DEFINING VACANT
vacant, adjective (EMPTY) (of a place) not being lived in or used: We have three vacant apartments in our building.
vacant, adjective (NOT AWARE) not showing much awareness or interest in the world around you: There was a sad, vacant look in his eyes.
VACANT = not being lived in or used + not showing much awareness or interest in the world around you.
WESTERN AUSTRALIA is often described as the economic engine room of the nation, yet paradoxically its capital city performs among the weakest retail centres in Australia.
Perth is the capital of a state that drives almost half of the country’s export earnings, but its own CBD and key precincts lag behind their eastern-states counterparts on metrics like retail occupancy, foot traffic and commercial vibrancy.
Almost one-fifth of our central urban fabric lies idle, according to recent reports on our two major centres, Perth and Fremantle.
The vacancy numbers are stark; for 2024 the City of Fremantle recorded a reported commercial vacancy rate of 17.7 per cent (likely higher when including partially occupied or concealed vacancies).
Similarly, global commercial real estate advisory CBRE reported that in the first half of 2025 Perth CBD’s retail vacancy measured above 20 per cent, with office vacancy hovering in the high teens. These are extraordinary numbers given the state’s prosperity.
Far from simply being an economic condition, however, this striking vacancy level is also a cultural one.
Vacant spaces tell a greater story of disconnection: between landlords and tenants, between policy and place, between what our cities once were and what they might still become.
Across Australia, empty spaces are mute but powerful evidence that systems underpinning our centres and high streets continue to pull further apart, exposing an ever-widening divide between private interest and public life.
This Churchill Fellowship set out to understand how cities abroad are bridging this gap – places rethinking governance, ownership, and collaboration to keep their centres alive.
Over six weeks, I travelled through Europe, meeting with policy makers, innovators, urban professionals, creatives and advocates to study how different cities are responding to vacancy and how they’re aligning policy with people.
What I found was not a single solution, but a series of interconnected principles which I share throughout this report.
In Paris, the city has taken a direct hand in protecting its social and cultural fabric.
• For more of Ms Booth’s report, head to http://www.fremantleherald.com, and keep your eye out over the next couple of weeks.
by SARAH BOOTH
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