Distribution of Home-Based Work in Cities: Implications for Planning and Policy in the Pandemic Era

Abstract

The rapid growth of home-based work raises questions about its long-term impacts on neighbourhoods and cities. By removing the need to commute, home-based work has the potential to advance the New Urbanism aspirations of walkable neighbourhoods in an urban village format where people live, work and play. Nonetheless, the uneven distribution of this emerging work practice, strongly associated with the socio-economic status of neighbourhoods, is exacerbating the risk of increased urban inequalities. This paper presents pre- and post-COVID data for the City of Gold Coast, Australia, and it discusses the urban distribution of home-based work by analysing the home-based workers’ locational preferences, their daily movement patterns, the preferred built environment outcomes, and the urban design features. The findings suggest that certain social and economic interactions tend to increase with the growth of remote work. These interactions, magnified by the COVID pandemic, offer opportunities to advance the New Urbanism aspirations of cohesive, walkable communities and neighbourhoods.

After the pandemic is before the pandemic: Rethinking urban priorities, assumptions and planning approaches

“…Remote working and online retailing had been growing prior to the pandemic but with an estimated 40 % of jobs being capable of being undertaken wholly and largely remotely the prospect of a permanent shift in working patterns would fundamentally challenge cities. A permanent shift towards greater online working, even if partial, would reduce the demand for public transport, services and retail as well as office and residential space in cities [ 19 , 20 ]. Related consequences of such a change would be on longer term policy positions and trajectories around the aim of addressing climate change through increasing development densities and investing in public transport.…”