National legislation requires Australian cities to be accessible and inclusive. Focussing on Geelong in Victoria, this paper focuses on how best to theorise those with lived experiences of disability understand Geelong and considers how this city has met this challenge through its various plans.

Over the past few decades, the act of engaging people in achieving sustainable cities has focused upon changing environmental values, predominantly through social networks and, increasingly, social practices. Despite increasingly higher levels of environmental awareness within the community, and reasonably consistent levels of community involvement in voluntary activities, there has been little improvement in the...

Djillong, the place where modern day Geelong stands, has been an urban centre for millennia. At the time of European colonisation, the traditional owners, the Wadawurrung, lived in low-density houses and gardens in settlements as large as most other sedentary communities across the world. Most of their basic needs (food, water, fibre, medicine, etc.) were...

Ongoing economic restructuring has produced many declining rust belt cities and regions. While governments and communities have acted to ease the impacts, most actions have not been effective. Politically the reaction to ongoing high levels of unemployment are now registering across the Western world and drive a reconsideration of what interventions might facilitate socially inclusive...

Business-led city associations and collaborative economic development organisations are an increasingly important player in urban development, particularly where cities are facing economic decline and are seeking economic and social reinvigoration or transformation. The Committee for Geelong (CfG) in Australia is one such entity, an “independent, member-based organisation committed to leading and influencing to achieve our...