Re-enchanting the industrial in the city

![CDATA[Many subtropical cities have developed around working waterfronts. With post-industrialism, waterfronts have undergone rapid change to become places for recreation and tourism. The tourism and recreational focus has prevented opportunities for innovative ways to maintain working waterfronts relevant to the needs of the 21st century. If subtropical cities are to become resilient, flexible and creative, lessons can be drawn from shrinking cities such as Berlin and Detroit where new ways of working with post-industrial sites are emerging. This paper argues for revaluing marginal lands so transience and the clutter of industry can be seen as part of the fabric of urban life. Many growing cities tend to rely on consumerism and spectacle as the mode of urban change. Although supposedly tempered by Richard Florida’s notion of a ‘creative city’, redevelopments are merely well designed lifestyles. Such approaches do not allow for the changes necessary if energy use and sustainability, including climate change, are to be addressed. In Europe, innovative approaches to urban development are being explored in marginal urban areas under the aegis of EU’s Shrinking Cities Project. As well, what was the plight of abandoned neighbourhoods in Detroit has become an urban model of resilience and autonomy. This presentation looks at re enchanting post industrial sites through poetic ways of creating new industries within the traces of old energy production. It presents two post-industrial proposals in Sydney; one a significant CBD development which has generated much community concern; the other, some re invigorated working bays through innovative re use of a vast post-industrial area.]]