourage use, two overarching questions were asked: what types of social connections residents want locally, and how the built environment and management can support this.Embedded Property
Author or co-authors: Douglas Harris
Published: Douglas C Harris, "Embedded Property" in Randy K Lippert & Stefan Treffers, eds, Condominium Governance and Law: Global Urban Perspectives (Abingdon: Routledge, 2021) 29.
Keywords: Disputes/conflict, Governance, Home ownership, Law, Redevelopment / termination,
Summary:
This paper offers the concept of embedded property as a way of thinking about and understanding condominium property, and of explaining how ownership of land within condominium is changing the character of ownership. In doing so, it describes property within condominium as spatially embedded, politically embedded, and temporally embedded, and then demonstrates how these different modes by which condominium embeds property are forcing courts and legislatures to reconsider long-accepted incidents of land ownership.Parenting and neighbouring in the consolidating city: The emotional geographies of sound in apartments
Author or co-authors: Sophie-May Kerr, Chris Gibson, Natascha Klocker
Published: Emotion Space and Society
This paper has been peer reviewed
Funders: Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship and the University of Wollongong Global Challenges Program Scholarship
Keywords: Children, Design, Disputes/conflict, Liveability, Qualitative research/interviews,
Summary:
Rapid urban population growth has prompted a shift towards higher-density dwellings. Yet little is known about the everyday emotional experiences of apartment residents. This paper draws on insights gathered from families, with children, living in apartments in Sydney, Australia. These families' experiences of high-density living reveal how the materiality of sound and built form interact with cultural norms to shape how apartment spaces are understood and inhabited.Does Discrimination Law Apply to Residential Strata Schemes
Author or co-authors: Cathy Sherry
Published: Sherry, C. (2020). Does Discrimination Law Apply to Residential Strata Schemes. UNSW Law Journal, 43, 307.
This paper has been peer reviewed
Keywords: By-laws/rules/CC&Rs, Disputes/conflict, Governance, Law,
Summary:
Though strata title legislation is over 50 years old, important questions about its intersection with other areas of law remain unanswered, including whether discrimination law applies to residential strata schemes. Bodies corporate wield considerable power over residents’ properties and lives, and the capacity to use that power in discriminatory ways is real. As ever-increasing numbers of Australians choose or are compelled to live in strata schemes, the need to resolve this legal dilemma becomes more pressing.Condominium Government and the Right to Live in the City
Author or co-authors: Douglas Harris
Published: Harris, D. C. (2019). Condominium Government and the Right to Live in the City. Canadian Journal of Law & Society/La Revue Canadienne Droit et Société, 34(3), 371-392.
This paper has been peer reviewed
Keywords: Dispute resolution / courts / tribunals, Governance, Law,
Summary:
This article considers a conflict between residential-unit owners and a commercial-unit owner within a condominium development in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. Drawing from material produced in litigation, the article situates the dispute within its property and urban contexts to argue that condominium government requires attention, not just for its impact on owners or residents, but also because cities must now account for, work alongside, and, in some circumstances, contend with these rapidly proliferating sites of government that are helping to shape who has the right to live in the city.Dissolving Condominium, Private Takings, and the Nature of Property
Author or co-authors: Douglas Harris, Nicole Gilewicz
Published: Harris, D. C., & Gilewicz, N. (2015). Dissolving condominium, private takings, and the nature of property. Rethinking Expropriation Law II: Context, Criteria, and Consequences of Expropriation (The Hague, NL: Eleven, 2015), 263-297.
This paper has been peer reviewed
Keywords: Comparative research, Dispute resolution / courts / tribunals, Law, Redevelopment / termination,
Summary:
Perhaps the single most important decision in the lifecycle of a condominium is the one to dissolve it. This paper gives an overview of various dissolution rules in various common-law jurisdictions with statutory condominium regimes, describes the rule in British Columbia before turning to several court cases revealing common issues. We develop the argument that the non-consensual dissolution of condominium is a form of private-to-private takings, in order to reveal that the choice between dissolution rules is also a choice between different conceptions of property.2020 Australasian Strata Insights
Author or co-authors: Hazel Easthope, Sian Thompson, Alistair Sisson
Published: Easthope, H., Thompson, S. & Sisson, A. (2020) Australasian Strata Insights 2020, Sydney: City Futures Research Centre
Funders: Strata Community Association
Keywords: Comparative research, Economics / markets, Quantitative research/statistics,
Summary:
This project, supported by Strata Community Association who are the peak body for the strata industry in Australia and New Zealand, provides a comprehensive picture of the strata industry in Australia and New Zealand, following from the first Australian National Strata Data Analysis in 2018. National, state and territory information sheets provide information on the number of strata properties, their value, the demographic characteristics of their residents, and the professionals employed to serve them.