Housing Industry Transitions: An Urban Living Lab in Melbourne, Australia

Urban housing experiments test real-world applications of sustainable, liveable, affordable and innovative developments. However, there is limited evidence of how they influence the wider building regime through the facilitation of new shared experiences, networks and relations. This paper explores the influence of a government-led demonstration project in Melbourne, Australia. Interviews with 14 key industry stakeholders reveal that, while some innovations had limited impact on practice, others resulted in take-up. The case adds to previous studies on the contested nature of sustainable building experiments and develops empirical insights on how such developments shape and are shaped by industry low carbon transitions