Many people believe that the 30 year plan is the Governments way to pay back large developers who have contributed to their election funds.  A number of people are also sceptical of the projections of an additional 500,000 people living in this lovely city in the next 30 years

Is the 30 year plan is a question being asked many of these people, who doubt the need for the plan. Let’s face it a half a million people is a mind blowing number. And let us not forget that Adelaide has not grown that much in the last 30 years.

Being aware that Unley had 47,000 people in 1947 and we now only have 35,000 I have done some research to see if I can justify this.

This research has revealed that Adelaide in 1970 had a population of 792,000. This is close to my memory of our population when I started work in December of 1969. The population in 2010, just 2 years ago was 1,125,000. I must admit I thought it was closer to 1.3 million.

At 1.125m this is an increase in population of 42% by my calculation. Wow! 42%. Does not seem feasible.

Here is the bottom line, if our population grows in the next 30 years, or 40 years, that equals 473,000. This is close to what Deputy Premier John  Rau was saying the demographers have predicted last Friday at the AIUS monthly luncheon.

Back to the real question then, how do we accommodate these people, many of whom will be our sons and daughters, grandchildren or great grandchildren.

Let’s hope we get it right.