Was the Multi-Function Polis a Smart City of the Future?

In the public interest.

The critiques around the Japanese Multi-Function Polis that was proposed for Adelaide provide insights into Smart Cities. See bolded information.

Hawke/Keating Government believed Multi Function Polis needed different name, Cabinet papers reveal

TORY SHEPHERD POLITICAL EDITOR, The AdvertiserJanuary 1, 2014 12:00amSouth Australia’s hi-tech fantasy city – the ill-fated Multi Function Polis – should have been called something else, the Government believed at the time.

The MFP, which then-RSL chief Bruce Ruxton famously referred to as “Jap City”, was to be built near Mawson Lakes and meant to be a futuristic, utopian metropolis built in conjunction with the Japanese Government.

Cabinet records from 1986-87, released today, reveal previously secret information from the Hawke/Keating years.

The background to the MFP project describes it as a “city of the future”, which all states and territories battled to host. It was to be a centre of biotechnology, computer wizardry, education, health and tourism.

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But controversy, secrecy, wasted money and racist fears of an Asian enclave ended the vision. So Adelaide does not have a 2km-high mountain from which spaceships could be launched, but it does have Technology Park, the only legacy of the MFP.

The main proposed site for the MFP is set to become an industrial hub.

The Government of the time could clearly foresee the potential reaction, and warned against it being an “enclave”, instead emphasising the need for a “truly international city”.

According to the documents, they needed an “investigation of a range of urban development options … all of which should assume that the MFP should not be a cultural enclave, but rather should be integrated with the remainder of Australian society”.


“The Minister for Industry, Technology and Commerce (should) also convey to the Japanese Government the Cabinet’s view as to the desirability of choosing an alternative name,” the documents state.

The industry minister at the time was John Button. Bob Hawke was prime minister and Paul Keating the treasurer.

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It was state Liberal Premier John Olsen who eventually announced the dream was over in 1997, saying the MFP would be radically altered to become a more mundane development project. The Advertiser headline at the time read: MFP dies: long live the city.

Other concerns included exposing important Australian industries to Japanese control and “possibly locking Australia into a cargo-cult mentality”, as well as diverting resources from other industries. Cargo cult describes societies that develop myths about more technologically advanced groups, believing they will magically deliver goods.

The Advertiser revealed last week that the Gillman site from the MFP will become a 400ha industrial hub to support the resources industry.

Also in the thousands and thousands of pages of Cabinet documents is discussion about the choice of the Collins Class submarines to be built at Port Adelaide.

The submission points out that the Type 471 subs – which were modified to become the Collins Class – would possibly run into “severe difficulties” but were the best choice at the time.

The Collins Class have had ongoing troubles with costs and maintenance and are set to be replaced. More than two decades ago, the Government was warned of “significant potential for a real cost blowout”.