Let’s build a beautiful, liveable and accessible city
Streets Alive Yarra calls on local, state and federal governments to provide sustained long-term investment in walking, cycling, public transport and place making; and to update laws and regulations to deliver better outcomes for health, transport and land use.
Local Government
- Implement the adopted Transport Strategy.
- Allocate an annual budget of $10m for capital works to support walking, cycling and place making, funded by revenue from on-street parking.
- Alter council’s organisational structure so that the Urban Design team is responsible for the allocation of public space to competing uses (such as footpaths, bike paths, driving lanes, on-street parking, or greenery); and policy for managing access to public space (such as the type and pricing of on-street parking).
- Eliminate parking minimums from the planning scheme; and mandate a parking maximum of one bay per 100 m2 of floor area; for properties within the Principal Public Transport Network area.
- Convert all free on-street parking to paid parking, using permit zones and digital permits, enforced by automatic number plate recognition.
- Invest in mobility counters that measure the number of people walking, cycling, using public transport and driving in Yarra, to guide the re-allocation of budgets and street space.
- Update the ‘Standard Concrete Vehicle Crossing’ drawing YSD601 to match best practice from the Netherlands, mandating a maximum width of 750 mm for entrance ramps.
- Increase the target for car sharing vehicles to 2,000 by 2030 and permit them to be located on residential streets.

State Government
- Revise the Speed Zoning Policy to enable councils to designate 30 km/h zones.
- Fund walking and biking on council controlled streets via grants of up to $100 per person per year to each council in Victoria, i.e. $10 million per year for Yarra from a total of $0.7 billion per year.
- Deliver the VicRoads Principal Bicycle Network on state government controlled arterial roads, with a budget of $100 million per year; including revitalising arterial shopping streets with wider footpaths, protected bicycle lanes, protected intersections and level access tram stops.
- Give councils authority to design and implement traffic control devices on local streets, e.g. to deliver wombat crossings and modal filters.
- Speed up trams by using smart traffic lights to clear intersections as trams approach.
- Revise planning schemes to treat car parking as a separate land use (this will eliminate costly parking mandates from other land uses) for properties within the Principal Public Transport Network area.
- Expand the off-street parking levy to encompass all properties within the Principal Public Transport Network area.
- Manage congestion on state government controlled arterial roads by imposing demand responsive driving charges.
- Develop and implement an Integrated Transport Plan for greater Melbourne, based on the Melbourne Rail Plan 2020-2050 and the NSW Future Transport Strategy.

Federal Government
- Redirect funding from commuter car parks at train stations toward walking, e-biking, bike parking, and buses.
- Link federal road funding to state governments with requirements to upgrade all roads in their jurisdiction to a 5-star safety rating, defined by AusRAP.
- Manage congestion on federal highways with demand responsive driving charges.
- Support 30 km/h for local, non-arterial streets.
- Lead the adoption of uniform national best-practice design guidelines for networks of footpaths and bike lanes.
- Fund walking and biking on council controlled streets via recurring grants of $100 per person per year to each council in Australia, i.e. $10 million per year for Yarra from a total of $2.5 billion per year.
