How Juanita Nielsen sparked reforms that transformed city landscapes
Iconic Australian anti-development activist Juanita Nielsen left behind far more than a deeply disturbing whodunnit mystery when she disappeared, presumed murdered, 50 years ago, next month.
Her death also sparked a huge range of planning and policy changes that transformed the landscapes of our cities, and are now back under the spotlight, a new book to be released on Saturday argues.
Some say the reforms that sprang from the urban warfare that erupted on Sydney's streets between developers and conservationists in the 1970s over plans for high-density housing in the city's east helped precipitate today's current national housing crisis; others argue they need to be further strengthened to protect our cities.
'I don't think there's any doubt that Juanita Nielsen's death made the environment for developing land much tougher for many years, if not decades,' said Mark Skelsey, author of Views To Die For: Murder, Anarchy and the Battle for Sydney's Future. 'It initiated popular movies, plays and books which cast developers as villains and which really had a long-term influence on housing and development levels.
'She was also a strong advocate for public participation in planning decisions which increased people's influence and put heritage protection on the agenda, which both have the power to inhibit development. And she campaigned too for affordable housing and for developers to retain portions of projects for affordable housing, which still rings true today.'
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Skelsey, a communications consultant and former NSW Department of Planning staffer, was determined to take a fresh look at Nielsen's activism through the prism of housing planning, rather than about the circumstances of her death.
While he charts her role as a publisher of the newspaper NOW, campaigning against developers' plans to demolish the historic terraces on Kings Cross's Victoria Street for high-rise towers of luxury apartments – which eventually led to her death – he looks closely at her legacy.
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