GOVERNMENT TOOLS
CONSULTING
You are planning for growth. But will it be built?
Realistic growth forecasts for urban utilities: separating what is zoned, what developers promise and what the market will actually deliver.
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Tuesday 4 August 2026 · 1:00-2:00pm AEST
(12:30-1:30pm ACST · 11:00am-12:00pm AWST)
Planning reforms have shifted where housing growth will land.
If you are responsible for the size and timing of infrastructure, you are likely asking what Transit Oriented Development (TOD), low and mid-rise and activity centre changes mean for your service area. Zoned does not mean built: feasibility testing separates what is approved from what the market will actually deliver, and when.
Rob Hall, Oliver Bowering and Nenad Petrovic from Informed Decisions share lessons from recent work with urban utilities grappling with exactly this. They show how to pressure-test your growth forecast: realistic housing supply, not theoretical capacity, the timing and sequence of development, and how to see your service area in the wider national growth picture.
You will also see how our forecasters visualise the location, timing and sequence of development in Placemaker, our online platform that brings independent forecasts of population, housing and development into one map-based view.
Have a question for the panel? Submit it when you register.
Drawing on the National Forecasting Program: 30 years of independent forecasting covering every area of Australia, built from more than 50,000 tracked development sites.
PRESENTED BY
Rob Hall
Chief Economist
Oliver Bowering
Senior Forecast Consultant
Nenad Petrovic
Head of Consulting
Preview the headline stories
What we'll cover in this session
Where growth actually lands
Why planning reforms have moved where housing growth lands, and why a forecast made before them can look right in total yet wrong on location.
'Zoned' is not the same as 'built'
How development feasibility exposes the gap between zoned capacity and the housing the market will realistically deliver, and when.
Timing and sequence, not totals
How to understand the timing and sequence of development, not just an aggregate forecast.
Why supply competes
Why developments compete to fill first, so a piece of infrastructure can be needed years later than it first appears.
Your area in the national picture
Why it's important to understand your service area in the context of neighbouring regions and the wider national growth picture.
Beyond new homes
Why jobs and industry, not just new homes, drive the demand you need to plan for.
Who this session is for
This session is for the people who plan infrastructure, prioritise upgrades and answer for those decisions to boards, regulators and the community. Network, strategy and demand planners at water, power, data and transport utilities, across growth areas and established suburbs, metro and regional.
The demand planning decisions you make today set capital works programs and investment priorities for years to come. They need to rest on what the market will actually build, not on what is theoretically possible.
It is just as useful if you advise on or invest in that demand, from energy retailers and renewables developers to infrastructure advisers who need independent evidence of where growth will land, and when.