Denis Najzar, a real estate agent from Place Bulimba, told WILLIAMS MEDIA that while Lord Mayor Graham Quirk's plans to 'protect Brisbane's backyards' may come from a good place, property prices will be affected.

"It's all well and good to say 'keep backyards' but it comes at a price. We all want to live in a big house with a nice big backyard that's close to the city, but how many people can honestly afford that?" he said. 

Lord Mayor Graham Quirk, who unveiled the blueprint on Friday, said the plan for the city was about creating a city of neighbourhoods to "protect the Brisbane backyard", and is off the back of the $2.1m ratepayer-funded Plan Your Brisbane campaign, that over 100,000 residents have responded to.

Brisbane's Future Blueprint at a glance:

• Stop townhouses and apartments being built in areas for single homes
• Ensure that suburban development fits in with its surroundings
• Preserve the space between homes by ensuring minimum setbacks on property boundaries
• Protect Brisbane's character and heritage by demanding greater enforcement powers and penalties from the State Government
• The 40 action items developed from resident responses in Plan Your Brisbane campaign will be rolled out over coming 18 months
• A "range of suburbs" will be affected, Cr Quirk has refused to specify which suburbs

Cr Quirk said the resident responses gathered during the Plan Your Brisbane campaign had been developed into 40 action items, focusing on creating neighbourhoods and protecting backyards, to be implemented over the next 18 months.

"In this blueprint, council has committed to putting a stop to townhouses and apartments being built in areas for single homes, and restrict repeated designs for townhouses to ensure the city retains its unique character," he said. 

In order to do so, the blueprint suggests increasing the required areas for tree planting and deep landscaping in new developments, introducing a design rating scheme, stopping 'cookie cutter' townhouses by limiting repeated designs, and implementing a new design strategy to preserve the city's Queenslanders and other traditional designs.

University of Queensland Urban Planning expert Dr Dorina Pojani said the Lord Mayor's attempt to "save the Brisbane backyard" could drive up property prices.

"If you have more apartment buildings in neighbourhoods it means that you have higher densities in those neighbourhoods," Dr Pojani said.

"It's caused urban sprawl, it's caused problems with access to housing because housing prices end up being very expensive if you can't have the higher densities that apartments provide. It makes neighbourhoods more homogeneous because there's only certain people that can afford family homes," he said.

Cr Quirk has refused to comment on which suburbs will be affected, commenting only that, "this will affect a range of suburbs, and I'm not going to get down to that detail. People can check the city plan, it's available online," he said.

At time of publication (12th June 2018), the Brisbane City Council 2014 City Plan has not been amended to reflect the new blueprint. Lord Mayor Graham Quirk was unavailable for comment.

View the Brisbane City Council plan here.

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