The Greens are turning up the volume on the Government to let music live in Canberra.

With areas like Garema Place, Lonsdale St and our town centres becoming home to more residents than ever before, low noise limits and out-of-date laws mean Canberra’s live music scene is increasingly under threat.

In our town centres, noise limits are limited to between 50-80 decibels: around the same level of noise as a group conversation.

With more people living in our city and town centres than ever before, live music venues and local businesses could be shut down if there’s noise complaints from new residents.

Entertainment precincts are the answer.

It’s been almost ten years since the Greens first made the case for entertainment precincts in Canberra to make sure Canberra continues to become more vibrant.

Entertainment precincts will help to protect the long-term future of our music and entertainment industry without exposing residents or businesses to unreasonable or unexpected levels of noise.

Entertainment precincts would put the onus on new developments to incorporate extensive noise insulation—not on music venues to turn down their volumes when residential development is built nearby.

For the Greens, we’ve been advocating for entertainment precincts now for almost a decade.

Now we need your help to make it happen.

Today we passed yet another motion in the Assembly calling for entertainment precincts to be put in place in Canberra.

But there’s still more to do. We need to keep the pressure up on Government to make sure that we protect our live music scene and ensure that Canberra doesn’t become a silent city.

Entertainment precincts help to protect the long-term future of the music and entertainment industry without exposing residents or businesses to unreasonable or unexpected levels of noise.

Precinct laws means that the onus is on new developments to incorporate extensive noise insulation—not on music venues to turn down their volumes when residential development is built nearby.

In areas like Fortitude Valley in Brisbane, entertainment precinct laws have helped ensure that these vibrant mixed-use areas work for residents, nightclubs, live music venues, cafes, restaurants, hotels and retail businesses.

Canberra’s music and events culture has evolved organically, with entertainment venues popping up in the city, in town centres and at local shops.

As our city becomes more compact, now is the time to act to realise entertainment precincts, in places like Civic, our major town centres, and around EPIC.

The Government needs to make real headway on the growing need for entertainment precincts and environmental noise dampening. Given the rate of new apartment blocks going up in the Northbourne corridor and in our town centres, this should be a priority.

We are still awaiting the Government’s response to MusicACT’s 2015 Cool Little Capital Action Plan and outcomes from the Urban Sounds discussion paper from 2016, which were both expected by the end of 2017.

The Greens believe we should get started on the community consultation to roll out across the city in places like EPIC, Woden and Belconnen Town Centres, to ensure that we’re supporting our live arts and music scene, and our local residents.